June 26, 1999

We headed out to Manuel Antonio early today and stopped for lunch at Caleta again. It rained on and off in the morning and was raining fairly hard when we ate our lunch. The mist created by the rain was so thick that I couldn't see the Pacific Ocean from the porch.

We continued our way to Manuel Antonio and checked into David's condo there. It's a small two level condo in a complex, shrouded in tropical trees and a large pool. The grounds are nicely kept and surrounded by a lush growth of tropical forest. Each of the condos in Villa Nicolas is privately owned, but most of the owners are only here for 2 weeks out of the whole year so for the rest of the year, the condos are rented out to guests and tourists.

The skies were overcast but we headed down to the beach anyway. The surf was rough but the water was warm - warmer than Bermuda's water and I went into the ocean for the first time this year. It started pouring after about half hour and the rain continued for the next few hours. It reached a point where the air and rain temperature was colder than the water temperature so I soaked in the water for a while watching the rain falling all around me and on the beach. The only signs of life on the beach were little hermit crabs and some well camouflaged crabs that runs across the sand at light speed.

The rain let up a little bit and the sun actually broke through the clouds toward the late afternoon. We hiked back to the car and back to the hotel for a rest before we headed out to dinner. It rained, and rained, and rained. There wasn't much to do there at night and I turned in early.

  June 27, 1999

I headed into Manuel Antonio park on my own and hiked through most of the trails there. There were only a few tourists hiking this time around and it rained on and off for most of the time. I saw some small rodent-like critters again munching on fallen pods. A few squirrel monkeys played in the tree above but not much wild life there.

Again, it rained and rained and rained. I had my Alpine Lowe waterproof jacket on and it kept me fairly dry and well ventilated. The beaches in the park were mostly deserted and I passed a few very wet looking tourist hikers without much enthusiasm in their faces. It was a very nice hike for me nevertheless, and I was drenched and wet after 3 hours and started hiking back.

It rained and rained for the rest of the day and night but I didn't mind it too much. We had dinner at Karolas, which again had very good food.