There was no time for breakfast this morning as we left our hotel at 730am for the journey to our second Costa Rican destination – the town of La Fortuna which is next to the Arenal volcano. Once again this was a day where we were offered the option to upgrade to private transport for an extra $8 each and we decided to take advantage of it – instead of taking local buses all the way we used the hotel minibus to take us down to the lake and we used a boat to go across the lake to La Fortuna.
The road to the lake was mostly unpaved, except for a short 50m section, and took us through some amazing scenery over the course of the 90 minute journey. We arrived in plenty of time so were able to grab snacks and use the restrooms at a little cafe before boarding – although when we got out of the minibus we discovered we were back in tropical territory so the jackets immediately came off!!
Arenal was shrouded in cloud but the 45 minute boat ride across the lake gave us some impressive views and allowed us to relax unlike if we were on a local bus. On the other side we were picked up by another minibus and driven to our hotel “Fortuna” in the town of La Fortuna. Half way along our journey we went past a huge tent in one of the fields and our driver explained that the new Will Smith movie is being filmed in town and that was one of the locations. Of course when I realised that this was the upcoming M. Night Shyamalan movie “After Earth” that I had read so much about (I’m a fan of his work) this got me really excited – so close but so far!
Our room wasn’t ready yet when we arrived so we left our bags at reception and made our way into town to grab some food, eventually settling on Pizza to make up for the horror that was Honduran Pizza Hut the other day! Unfortunately they gave us the large size pizza instead of the medium by mistake so this meant missing out on a group meal tonight with the others but some of the group are heading down to the hotel bar soon for drinks so I think I might join them. It’ll have to be an early night tonight though as we leave at 730 in the morning for a whole day tour to a National Park.