Sloths, Spider Monkeys and Samara

January 25^th-26^th, 2015

As we left Bob’s kite surfing farm, we were immediately on a mission: Pat wanted to see a sloth.  They had heard from another kite surfing couple from Calgary, Holly and Roger, that there was a nature resort just north of La Cruz called Cañas Castilla.  It’s run by a Swiss family and the lady was quite accommodating in allowing us to hike one of her trails for a small tip.  We meandered along the 2-3 kilometre path but no monkeys were to be found, just a variety of trees and bushes, a very strange sounding bird and an amazing red ant set of highways which we had to tiptoe through in order not to get any bites.

This was a crazy pompous turkey who kept strutting his stuff:

A rather large dog:

Off we go:

Back at the buildings of the resort the lady pointed out some spider monkeys in a tree.  Bingo!  Pat had achieved one of his goals.  I had never seen spider monkeys in a natural setting before.  I’ve seen macaques, langurs and howlers but not the smooth swinging spider monkey.  The woman then took us to this small enclosure where she had a 6 month old light brown coloured sloth.  He had been abandoned by his mother, probably after falling out of a tree so he was being taken care of by the Swiss family.  Talk about super cute.  We were able to get within a foot of him as he chomped down on a bright red flower that the lady gave him.  He was a like a living teddy bear and I just wanted to cuddle him but I refrained.  She then led us to a tree by the small river where a mother sloth was asleep near the top with her baby in her arms.  It really just looked like a ball of fur but with Pat’s kickass camera we could make out how the sloth was resting and even see its coarse whitish grey fur.  And lastly we checked out the crocodile that was basking in the sun on some rocks in the middle of the river.  I thought it was apropos that I gave the lady a 5000 Colones bill ($10) for a tip which has a picture of a monkey on it.

The adorable baby sloth:

Mr. Crocodile:

We got back on the road and headed south towards Liberia.  We skirted around the side of the second largest city in Costa Rica and passed by the airport that members of my family had used to return after our Christmas holidays.  Driving into the Nicoya Peninsula the road began to wind up and down through hilly terrain which was quite beautiful.  Reaching the cute little seaside town of Samara, we ventured onto the beach but the three o’clock sun was still quite toasty so we took the most sensible course of action and sought the refuge of  a cold beer at a beach restaurant before attempting to find accommodation.  I found a room in Mitadori hostel while Pat and Danielle got a private room in a hotel/restaurant near the beach.  We enjoyed sunset and a lovely pizza dinner before calling it a night.

Cheers!

The next day Pat and Danielle went snorkelling while I wandered along some rocks at the end of the beach and watched about 18 turkey vultures taking turns pecking at three carcasses of fish, two of which were my favourite parrot fish.  I had a quick dip in the ocean and met up with them later on for a relaxed afternoon.

Samara Beach:

My good friend Tony, this one's for you...a convertible, well converted, Toyota Tercel station wagon.  What a sweet looking ride.  Just behind the driver's seat you may see a bar that was added to keep some structural integrity...hilarious.  I saw the guy driving it around the next day and he was waving to all the locals...a popular guy in town I'm sure.

You're so beautiful...

The following morning we drove four kilometres south of Samara to Playa Carrillo which was stunning and had no restaurants or hotels cluttering its pristine beaches.  We returned to Samara, checked out and got on the road to head north to the surf town of Nosara.

The lovely Playa Carrillo:

Danielle enjoying the view: