It wasn’t raining this morning.  I was so glad to see the sun shining again.  After breakfast, we left to head to the mountains and overnight in a lodge deep in one of the valleys.  On the way, we stopped at a MaxiPali which is a supermarket chain in the country.  The store sells everything from fresh cutup chicken to TVs, to clothes and undergarments.  A few people made purchases and then it was back on the bus. 
Our next stop was at Hacienda Barú National Wildlife Refuge.  The group split into two again.  Mom was in the big group that chose to hear a lecture on how the refuge came into existence.  I was with the walking tour lead by Javier.  The other hikers were Margaret, Andy, Rachel, Wendy, Yael, Laura and Jeff.  Yael must have been very warm before we even started the walk.  She borrowed a pair of scissors from the owner and redesigned her shirt. Gone were the sleeves and the collar and now the shirt had slits up the sides.  The walk started with seeing a large beetle, about the size of an egg, on a tree.  Other things viewed were a peccary (it ran so fast my picture was blurry), a walking stick bug, a gouti, butterflies, and leaf cutter ants working on their mound.  The best part of the walk was watching the white-faced Capuchin monkeys.  The troupe was on the move.  There must have been about twenty of them.  Two of the monkeys were carrying babies on their backs.  A couple of them stopped to look at us.  It was a good walk except for the mud.  There were a couple of places so bad that our feet started to sink.  Margaret’s shoes sank so deep that even the top of her shoes was covered in mud.  We were headed to the beach but had to turn back because of it.  I was a little disappointed in this. 

Back on the bus, we headed to lunch at a “Soda” which is a small restaurant on the side of the road.  The food was pretty good but the view from the outside eating area was spectacular.  It overlooked the valley below.  My picture does not do it justice. 
After lunch, more travel.  This is what I learned today

1.  It takes 6 hours to travel from coast to coast in Costa Rica.
2. The highest mountain is 3800 meters high.  That would be over 12,000 feet high.  It is in Chirripó National Park.
3. Today is a national holiday, Guanacaste Day which celebrated the annexation of the Guanacaste Province in 1824.
4. Costa Rica is a melting pot like the United States.  Immigrants come from Poland, Germany, Israel, Italy and many more places. 
5. The country has 12 indigenous tribes. 
6. The white-tailed deer is the national mammal.  The national tree is the Guanacaste tree and the La Guaria Morada orchid is the national flower. 
   

We stopped at this cute little place for a break.  It was at an altitude of 3100 meters and known as the hummingbird stop.  Along the back of the building where tables were setup was a large bank of windows.  Outside of these were hummingbird feeders and the hummingbirds were buzzing around them. 

We traveled for another hour and then Frank turned off the main road to what looked like an unfinished semi-paved road to me.  It was narrow, somewhat bumpy and extremely steep. It felt like the road went straight down with hairpin turns and switchbacks.  Every once in a while, you could hear something in the front of the bust scrape the road.  It was a little scary sitting right up front but Frank handled it like he had been driving that road every day.  We all clapped when he finished the approximately 8 miles of this road and turned into the narrowest front gate bridge I have ever seen.  
We stepped off the bus and it was almost cold.  When we got to our room, I actually put on one of my long-sleeved shirts that I brought on the trip.  The daily rain finally came right before Mom and I left to go down to dinner.
Tomorrow is our last full day.  I think I might go bird watching at 6:00 a.m.