Saturday Morning in Monteverde
It's early Saturday morning in Santa Elena. The local farmers market is in full force. I'd normally be there early in order to get first pick of the organic veggies. The local kids race about all through the marketplace. This morning I'm just kicking back at the house drinking coffee and making this journal entry. A bit later I'm planning on taking a yoga class and then probably going to play Ultimate Frisbee down at the school.
If you're ever around on a Saturday, come visit the local schoolhouse and play Frisbee with us. The real young kids just climb about on the playground while the older kids and the adults play frisbee. It's a great way to get to know the community. Families come from different aspects of the community: hippies, Quakers, businessmen, students, biologists. It's always fun, and it keeps us in shape.
I have some friends from California here visiting. They're due to arrive on the morning bus, so they'll miss the game, but I have an exciting plan for them when they arrive. After dropping their luggage off at my place, I'll take them for a hike into the cloud forest. I know of some hikes through here, ones that only the locals know about.
Then, I am taking them on a zipline tour. I used to be a freelance guide for a couple of the local zipline companies, and I can think of no better way to show my friends the cloud forest. Seeing the forest from above, and having the freedom to soar over and through the canopy, was an experience that changed my life forever.. and is what has led me to live here.
To me there is something so primitive about being up so high in the trees. An instinctual fear arises at this height. These ancient trees are huge. The cloud forest is at 5000 feet.. From here the clouds race by and give you fleeting views of the pacific and of the lowland farms along the coast.
You connect to cables from a pulley and harness, and swoop across from tree platform to tree platform, and you're standing in a tropical setting, jungle moss curtains all around, small creeks running below, and tropical birds zipping in and out of view. From miles away you can hear the daunting calls of Congo monkeys.
At the next platform you might see that each tree limb at this altitude has a great quantity of life upon it's surface. Practically microscopic orchids cover large swaths of branches, and carpet vegetation create a perfect substrate for endless bromedliads, each forming a natural pitcher of dew drops, many of which provide shelter and protection for growing tadpoles.
The cloud forest is a magic place. Darkness and Light merge into a something similar to an underwater seascape. Its as if you are floating across an ocean of jungle at incredible speed, stopping at each platform to explore the endless lifescape of each parcel of jungle.. Each branch is brimming with life. Army ants, Stingless wasps, vicious toucans raid nests of blue warblers. The cloud forest offers much to be discovered.