Our adventures today were in a lower key. We went with Frank and Cindy on the Community, Culture, and Conservation tour. We were the only four in the group for the day. Our guide Greg was a transplant from Oregon. He had lived in Costa Rica for over fifteen years. Our driver’s name was Adonai.
Our first stop was the AMURECI women’s cooperative. A central group of eight or so women from the surrounding area worked in their shop, oftentimes with volunteers, to make recycled paper products. Their focus was twofold – to provide a source of income for women who might not have other means of support and to encourage recycling in the community.
Marta was one of the founders, and spoke slowly enough that I convinced myself that I understood her, or at least the main thrust of what she was saying. As is customary, we were treated to coffee and cookies. She invited Cindy and Mere to help her make a couple of sheets of paper, and all of us, Frank and I included, decorated picture frames. We got about $40 in souvenirs from the gift shop in addition to the frames and paper they let us take with us.
Our next stop was an animal conservatory, much like the sloth sanctuary we visited about a week prior. The guide there introduced us to Perla, a warthog that could not be re-released into the wild. She had hair as stiff and thick as pine straw. Her main defense mechanism, or method of attracting mates was a gland on her back that shot out some of the grossest smelling liquid you’d ever have inhaled. It smelled like concentrated liquid B. O.
There were also large, orange spider monkeys on the premises, small caiman, and many varieties of birds. We saw a pelican and a strange type of duck that perches in trees. Greg found a colony of termites and offered some to eat. The very small bug has a strong flavor of carrots, and apparently is extremely high in protein. I’ll keep that in mind if I should run out of granola bars on a long hike.
Our guide at the conservatory offered us all a drink made with allspice that tasted like kool-aid. At the time, I thought about how it was probably prepared with the local water, but I didn’t want to seem rude and turn it down. It did taste quite good.
Our last stop was a farm run by New Chapter, a natural products company, and overseen by Steve, an old hippie from California. We started out with an excellent, gourmet-quality lunch. Part of the purpose of the farm was to be a seed conservatory, in case some of the tropical plants and herbs should ever disappear in the wild. He led us through the garden, occasionally offering us an herb to eat. One offering was of “jackass” bitters, which some locals eat for reasons I’ll never understand. It left the absolutely worst taste in our mouths – we should have followed Greg’s lead and turned away.
We didn’t have water available, and it took a while and a lot of other herbs to get that awful flavor out of our mouths. The wide variety of herbs and their common uses was interesting, but after about an hour and a half in the garden we were ready to head back for a nap. On the way back, Mere and Cindy started to feel some intestinal discomfort, and I wasn’t feeling a hundred percent.
I was expecting a full on case of traveler’s diarrhea, or whatever the colorful local term for it might be. Once back at the hotel, I ventured to the Super Cristian #1 to get some supplies should the worst occur. Thankfully, nothing serious ever materialized for either of us.
We went with the group that evening to a pretty good restaurant. Anthony, Melissa, Mere, and I shared a pitcher of sangria. I had a yellowfin tuna steak sandwich with yucca, a local plant that is becoming popular as a side dish. It had the texture and taste of a potato, with a little more natural flavor. We even had a brownie a la mode for dessert. It was one of the best meals we had in the country.
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