Volcan Barva

Volcan Barva from the street I live on

Volcan Barva is north of San Jose, at the southern tip of the Parque Nacional Braulio Carillo. I read somewhere that it is the third highest volcano in Costa Rica, which is kinda sweet. (No, I don´t actually remember how high it is). Its in cloud forest, which is sweet, but does mean that after about 11am, it is difficult to see anything beyond whats in front of your nose.

Road Sign - I passed at least 3

I got up at 5 am to catch a bus to downtown San Jose. Because I was worried about timing (and it turns out I didn´t need to be), I caught a taxi to Heredia. I then took another bus to Barva, which is a small municipality immediately north of Heredia (it took not even 10 minutes). The bus stops at the central plaza, which, like all plazas, is in front of the Catholic church. There was an early morning mass going on, which I could hear bits and pieces of as I waited for the bus outside the church. I stopped at a bread store and had a donut for breakfast, and also bought a small baugette to eat later. At the UBL, the majority of the students are ¨christian¨, aka protestant. I forget that Costa Rica is a mostly Catholic country, but it was brought home to me by the men who biked past the church - of the 13 I saw, 11 crossed themselves. The third bus I caught took me about halfway up the mountain, to a very small town called Sacramento, which is the end of the line.

view of the central valley -aka San Jose - from the road

At that point, I began to walk. Having looked it up before starting, I knew that it was a 10 km walk up to the park, and the last 3.5 km were not paved. Thats about 6 miles of walking - I figured it´d take me about an hour and a half. Well. Try three hours. It was a beautiful morning, luckily! I walked up the side of the mountain, through big farms, mostly cattle  ranches. I had, for much of the morning, views of the central valley, and therefore of San Jose. I saw tons of cows, birds, and butterflies. I got to watch the morning clouds roll in, and cover the valley, and then the road. I passed through small towns, and by farms where the families all smiled at me, and asked if I was headed to the volcan. I watched as the vegetation changed as I got higher and higher. Several cars passed me, and I considered asking for a ride, but I decided that it wouldn´t be very safe, and that I was enjoying my walk. I had no watch, and the only way I could tell time was passing was from the sun and the clouds, which crept across the road and into the hills the later it got.

View down the road once the fog rolled in

Finally, I reached the unpaved portion of the road. As I continued on, I ran into a group of young ticos, who were walking home after a long night of drinking. They all called to me, and told the one english speaker in the group what he should say to me - although I understood everything they were saying. One of the young men decided he wanted to accompany me up to the volcano, and another of his friends came along to keep him out of trouble. After about half a kilometer, the first young man decided he was done with walking up a hill unneccesarily, and they both turned back. I reached the park at about 10 am, and checked in with the ranger, and arranged for a taxi for the way down.

Trees along the trail

The hike to the volcan was pretty short, considering the walk I´d had to get there. I walked on a smaller trail that caught the main trail at the start of the steep climb up to the volcano.

Poor Man's Umbrella - the purple thing is my winter hat

On that trail, I passed (among other things) a thistle that was taller than I was, and grasses that came up to my shoulders. When I reached the summit, there was a lookout platform over the crater lake, which is about 70m in diameter.

Laguna Barva

 I sat down at the top and opened my backpack to get out the snacks I had packed, to discover that I had not, in fact, packed them. So I ate my bread, and the nuts that have lived in my backpack since leaving home, and drank my water and gatorade, and thought longingly of the chocolate ¨enrobed¨ cookies that I knew were sitting on my table, along with other snacks, carefully packed in a bag.

Trail Markers

I then hiked back down the trail, and took a second trail to a mirador, or a lookout, that looked over another valley. I had a surprisingly clear view, though it was still cloudy. I continued on to the park entrance, where I chatted with the guarda bosque (park ranger) and two men from Philadelphia, who were waiting for their wives. I learned that durning the week, hardly anyone goes to Barva, and on the weekends, its mostly tico families, not tourists. I also learned that the guarda bosuques live at the park for 10 days, and then with their families for 5. Eventually, my taxi arrived. I chatted with the driver all the way down the mountain, to San Jose de la Montaña, where drivers switched, and I continued almost in complete silence to San Jose. I took the taxi all the way into San Jose because it wasn´t that much more expensive that taking it just to Heredia, and I was pretty exhausted. I caught the bus back to my apartment, and was home by about 3pm.

Pretty Flowers from the trail

So despite the ridiculously long walk in the morning, which, to be fair, ended up being my favorite part of the day, I loved it. I had a great time, and a beautiful day - no rain, which is practically unheard of. Everyone thought I was crazy for walking all that way, and some thought I was crazy for going by myself, but I had a lovely time being by myself, which is something I miss out on here sometimes. I have to be ¨on¨ when I´m at the UBL, and its still pretty tiring to work mainly in spanish, and Luz is in and out of my apartment after work, sometimes with the other kids in the complex, so having time to myself where I don´t have to be on was pretty amazing, and very refreshing.