Hudd Family Travelling Zoo: 21 Dec - Arriving in Costa Rica and a hairy horseback ride

After a 5 AM start, two buses, a taxi, two airplanes, and several hours driving up green mountains, we finally arrived in El Castillo, Costa Rica night before last! This is our 2nd morning waking up here and my favourite thing (besides having our 2 gorgeous nieces Brittany and Katie join us here) is seeing a group of hummingbirds in the flowery bushes next to our window each morning before 7.

Our lime eating trial on the way to our digs in El Castillo

The howler monkeys have followed us from Belize, we can hear them roaring in the trees outside our lovely rented casita, Hacienda Encantada. So beautiful and remote here. People who choose to live up here in El Castillo must be folks who've decided to drop off the grid and get back to natural living, it is a good 40 minutes drive over some rocky roads to get to the nearest town with a supermarket, bank s or doctors' office. I can't believe the locals here get to wake up each day to the stunning fairytale view of the cloud topped Arenal volcano, misty lake Arenal and endless rainforest ... imagine that for a regular coffee morning on the veranda?!

relaxing in our 1st home in El Castillo

Yesterday, we took a horseback ride with Lilander and his Apaloosa horses up into the Arenal rainforest, stopping at a waterfall before the return trip. Lilanders' horses were gorgeous, well-cared for and well-behaved animals. We loved on all the horses and visited his breeding stallion before mounting up for the ride.

Sam spoke up to request his own horse without a leader - he thinks he knows it all now that he's ridden horses a few times!! Lilander thought that was ok, as long as he wore a helmet. The older kids all jumped straight on and got to know their horses too.

I'm still a little nervous about trotting, not yet a seasoned horse-rider, but getting there! These horses had a lot of spirit and are all desperate to get in front of the other. We had little competitions going on during the whole ride where 2 or 3 horses would try to edge past each other on the path and they all loved to break into a trot when given a chance.

We were amazed at the terrain they covered. At points heading up the mountain, they were literally making their way through knee-deep mud and then over rocky little paths, through fields of cows ... without hardly a hesitation. Later, we found it amazing that none of us had come off our sadles because sometimes the horses had to literally jump down or up steep 2 foot sections ... and along cliffs that went down perilous trajectories!! But we had a lot of faith in the horses and Lilander, who all seemed to know their way about the mountain like they could do it blindfolded.

The waterfall at the end was spectacular, if avery c-c-c-c-old!! A little too cold fo the girls to get into, but the boys and I jumped in right away. There was a grandma riding with us, along with her son and grandson. She was crazy, in a fun way, and led the way both on the horses, galloping off way ahead of us and then diving into the falls before our clothes were even off! I couldn't be shown up by a granny and a six-year old - how humiliating! - so I really had no choice but to jump on in. It felt great to be clean and then in dry-ish clothes again.

I was worried abotu Katie riding a horse since she had just had a terrible stomach bug, but she and Brittany both were great on the horses. They

On return, we left the 2 big boys at home with Brittany and Katie and headed to the grocery store in La Fortuna, the nearest small town. We left around 2:30 PM and were surprised to find that the drive there, a cup of coffee and quick wander through the central square, the grocery store and the ride back took us until 6 PM to return!!

We're all looking forwared to the next adventures!!