Lost and Found - An adventure in Panama

You know you’ve found somewhere pretty special if you have 24-bed dorms, require a complicated bus route to reach you, followed by a 20 minute uphill jungle hike with giant backpacks, and you’re still able to be fully-booked and have to turn people away. Let me introduce you to Lost and Found-Panama’s infamous jungle hostel!

The offending triple-decker bunk-bed. We were at the top...oh joy.

 To get there from Corcovado we had to take a boat, then 5 buses, including one terribly chaotic border crossing. The border crossing itself was quite hilarious (although perhaps more in retrospect than at the time)…We had to queue up 4 times, the officials were wearing what looked like home-made polo shirts (the kind you get for a hen do), and then no-one actually checked our passports when it came to entering Panama to the point that we didn’t realise we were in it until a friendly American pointed this out to us. Perhaps my favourite bit?....you have to pay an exit fee to leave CR, and this involved giving your passport to a woman (in another polo shirt) through the window of a camper van (yes a free-standing camper van!!), where she enters your details into an oldschool laptop on a car seat and a child (yes a child!) eating a kebab hands you a receipt.

Like, sooo official!

Anyway, we made it through, and finally made it to Lost and Found after a whole day of travelling.

Lost and Found is actually a pretty crap hostel-it has ridiculously overcrowded dorms and we were in the top of a triple-decker bunk bed (yes that is actually a (rather petrifying) thing), it has a horrible dirty kitchen, and pretty gross toilets….but it’s in an incredible setting, has a resident rescued honey bear (a kinkajou) and has an awesome bar with and equally awesome happy hour (hello $1 beer!). It also has a really sociable vibe, and attracts the kind of people who are willing to put in the effort to get to such a tricky place in the jungle, so we ended up having a fab few days here with some great people!

On the first day it was really rainy so we decided to do some jungle trails and simultaneously the famous Lost and Found treasure hunt with some other guys we’d just met. It was great fun and had us trekking through jungle, wading through rivers, exploring caves and figuring out cryptic clues…needless to say we’re too competitive to fail at something like this so we managed to complete the hunt and earn ourselves some free drinks which led to a rather messy but insanely fun night in the bar, where we managed to convince the entire bar to play a giant game of spoons (or ‘empty cans’ in the absence of spoons).

Some (rather wet) photos taken on my smashed up samsung...they give you the idea anyway!...

This tree is sooooo cool!

Figuring out the riddle for our free drinks!

On the second day, nursing the mother of all hangovers, we decided to catch a local bus to some canyon river rapids near the small town of Gualaca. I won’t go into the details, but hangover + car sickness + hot, overcrowded bus = one very sick Emma, stopping the bus twice and being sick into a (very holey!!) carrier bag in front of the entire bus…it was not one of my proudest moments, but I’m sure will be funny when I look back on it….one day.

 The canyons were amazing though! Beautiful blue skies, crystal clear, cool water and some wicked canyons to jump in from, and once again a great group of people to hang out with…perfect!

Cup of tea and a view!

The view from the hostel

Ribbit!

So I think this is the first time I’ve written two blog posts for one day, but these little guys had to have a post all to themselves!!

We wanted to make the most out of being in such an incredible place, so we signed up to a night walk and it did not disappoint….Atypically we had an arse of a guide who despite earning a small fortune to take the 5 of us on our 2 hour night walk, made out like we were the most irritating blemish on his evening imaginable. That said, he did find us some pretty cool frogs!

I’ll let the pictures do the talking, and I hope you enjoy these little dudes as much as we did...

Yello flecked glass frog (Cochranella albomaculata if you're interested)

Poison dart frog (Dendrobates granuliferus)

Red eyed tree frogs (Agalychnis callidryas)...getting cosy...(the man is on the back)

Black and green poison dart frog ( Dendrobates auratus)

Glass frog eggs-how cool are these?!! You can even see the little tadpoles developing inside, and there's some lovely refraction going on...like a science lesson in a photo!

Corcovado National Park

It’s not every day you get to visit somewhere pegged by National Geographic (and then shamelessly quoted by the Loney Planet) as ‘The most Biologically Intense Place on Earth’. We were lucky enough to visit the quite simply mind-blowing Corcovado National Park for the first three days of our Christmas adventure.

It’s not the easiest place to get to-it’s stuck out on a peninsula on the Southern Pacific Coast and is usually overlooked by tourists as it is simply too tricky to get to within normal holiday timeframes. We have the luxury of time, so we decided this was one we couldn’t miss.

To get there you need to get to Palma Norte by bus, then take an over-flowing local bus to Sierpe, then pick up a speed boat ride to Drake Bay. It was a long day! Our boat left at 4pm and took just over an hour, zooming through pretty awesome mangroves (I never get bored of mangroves!), then skirting the coastline. It being 4pm, we had the wonderful bonus that it you spend the last 20 minutes of the trip basking in light of a spectacular Sun set…We kind of had the feeling this was going to be a good trip!

We had two days in Drake Bay so on the first we took ourselves for a hike along the coastal walk. Now I know I have a habit in waxing lyrical about the places we visit, but my god this walk blew me away! In fact, dare I say it, I think this walk even trumped the incredible Abel Tasman walk we did back in March….and that’s saying something! It is basically a two and a half-hour walk along the coast and back, passing incredibly picturesque and deserted beach after incredibly picturesque and deserted beach. The forest leads right up to the shore so each beach is a palm-fringed beauty! To add to our pleasure, the walk was literally riddled with wildlife!...Toucans, white-faced capuchins, scarlet macaws, incredible birds of prey, oodles of insects, howler monkeys, lizards, turkeys…..you get the idea! The walk was supposed to be 2.5 hours each way but it took us 8 hours as we had to stop every 5 minutes!!! Simply beautiful!

