Day 7: The Iguana Outside the Door (written by Grace Bannon)

When I went to open the stall door all I heard were the voices. 

“Watch out for the viper, it’s right outside,” yelled Bryan. 

“Open your door very carefully,” said Sam.

Bonnie added, “open your door slowly there is an iguana outside.”

What am I about to stumble on? “Hmmm should I even open the door then?” I asked the group outside. If this is that venomous snake I’m slamming this door shut!

“Ya just open it slowly so you don’t hit it,” said one of them.

“Okay,” here we go let’s see what this animal is. I opened up the door a crack and was quickly greeted by an iguana (not a venomous, deadly viper snake).

We had just walked in the Parque Nacional Carara for about 3.2 miles. As we walked Chito pointed out the trees and birds we ran across. Once we finished the walk we all rushed into the bus for the AC. The walk was very humid and hot, making all of us want the air conditioning as soon as we got back. 

The bus brought us all back to Punta Leona. When we returned we had one hour of free time until we had to go to lunch at 12. After lunch we all had free time to do our own things for a couple hours.

Bonnie, Sam, and I decided to go to the soda (grocery stores), butterfly garden, and coffee shop. We were scorching as we walked. It was so hot! 

Bonnie said, “I’m too hot for this,” and “we need to find the grocery store soon, I’m too hot to keep going.” About 10 minutes later, dripping in sweat, we found the store. Once we entered, we went to the frozen area, opened the coolers, and stuck our heads into them. 

“OOOOHHH, this feels so nice,” commented Sam. 

“Is this crazy of us to do,” I asked. They definitely know we are Americas doing this. We all decided to get electrolyte drinks since we had been sweating so much already. After the store we walked across the street to go get coffee. 

“Is this place even open,” I asked as we got to the coffee shop by the butterfly garden. The coffee shop was a little room with no lights and a closed door.

“Umm, I think it’s locked,” said Sam. 

We tried to open the door and it would not budge. That alone should have told us that the coffee shop was not open but we tried to open it a second time. That’s such an annoyance because I really wanted to get coffee right now.

“Okay let’s just go to the butterfly garden I guess,” I said to them after we couldn’t open the door. 

We walked around the butterfly garden for a while and saw endless colorful butterflies. Some of them had blue, yellow, orange, and black wings. One butterfly blended into the sticks so we could not see it until it moved away. 

“Owwww,” said Bonnie suddenly. 

“Are you okay,” I asked. “What even just happened?”

“I just got bit by those ants that bite,” replied Bonnie. 

We got bit a few more times and then decided that we needed to leave and go to the pool to cool down. We stayed in the pool for a couple hours before we left for a volleyball game. We did 5v5 with two workers, one on each team. My team, Bryan, Mia, Cailin, one of the workers, and I beat the other team 3 times in a row. We all laughed, taunted, fell, dove, and had fun. Once the better team, my team, won 3 games, we all left to go to the white sand beach. 

Almon, our driver, drove us down to the beach for sunset. Once we arrived we all ran to put our stuff down and jump into the water. We all dove into, yelling “under or over” for all of the huge waves. Mia and I were both rocked by a wave when we were trying to get into the ocean. We swam, body surfed, and watched the sun go to bed. 

Seeing the sunsets the last couple of nights have been the dream ending to our days. The sunsets have been so calming to watch in the water. Ending our days in the sun, sand, and water has been the best. Our days in Costa Rica have been so packed with activities that the quieter, calmer, slower endings of the days has been the best way to end the evenings.