Plentitude!

Buenos Tardes, family and friends!

Breakfast this morning was interrupted by our driver (gotta love having a driver!) early arrival to take us to our ATVs for a tour of the Arenal waterfall. Bumpy roads, traffic (in the form of cars, SUVs, horses, cows, et al) is old hat for us, and we´re pros on the ATV. The jungle around the falls was green, green, and we saw our first toucans. And our guide took us to the Arenal river where he told us about the big volcano eruption in the late 60´s. We compared notes with the St Helens erruption in 1980, and had a really fun time.

But the big adventure of the day belonged to us as we tried the ziplines through the jungle canopy. Stapped in and safety lined, we zipped and zoomed from treetop to tree top between high platforms hundreds of feet off the ground. It simply moved too fast for us to be afraid of the heights or the speed-- but only just. A fun Flemish group, plus some Spaniards shared the experience with us. Halfway through the platforms, we paused for the optional Tarzan swing. All the women in the group raised their hands, among them, me!! Nearly all the guys volunteered to take pictures. I was fourth up. Strapped in, they opened the gate before me and I dropped a good 20 feet before I swung out wide and far, screaming bloody murder the whole entire way. Everyone was laughing at my screeching, including me, and the whole thing was caught on video. Priceless.

Our taxi driver to this evening´s internet cafe plus dinner (internet was down at the hotel, because internet goes down when it rains....) was a driver by trade but a philosopher at heart. He stopped the cab to give us advice-- don´t use bad words, be honest at all times, and seek out plentitude in all that you do. We thought it was a magnificent thought for our last night in Arenal :-)

Love T