Not a bad spot for a coffee!

Heron on the beach

Scarlet Macaw

On our second day we paid a small fortune to take a boat and a compulsory nature guide on a hike in the actual National Park. Corcovado National Park is 424 square kilometres in area and is the largest NP in Costa Rica. It was set up in 1975 and has been left mostly untouched since….hence it has an absolute ton of animals, some of which are extremely rare. The headliner is the tapier as there are only 1500 of that particular species left in the wild….and many of them are found in the park.

Peak-a-boo!

The boat ride itself is spectacular-an hour-long ride hugging the coastline, and that entire stretch of lush jungle we passed between Drake Bay and the station was National Park. And here’s the best bit…apparently the rules are so tight that no-one is allowed to set foot there, on the beaches or jungle (I guess unless you’re a park ranger). How refreshing! It’s not often you get to see that much untouched rainforest. Throw in a brief turtle spot and a couple of friendly dolphins passing by, our first Brown-Footed Boobies, wind in your hair and sun on your face, and you can actually feel your soul being soothed. It certainly did a little to undo my current feeling that the condition of the world is in a rapidly downward spiral.

We had a wonderful day in the park. It did feel a little overly organised after our many other exploits in the jungle-you arrive with about 60 other people and then spend the morning trailing a guide and passing other groups also trailing their guides down well-worn tracks. However, while this takes away a little of the lost-in-the-jungle magic that we love so much, it does mean that you see heaps of wildlife as the guides tip each other off, and I’d rather there was one little area of well-walked jungle which is funding the protection of the rest of it, than people being let loose all over the forest.

All in all a rather marvellous weekend!

Spider monkey

Squirrel monkey

Shhhh...a very sleepy, very large tapier!!

Adios Cloudbridge…until next year!

Well this must count as one of the quickest 5 weeks ever-we feel like we’ve only just arrived at Cloudbridge, and here we are saying goodbye! I think it’s a sign we’ve enjoyed ourselves, and we have certainly felt very much at home.

We feel pretty exhausted at the end of our stay, but definitely in a satisfied, feeling-of-accomplishment kind of way…I think you might say we’ve thrown ourselves into it-we’ve not really had a spare minute!...I’ve learnt how to use saws without losing my fingers, how to construct a wall, how to mix cement, and how to plaster a wall….I’ve spent hours chopping wood, nailing wood, screwing wood, cursing wood, and admiring wood…I’ve stapled chicken wire until I have so many holes in my fingers they feel like a colander…I’ve gone on night hikes in the rain in the hunt of frogs, and I’ve weeded saplings, I’ve looked up 260 species names for birds and planned another crowd-funder…I’ve planned a week-long vegetarian menu for feeding 20 kids…I’ve learnt how to make my own bread, but learnt absolutely no Spanish (lo lamento Chicos), and I’ve loved every minute of it! I am gona have a kickass CV by the time I get home!

We’ve had the absolute pleasure to work (and live!) with some simply wonderful human beings during our stay here…some of the most hard-working, passionate and dedicated people I’ve ever met, and I feel proud to know and work with. Between us we have built a dorm (almost) in under 6 weeks, and somehow managed not to kill each other.

In fact, we’ve loved our stay here so much that we’ve decided to come back in January! Tom (clearly having not identified which of our weekly Pot Luck dishes were Brodie and Emma creations), perhaps naively asked if we’d come back for a bonus week to help Anna and Alan cater for a group of 20 vegetarian school kids...and we (perhaps naively) said yes!!! So rather than say goodbye, we simply gave everyone a big Xmas hug, wished them Feliz Navidad, and bade them adios until January when we shall be returning with bells on! Those kids don’t know what they’re in for!!!! (...and I guess maybe we don’t either!!)

Gavilán

We only work weekdays at Cloudbridge, so weekends are free to explore!

Last weekend, Genevieve, the owner and founder of Cloudbridge very kindly offered us to spend a few nights in Gavilán, a rustic (think dead flies, mouse poop, cold water and candle light), but very appealing little hut, found deep into the Cloudbridge Nature Reserve….and up a VERY steep hill. 

Not bad to wake up to!

The thing with steep hills is that they often have beautiful views, and this one is possibly one of my favourite views I’ve ever encountered…sweeping vistas of the valley, a glimpse of the Cloudbridge waterfall, tree-ridden hillsides and the majestic Mount Uran (one of Chirripo’s slightly smaller sisters) towering over it all! And if that wasn’t enough, there’s a giant porterweed (Staphytarpheta frantzii apparently) bush right in front of the veranda for you to while away the hours watching hummingbirds do their thing (Nb. their thing is to drink nectar and chase each other). This place is just magical.

Bro and I stayed here two nights, tucked away in our jungle paradise. In the mornings, we sat and watched the view and the hummingbirds, during the day we trekked the beautiful route to Victor Falls at the far end of the reserve, Bro taking footage for the crowd-funding project we’re setting up (watch this space!...), and during the evening we read, played cards and drank wine. Much as we’re loving Cloudbridge, we’ve been so busy here that sometimes it’s nice to escape, and just reconnect with the world.

Chilling on thebalcony

Tired after a busy week (I fell asleep on the bed)

The view from the path

Our lovely cabin

Victor Falls at the furthest end of the park...isn't she a beaut!