Lava rocks!

Sunset
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We were taken by minibus from Puerto Viejo de Sarapiqui down to La Fortuna, in the proximity of Lake & Volcan Arenal. We had a couple of days to spend in La Fortuna. Bar one afternoon/evening which I'll talk about below, I was really very lazy & spent a lot of time pottering, grockling & Interneting!

So, the one busy day... We'd all booked a trip to go & see Volcan Arenal - a live volcano which supposedly has an average of 80 eruptions per day. Because of its active nature, you aren't actually allowed to get too close to the volcano, but instead have to view it from one of the many lookout point located around its edge. Historically not even all of these are 100% safe, but still safer than actually climbing the volcano, which is what the Japanese mother in our tour group wanted to do. She kept asking our guide "exactly HOW illegal is it to climb the volcano?" etc. etc. He he he. Like a naughty schoolgirl. Her daughter told us that she was going to take out life insurance on her Mum because she was "wrong in the head"!!!

Volcan Arenal
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So, anyway, I digress... We patiently waited at the lookout spot, hoping to see molten lava spewing down the side of the volcano. Instead what we saw was a bit of a spit & a trickle of lava that lasted for all of about 5 seconds. Woohoohoo. Needless to say, it wasn't all that easy to capture on camera, so I bought a postcard to show what it's supposed to look like instead!

After spending a while waiting at the lookout spot we decided to give up & head on to Baldi Hot Springs - 10 hot pools with different temperatures fed by individual springs, 2 of which had swim-up bars which we took good advantage of. It felt very decadent as a backpacker to be sitting in gorgeously warm big baths of water whilst drinking pina coladas :o)

Whilst in La Fortuna I managed to take a tumble in the street so my left leg is now not only black & blue from my fall in Rara Avis, but also covered in cuts & grazes. Soooooooooo attractive!