Puerto Limon, Costa Rica

Unlike the rest of Costa Rica, with its overwhelmingly mestizo population, Puerto Limon and other towns and villages on Costa Rica’s Atlantic coast is largely Afro-Latin American.  Most are third and fourth generation descendants of Jamaicans who were brought in to work on the banana plantations.  Many, in the early 20^th century, worked on the Panama Canal, then returned to Costa Rica.  As a result, English is as common as Spanish in Puerto Limon.

In previous visits we have seen most of the interesting PoIs in the area:  a boat trip up the Tortuguera River where wild life is abundant; a stop at the Del Monte banana processing plant, where we watched mostly Nicaraguan workers cleaning, sorting, and packing bananas; Playa Blanca, the prettiest beach in the area, and Veraguas National Park, one of Costa Rica’s 25 national parks—this one with paths through the rain forest, a suspended cable car and a zip line. 

This time we learned of a new rainforest park, Brisas de la Jungla (Jungle Breezes), which has a well-maintained, 1 km. path through the forest and a zip-line with several platforms en route. We were lucky in that we had two guides—Gerardo and Graciela—both well educated and informed about the flora and fauna. 

While waiting for Gerardo to finish with a previous group, another staff member showed me the tiny, poisonous frogs for which Costa Rica is famous.  They are shy creatures so capturing one—and one good shot—was an achievement but was helped by the guide capturing a red frog and bringing it over for me to shoot.

The path through the forest, like the zip-line, begins at the top of a hill and our wonderful driver, Augustus, drove Gerardo and us up to the start of the trail.  Gerardo provided us with sturdy walking sticks and we were joined by Graciela, who had finished with a group and was on her way down.  Between the two guides, we saw sloths, monkeys, spiders, bullet ants (they’re big!) more frogs, and a small delicate, but poisonous snake—most of which we would have missed if we had been on our own.

Back at the welcome centre a large plate of sliced watermelon was waiting—a most welcome antidote to the extreme heat and humidity that had left both of us soaked through.   

   

Augustus returned us to the ship, dropping us as close as he could get to the pier.  We will look for him the next time!