The last time we were in Costa Rica for 3 months we visited Arenal. Arenal is a volcano surrounded by lush forests and all sorts of animals we don’t see around Coco. During THIS visit to Costa Rica we had the choice of going back to Arenal OR visiting Monteverde, a region of Costa Rica near Santa Elena, most known its cloud forests. A cloud forest is a tropical forest with low cloud cover and a moist environment. In Santa Elena there are multiple forests, some of which are called transition forests because they are between the cloud (damp) climate and the dryer climate.

After a bit of research to learn about what we might see in Monteverde, the family opted to visit there rather than Arenal again. We found the perfect place to stay, Valle Escondido. This “hotel” practices Permaculture which is essentially caring for and cultivating the land as naturally as possible, allowing for native plants/animals/water to exist, and using that natural development to co-exist. At Valle Escondido they collect rainwater for showering and washing laundry, and they use solar panels for  electricity. Another reason we selected Valle Escondido was the view and on-premise hiking trails.

The last thing we did before leaving Coco was booking two tours with Three Brothers Tours. More on them later…

We set off on Monday the 19th of February with the 3.5hr car ride ahead of us. We heard before leaving that the ride was going to be interesting – meaning a whole lot of cliffs, narrow roads, and little paving. If I thought Arenal was bad, this was worse.

The views were breathtaking, but I didn’t get to enjoy them. When we finally arrived at Valle Escondido and I let go of the wheel, my fingers were white from gripping so hard. It’s one thing to drive a dangerous road and experience the “thrill”, but it is a whole other thing to realize that your entire family’s lives are in your hands.

Regardless, we arrived safe and sound. Monteverde was notably cooler than Coco. Because of the cloud forest conditions it is more noticeably damp, and the temperatures were around 60 degrees on average each day. At night we were in the 50’s!

Due to a booking issue, Valle Escondido didn’t have us arriving until Tuesday. They realized it was an issue on their side and put us up at a place right around the corner: the Monteverde Country Lodge. We appreciated the gesture and, although we did have an ok place to stay, the Monteverde Country Lodge does not have any grounds to hike, their walls are only particle board (which means you can hear EVERYTHING happening around you in other rooms), and the restaurant was just average.

Our first night there allowed Noah and Ken to take their first night walk at Valle Escondido. I stayed behind, drained from my drive. While they saw agouti and tarantula, I watched my first episode of Jeopardy in months… we all enjoyed our first night in Monteverde.

Tuesday morning we visited the Orchid Cafe for breakfast. I enjoyed a traditional Tico Coffee with my eggs benedict, and Ken ordered three different plates of food. This was one of the best meals we had!

Once finished with breakfast, we packed up our room at the Country Lodge and headed over to Valle Escondido. We hiked around the property, with Ken and Noah showing me where they saw all the spiders the night before, and ended our walk with lunch at the restaurant on the property: Cafe Escondido. They made Aztec Soup and empanadas to die for! I ate these almost every meal.

Once we checked in and scoped out our surroundings, we decided to keep our afternoon light because that evening we had our first night walk with Three Brothers Tours.

Mauricio, one of the brothers, picked us up at our hotel. We went to Santa Elena Reserve and were off on our night walk. Mauricio quickly learned that Noah was not a normal 6 year old. When asked what he wanted to see on the walk, Noah replied, “Anoles, katydids, and sleeping blue-crowned mot mots, not turquoise-browed mot mots because those are only in Coco.” Mauricio looked at Ken and me. We just shrugged. We didn’t have to explain that Noah knew more than us about the animals we would see, it was clear. So we set off, Mauricio in the lead followed closely by a chatting Noah.

I can’t express enough how wonderful our guide was. Mauricio was patient, answered all of Noah’s questions, and by the end he had turned the hike into a game of points, questioning Noah and challenging him to spot new things.  On this hike we learned about click beetles, saw a side striped palm pit viper, and watched a sloth (who had fallen out of a tree) climb quickly to safety.

The next morning we woke early to visit the Curi Cancha Reserve, a transitional forest known for their Resplendent Quetzals. This bird is the main reason we came to Monteverde in the first place. We thought we’d be able to find one on our own while hiking this reserve.

We were very wrong. Not only was it drizzling (and we didn’t bring our ponchos), but we had no idea where the Quetzals were, what types of trees we were looking at, or what birds were making the different calls/sounds we were hearing. We enjoyed our morning hike and we did see some birds, but we knew that our Thursday morning tour with Three Brothers was our best chance at spotting the Quetzal.

