Month: November 2022

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Costa Rica 2022: Arenal 1968 Trail

Arenal is a massive cone-shaped volcano that towers over the surrounding area, including the town of La Fortuna and the neighboring Lake Arenal. The rich volcanic soil, bubbling hot springs and gorgeous flowers growing in the rich volcanic soil draw enthusiastic visitors – including us. Arenal erupted in 1968 and buried a village, and the Arenal 1968 trail acts as a monument to the tragic event.

Just off the parking lot was an exhibit with some information about the tragedy, and a scale model.

We set off on the trail in a cool mist – the day felt suitably somber to be hiking this particular trail.

The dirt trail was much darker in color and grittier in texture than other trails we had hiked in Costa Rica – that’s the volcanic soil.

There was also pumice all along the trail – we picked it up to see how light it was (and then put it back where we found it! #leavenotrace).

Massive tree roots! Pretty amazing to think that all of this foliage grew up after 1968.

Thanks to the rich volcanic soil, the trail was starred all the way up with absolutely spectacular orchids and lilies.

I’m sure I was driving Steve crazy, but I had to stop and take a picture of every! single! flower!

The trail climbed gently to a viewpoint that looked out over the side of the volcano.

Eventually, we reached the trail summit and were rewarded with a spectacular view. Even with the top of Arenal shrouded in mist, it was an arresting sight.

We watched for awhile as the clouds started to roll down off the mountain – hoping that the cone would come out so we could really take it in. The slope of the mountain did start to clear, but eventually we had to turn back and head for the car and our next hike.

More stunning flowers on our way down from the viewpoint…

We stopped to take in the view of Lake Los Patos and were surprised by two toucans swooping out of the trees and across the lake – easily identifiable by their huge yellow beaks. Sadly, I was not quick enough with my camera to capture them – those guys are fast. Steve mused that he hadn’t realized what a treasure the roosting toucan was that we saw while kayaking around Drake Bay on our first afternoon in Osa; all of the others we saw were almost impossible to capture.

We did get a good look at a Lesson’s Mot-Mot! Look at those tail bobbles!

Towards the end of the hike, we came up on a beautiful viewpoint overlooking Lake Arenal – look at that! I was really hoping to get out on the lake for a paddle, but the weather didn’t cooperate. Still such a treat to take it in from this vantage point.

Doesn’t get more beautiful!

Next week: another view of the volcano.

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Reading Round-Up: October 2022

Reading is my oldest and favorite hobby. I literally can’t remember a time in my life when I didn’t love to curl up with a good book. Here are my reads for October, 2022.

Invisible Man, by Ralph Ellison – Fully reviewed here for The Classics Club Challenge. This was a powerful, unsettling, dreamlike, confusing and fascinating read, and one to which I can certainly see myself returning.

Death in Captivity, by Michael Gilbert – Definitely the highlight of the month here: I absolutely loved this golden age detective story set in an Italian POW camp in the waning days of World War II. An unpopular prisoner – believed by many to be feeding information to the Italian guards – is found dead in a tunnel that some of the prisoners have been digging in an escape attempt. The tunnel was believed to be a secret, and is inaccessible without the cooperation of at least three people. How did the victim get there, and was his death an accident or murder? This is a blend of a locked room detective novel with an adventure story, and I loved every page.

Miss Pym Disposes, by Josephine Tey – I’d been so looking forward to this story of intrigue and tragedy at a women’s physical fitness college, but it mostly fell flat for me.

Death on the Down Beat: An Orchestral Fantasy of Detection, by Sebastian Farr – For my birthday, Steve got me a subscription to the British Library Crime Classics – I know, I’m a lucky lady! This was my first month’s book and it was such a fun one. An unpopular orchestra conductor is shot dead in the middle of a performance, in full view of the entire orchestra and a 2,000-person audience. It turns out there were no shortage of people with a motive for murder, but who had the means and the opportunity? Detective Alan Hope thinks his way through the muddle via letters home to his wife, in which he encloses documents, news reports, and witness statements. I’ve seen some criticism that the author didn’t entirely play fair with the solution, and I think that’s right, but I still really enjoyed it and will revisit it to see if I can spot some of the buried nuggets I missed the first time around.

Pumpkinheads, by Rainbow Rowell and Faith Erin Hicks – Reading Pumpkinheads on Halloween night has become a favorite tradition of mine – this is the fourth year running and I’ve come to look forward to spending an hour in the Patch with Josiah, Deja, and all of their friends. It has everything I love about Halloween – pumpkins, hayrides, fall colors, campfires – and none of the spooky stuff. I find something new to smile at every time I read this; this time, it was Patch veteran Todd, who never left because he just really loves being a mime with a jack-o-lantern head. The moment he creepily jumps out of a shrub and Josiah greets him nonchalantly – “Hey, Todd” – too funny.

Bit of a slow reading month! A couple of reasons for this: as you know if you’ve been reading along with my weekly updates, I recently took on some new responsibilities at work, and that’s kept me extra busy – and drained my focus a little bit. Couple that with Nugget’s bedtime creeping later and later, and by the time I hit the couch on quite a few nights in October, I had no attention left to give a book. I never thought I’d see the day… ah, well. Another explanation: I read a couple of chunksters in October – Invisible Man was a time commitment, and I am almost done with Sylvia’s Lovers as of press time, and that one will count toward November’s total. So I was turning pages, you see, just a lot of them in only a few books. Well, low book totals or not, I had a major highlight last month: Death in Captivity is a contender for my top-ten list at year’s end; it was just that good. And I’m looking ahead to a good month of reading in November – I’ve got a few really exciting titles stacked up to get to this month. Watch this space!

What were your reading highlights from October?