The pictures on postcards really do exist.

I travled to one of the most beautiful places on earth this weekend. It was called Parque Nacional Manuel Antonio, a national park. It truly looked like something from a postcard, and the pictures below don't do it enough justice. There is no way to capture the beauty on camera, or at least I can't.

We got there Friday night, and the whole weekend turned out to be hotter than anything I have ever experienced. The wind would die down in the evening, and the humidity would spike. To add to this, we did not have air conditioning. Needless to say, it was pointless to shower and everyone was absolutely disgusting all weekend. The only relief was when we jumped in the Pacific Ocean.

We returned last night about 10:30. I found out that, although beautiful, two days of doing nothing but sitting on a beach is a bit tough for a person that is bored if they aren't doing anything. Our next trips will be shorter...

Check out the photos below. You can click on them to enlarge them.

View of pastures between the ocean and mountains. There are a lot of Brahman cattle in this region only because nothing else would be able to survive due to the heat. While I'm mentioning agriculture, there were also a lot of palm tree farms for making palm oil. There were whole forests of palm trees!

A view of my favorite beach in the park.

View of the sunset over the ocean from our open-air restaurant.

"Ladron" = Thief in Spanish

These little monkeys were everywhere. Everyone thought they were cute, but you had to guard your stuff or you risked getting it stolen. What a nuisance!

Taking in the view on the second day.

In other news, my host mom told me tonight that the earthquake or tremor ("temblor" in spanish") that I felt Friday in class registered a 5 on the richtor scale. A new wave of anxiety has now taken over.

Pura Vida,

Billy