February 27, 1998 - Friday
We woke up very early today and ate a brief breakfast and left for Manuel Antonio National Park at about 7:30AM. The park was less than 5 miles away from the hotel. It was the same park I was at last year. I went on the Cathedral path this time and separated from John and Fabio shortly because they were doing bird-watching most of the time. I started spotting a very large rodent like critter without a tail all over the forest. It looked like a giant Guinea Pig. It gnawed on this hard-shelled fruit from a tree and makes a very loud continuous noise as it chews on the shell cover to get to the inside. I also saw a sloth and then the path rounded to the 2nd beach (Playa Manual Antonio) into a very large tidal pool area that I had missed last year.
The tide was low so there's a nice small shallow lagoon area with a lot of rocks and fish. I've never seen so many fish in one area except on the northern shores of Taiwan. The fish were the same ones I saw at Punta Leona and more. I also saw a very colorful yellow and black eel about 2 inches long. I also saw an octopus - all without going into the water. I could've kicked myself for not bringing my mask and aqua shoes though. I'll try to remember next time.
I went to the front gate to look for John and Fabio at 10:00, but they weren't there, so I went back on the path and looked for them. A lot of lizards were crawling along the path too. I found John and Fabio on another path, along with some large bright land crabs. At a pavilion, a group tour prepared some fresh fruit to serve to the people on the tour, and all the sudden a large troop of white-faced monkeys appeared out of the trees and started rummaging through the garbage to look for food.
The tourists gathered around and cameras and video cameras were all over the place, taking pictures. One gringa said "Ohhhh... they are so cute... Something's wrong with this one...". She was commenting on a little hump on the monkey's back, but it turned out to be a small monkey riding on the back that the woman failed to notice until 5 minutes later. We left the park after that and went back to the hotel to pack, swim, and shower before leaving for another restaurant that was serving Mexican food - it was OK. We left Manuel Antonio after that and stopped by a T-shirt shop in Quepos for a short while before leaving.
We picked up Elizabeth at the Best Western on the way back, and walked around Jaco to do a little more shopping before headed back to Punta Leona. We hung out and swam for a while before changing and went to "Steve and Lisa's" for dinner. It's a road side restaurant not far from Punta Leona. I had lobster again but it wasn't fresh so it didn't taste as good. It was still good. John and Fabio had jumbo shrimp and Elizabeth had shrimp and rice.
She knocked a bottle of beer over while she was animatedly explained to the waitress that she wanted Oil and Vinegar, in Loud English that the waitress couldn't understand. She barely touched her stuff before John pointed out a lizard's tail on a ceiling beam to everyone. He thought it was a lizard, and it would've been pretty funny if it was, but it turned out to be a rat's tail. These were 6-inch long rats - three of them, scurrying along the ceiling beam back and forth while we ate our dinner. Elizabeth lost all her appetite and had everything wrapped, but the rats didn't bother me, or John and Fabio. We left after that and John and Fabio and I went out to look at the stars before packing and heading to bed.
