Last months we visited Costa Rica. It was our second trip, so we looked for less known palces to visit and to discover. As we passed by Nicoya, we have heard about Barra Honda National Park. So we decided to visit it. It took as a good rate to find how to get there without paying an expensive taxi. Finally some people mentioned that there was a bus in 11:30 which goes to Santa Ana village which is the nearest village to the park. The travelling by bus was an advanture on its own. The old bus full of people, a narow aisle, we almost could not get in with our backpacks… When we left the Nicoya town and got to the dirty road- in couple of minutes we were coated by dust from heals to head. After about an 45 minutes we reached our destination. It was very hot out there. We had to walk about 1km more to reach the national park. When we heard that we would have to hike up the mountain and that the whole trip would take almost 4 hours, we decided to stay there overnight and take a tour early in the morning. It was as we found this small hotel just few hundred meters away from the park ´s office. It was an oasis of peace. Ok, it was not a Ritz. The hotel offers simple rooms but with private shower and toilet, with some fan or I believe they offered us also air-conditioning posibility. But after the whole morning spent by travelling we really enjoyed their swimming pool surounded only by mountain and trees. No roads, no noice, just swallows flying over our heads capturing insects above the swimming pool. The owner – real Tico guy and his wife prepared us good local typical plate, they call „Casado“ and they offered us to try local palm vine drink. We relaxed the rest of the day. After a dinner we spent a couple of hours more beside the swimming pool where we could observe a beautiful nigth sky with thousands of stars, as there was not a moon at visible that night and there were not any artifical lights to obstruct the view.
In the morning after „gallo pinto“ breakfast we set off our Terciopelo cave tour. The guides spoke a little English only but were very nice and they showed us a lot of animals and plants around before we reached the cave. Our first look down to the hole we had to descend was a quite thrilling, though it looked more danger then it really was. We got our harnesses, helmets, lights.. One by one we got down into the cave. There were many really beautiful calcareous formations and we had to pass by some really narow alleys. In total it was a great experience, we will remember for long time.