Wednesday afternoon, after striking out at Curi Cancha, we went to a frog center in town. Noah was unlucky in his search for amphibians in Monteverde because, despite it being a cloud forest, it is the dry season. This means that although it is cooler and more damp than Playas del Coco, it is dry by Monteverde standards and therefore limited in the amphibian department. It was cool to see the frogs, but seeing them in their glass enclosures isn’t as exciting as seeing them in the wild.

When we left the frog center, and were on our way to lunch, Ken looked up places that Noah would have the best chance of seeing frogs. He signed them up for a night walk at the Cloud Forest Reserve. Only 15 min away from our hotel, the Cloud Forest Reserve was not a transitional forest, but rather a full on cloud forest. This means that it is significantly more damp than where we were staying and the other reserves we visited. I opted to stay behind again, because although my ankle has healed, all the hiking had taken its toll. I also knew that I wanted to be ready for our bird tour at Curi Cancha.

Ken and Noah came back from their Cloud Forest hike ecstatic. Noah had seen his frogs! And after dinner, he CAUGHT two frogs on our property: a leopard frog and a cane toad! He went to bed one happy kid, for sure.

Thursday morning we woke up early and met Elberth, the second of the Three Brothers, at Curi Cancha. Much like Mauricio, he noticed right away who he was dealing with when it came to Noah. He was just as patient as his brother, and he began educating us on our surroundings immediately. He told us about the Quetzals and how they used to be found all the way in Mexico and Guatemala, but because of their beautiful feathers, they were hunted and killed. A lot of the headdresses and jewelry made from their feathers can be seen on display in museums and palaces around the world.  Quetzals are so prized that the Guatemalan currency is called the Quetzal, and most of the bills have a picture of the bird.

With us on the tour were two men from Zurich, Switzerland. They had been traveling around Costa Rica for three weeks, and Monteverde was their second to last stop. We had fun hiking around and chatting with some new friends, but we were all there for the same reason: the Quetzal.

Early on in our walk we spotted a turkey, but we really got excited when we spotted a female Quetzal.

We spent about 15 minutes just watching her eat and fly from tree to tree. While we were excited, we knew the male was really the one to spot, so we moved on.  After only 5 min of walking, Elberth received a call on his phone (they use Whatsapp to communicate rather than walkie-talkies so they don’t distract the birds). A male Quetzal was in the same tree we just left! Elberth checked that we were ok to turn around, but half of our group (Noah and the two men from Zurich) were already headed back! We found the male and he was one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen in nature.

We spent over 45 minutes watching him, showing others who wandered up where he was, and learning all we could from Elberth. We had found our Quetzal. The bird that brings thousands of people to Monteverde each year but rare and endangered, so few ever see one.

When we finally all agreed to move on, I don’t want to say the rest of the tour went downhill, but we all felt complete. What more did we need? We did watch the hummingbirds for a time, and we did spot a blue-crowned mot mot, but after the Quetzal he was all we could talk about.

The tour with Elberth ended, and we wound up purchasing the same bird guidebook he uses from the Curi Cancha shop. He agreed that an avid animal lover like Noah could really use the excellent book!

It was right before our 11am check out, and we packed up our room, said our goodbyes to Valle Escondido, and made our way into the city center of Santa Elena. We walked along the main street, wandered in and out of shops, and eventually stopped for lunch at the Tree House Restaurante. Full, tired, and happy, we got back into the car for the drive home. I wasn’t looking forward to going back down the way we came up, but with no other choice I gripped the wheel and headed out.

We arrived back in Playas del Coco around 5pm on Thursday. To go from hiking in a transitional forest of 60 degrees, to the blaring sun of Coco at 95 degrees in one day shows just how much Costa Rica truly has to offer. We were happy to be back in the sun and have the beach steps away, but the hikes in the cooler weather were a great reprieve.

That morning, as we began our hike in Curi Cancha, Elberth had asked Ken and I something about Noah. He said, “Do you think he knows how lucky he is?” Ken and I laughed and said, “We think so.” To be honest, Noah’s gotten so used to seeing so many new and exciting things that now this just seems like life. I mean, when your kid says something like “I’ve seen that monkey a million times,” maybe he is a bit desensitized. But I think once we get home and he’s back to “normal” life, he will realize how special this time in Costa Rica really was. And if he doesn’t remember, we have this blog and hundreds of pictures to remind him.

In all fairness we’re all lucky, Ken, Noah, and I. This time together as a family, in an amazing country, seeing things I never even knew existed… makes us some of the luckiest people in the world.