We left Richmond on Friday Jan 1, 2010 for Costa Rica, arriving mid afternoon and settling into the Hotel Buena Vista just north of San Jose. Nice accommodations with a great view from the top of a mountain overlooking the city. The next day the group, Dave (Wallace), Liz (Gromit), Brian, Mark (Shaggy), Ann, Sejal (Giggles) and myself (Mango), took a coffee tour while waiting for Costa Rica Rios to pick us up. We were then picked up around 2:30pm and driven to the Bed and Breakfast in Turrialba (2 hour drive).
Sunday January 3rd
We picked out our boats in the morning and outfitted them. We then loaded up and headed to the Lower Pejibaye (Class II, III, 40 feet per mile gradient, 4.4 miles). This was a fun tune up run but was much lower than what we had last year. This consisted of rocky rapids with pools. A good start up for the week. We then had lunch and shuttled up to run the Upper Pejibaye (Class III, 87 feet per mile gradient, 2.9 miles). This was a little more challenging. It had the same features as the Lower, just a little bigger. Although the gradient was high it didn’t seem like it.
Monday January 4th
Two hour shuttle to the Lower Sarapiqui (Class III, 56 feet per mile gradient, 6 miles). This section had a bigger water feel to it even though it was a small river and provided a lot of play spots for those that were so inclined. The wall shots that we had last year were not as big as the water was lower and the characteristics for the river had changed do to the damn breaking and flood from last year. I was surprised to see so little damage from that. And Dougie, I did see a monkey on this section.
Tuesday January 5th
We had stayed in the Sarapiqui area so the shuttle was short. The group split this time with most going to the Upper Sarapiqui and a smaller group, consisting of Mike from Harpers Ferry, Shaggy, Brian, Sejal and myself going to the San Miguel Section of the Sarapiqui (Class IV, 90 feet per mile gradient, 6.9 miles). The guidebook says, "from the put in, you take 12 paddle strokes and then the action begins" . The first third of this run was about the most intense, continuous creeking/boggie water that I have paddled. At points it was just crashing down punching holes and dodging rocks, then hard S turns and quick moves. The gradient was steep although there wasn’t any major drops. Almost at the end of this part, I had an out of boat experience. While trying to boof a hole, I got to far back on my backdeck then hit a curler wave and flipped. Rushed my attempted rolls and came out. I and my boat were quickly recovered and reunited with the excellent skill of our guides (Mario, Davies and Louis). The water settled down a bit after that and became sections of Class III+ boggie water with longer pools between. Everyone had good runs with my blip being the only incident. This was by far, the most fun I had had on the water so far. When we had dropped the other group off at the bridge (before our run), I had looked up stream at the rapid above just thinking about what line I would take (I later found out that Brian had looked and thought the same thing). It looked doable but would take a fair amount of maneuvering and punching a couple of holes. I though I might be able to handle it. It turned out to be the easiest rapid we did.
Wednesday January 6th
Upper Upper Pacuare (Class IV, 76 feet per mile gradient, 7 miles). This section was mainly Class III boogie water with pools in between and 3 Class IV rapids. We boat scouted two of them with no incident and got out and looked at the larger more technical one. The main drop looked gnarly but runnable to me but the middle part of the approach looked like to many opportunities to pin and a swim from those points would not have been fun, so I decided to walk this one. Most of the rest of our group ran it with little problem, but successfully.
Today we will start a 2 day trip on the Lower Pacuare with an overnight stay at the jungle camp. I’m not sure how "jungle campy" it will be as it has a hot tub. The first day is supposed to be like yesterday but smaller and Friday is supposed to be bigger water with some Class IV rapids. Sorry for taking so long but time and internet availability have been scarce. I’ve tried to put some stuff up on Facebook as we have been moving around, but not much of it actually has made it. All the rivers have been spectacularly scenic with the exception of the San Miguel Section, which I didn’t see anything but what was 20 feet in front of me . We have seen a lot of colorful bird (names I don’t know other than toucans), a sloth and a monkey. The accommodations and food (I’m not even tired of rice and beans yet) have been top notch and Costa Rica Rios has been great. The guides are the best. Even our Guide Blocker (Giggles, your the best) has been great.
I am attempting to put some photos on Flickr, but is taking a long time to load. Not sure how much will get there or what quality they are, as I didn’t have time to look at them before attempting to upload. I started an 1.5 hours ago and it is only 20% done. If I don’t get a link up for them, would some computer savvy paddler who knows my Flickr account put a link up for me. Thanks.
Hugs and Kisses,
Mango
**and yes, the KessmanN (and Scooter) shrine is still up.
Bringing our own personal guide is the bestest! 
