Rincon de le Vieja

So, I hiked a volcano this weekend! One of the physically hardest, yet most rewarding experiences here in Costa Rica, and really anywhere actually. I left with my two roomates on Friday afternoon, Laura and Alyssia (she's from Switzerland). We took a bus into Liberia, which is about 4 1/2 hours from San Jose, spent the night in a hostel and took a shuttle to the National Park at 7 am the following morning. You have to pay $10 at the main office when entering the park, and they take down your passport information and tell you to return to the office when you return to make sure you are not lost somewhere. When we left the office, they said 'Buena Suerte' aka Good luck. Our 8 km (almost 5 miles) up hill hike began in tropical moist forest, climbing past trees covered with epiphytic vegetation which got lower and lower to the ground in the harsher climate as we ascended. The first 4 km were pretty easy, it was hot so we were definetely tired, but nothing too strenuous.

The next 2 were harder, climbing through muddy steep areas with dense vegetation. 

The final ascent was on over exposed lava rock, and it looked like we were on Saturn, or some other planet with orangey red air filled rocks.

It was difficult climbing here because it was really steep and the volcanic rocks were airy and not reliable to grab onto to pull ourselves up with. Finally after this climb, we reached an open area where we took a break for lunch. We sat in this open area, surrounded by clouds so we couldn't see more than 100 meters around us for a while, and couldn't hear a sound, it was very meditative. After our short break, we continued, unsure of where the crater of the volcano actually was. We soon found a sign, and a very long, narrow path which led to the crater.

Once through the scene from the lord of the rings, we came to this on our left...

And this on the right..

So, of course the climb was totally worth it. At this point we had to turn around and start the trek back down because it had taken us almost 4 hours to hike up. We got a little lost, thankfully we had Alyssia, who guided us back down through rivers, steep ascends and descends and tons of beautiful flora and fauna. 
That night we took a bus to Playa de Coco. We wandered into town looking for a hostel and came across this little Tica woman who offered us her home for the night. She had an extra room that she rented out to travelers for $8 a night. It had a kitchen but the gas was off because she had been gone for a few weeks, so she welcomed us into her home and helped us cook and let us use her pots and pans and whatever else we needed. The next day we went to the beach for a while, I got far too much color, and even though we had to check out of her room at 12, Olga allowed us to come back into her home to shower and make lunch. It's so refreshing to meet kind people like her and open their homes to travelers for of course a little bit of money, but also just out of the kindness of their hearts.