Hola a todos!
Today we started out with breakfast with our host families (cream cheese-filled French toast with mango...the best breakfast ever was what we had for our last meal with our host mom, Marcela) and then met our new tour guide, Jeff, and driver, Fabio. Jeff is originally from Massachusetts and moved to Costa Rica 32 years ago. His English is perfect and his Spanish is pretty darn good, and he's extremely knowledgeable about Costa Rica and its plant and animal life, but he's not the kind of guide that will spontaneously break into a fast-paced Spanish rap like our last tour guide, Ricky. We still liked him, though.
The whole group met at Marcela's house to load up the bus and head to Irazu Volcano, our first stop. The fog lifted JUST in time for us to see the crater lake at the top of this magnificent volcano. It was over 11,000 feet above sea level, so it was a bit colder than we were used to (which was actually refreshing after so many days of jungle heat and humidity), and the air was thinner, making running more difficult. But, the views were spectacular.
Our next stop was the Lankaster Botanical Garden, which was full of interesting plants, trees, and flowers. We started with Costa Rican flora and fauna, including many beautiful orchids (one orchid no larger than a pin head), and also saw the Japanese portion of the garden which was donated by Japan. We all got some good practice at using the macro feature of our digital cameras!
After that, we stopped by the ruins of a 500 year-old church in the former Costa Rican capital of Cartago. Only the brick walls and facade remained, as well as the altar with a stone cross on it. We explored a bit, took a group picture, and then boarded the bus again. Today was a day of many bus rides.
The real cathedral in the city of Cartagos was our next stop. It is said to be the holiest site in Costa Rica, with people making a pilgramage to it from San Jose every August 2nd. In the basement we were able to see a vast series of tropy cases with thing like medals, trophies, metal representations of body parts that had been healed, and all sorts of other things that people had donated, accrediting their success or healing to Nuestra Senora de los Angeles, the patron Saint of this church.
Our trip back to San Jose lasted about an hour and a half. Marcela boarded the bus to direct the bus driver to the house of every host family. We said our good-byes and then Erik and I were driven back to our hotel by our tour guide, Jeff. On the way, we saw a license plate with a Green Bay Packers license plate frame, which made Erik really excited. It was fun to have a hometown connection all the way down here in Costa Rica.
Thanks for reading!
Profe Simmons and Olson
After that, we stopped by the ruins of a 500 year-old church in the former Costa Rican capital of Cartago. Only the brick walls and facade remained, as well as the altar with a stone cross on it. We explored a bit, took a group picture, and then boarded the bus again. Today was a day of many bus rides. 
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