Several times while we have been here at Plaza Yara we have seen families of monkeys in the forest behind the hotel. We have watched them from our balcony and from the patio near the breakfast area. They are really fun to watch.

This afternoon we took a boat tour through the mangroves to Damos Island. The guide pointed out all the damage from the big storm just before we got here. For over a week this area was cut off by flooding all around the area. When we got to the boat launch site he showed us many different plants including this paprika tree.

We were the only tourists on the boat. The ride was beautiful and relaxing. We saw bats and lizards.

A snake and a crocodile.

And then the guide got us some fresh coconut to drink.

And we fed a family of monkeys!

Our trip was with Cambute Tours. The guide was knowledgeable and entertaining. The whole trip was really fun.

A correction to yesterday’s blog. I said that I thought all the palm trees we saw along the road were date palms but I found out from our guide today they are being farmed for palm oil.

We left the hotel at 7:20 this morning for a guided hike in Manuel Antonio National Park. We had a wonderful time. Our guide Roger Orozco found plants and animals we never would have seen. I would highly recommend Our hotel here, the Plaza Yara and our guide Roger. Roger can be contacted through the hotel.

He had a tripod mounted scope and used it to show us lizards, colorful grasshoppers, bats, land crabs and monkeys. He also used the scope to take some great pictures with my phone.

We also saw lots of varieties of mushrooms.

And raccoons at the beach where they are a pests because they have been fed by tourists.

We hiked to the beach and back.

On our way back to the hotel we stopped at the side of the rode to look at a tree sloth.

For dinner we went into Quepos and ate at a lovely restaurant overlooking the harbor, Gabriellas. The food was wonderful and we had live guitar music and very friendly service.

Today we drove about eighty miles down the coast to Manuel Antonio National Park. The drive had some great ocean views and miles and miles of what I think were date palms.

We are staying at a really nice hotel here called Plaza Yara. Our room has a view of the jungles and the pools.

For dinner we ate at a nearby open air restaurant. As we were eating it stated to rain. The rain on the tin roof was loud and kind of fun.

The food was very good. Duke had a whole red snapper and I had shrimp and steak skewers.

We really liked the little town of Sámara where we stayed last night. We stayed at the Hideaway Hotel. We talked to the American owners as we were eating breakfast by the pool this morning. Coincidentally their second home is in Reno!

The drive from Sámara to our hotel near Puenta Arenas today was pretty straight forward. We are staying at a Hilton Doubletree all inclusive resort. This is pretty unusual type of place for us to stay. It is very nice with lots of families.

It has been so cloudy and overcast for most of our trip that we really haven’t had any sunsets. But tonight we had a stupendous one.

We had a seafood mixed grill for dinner.

Today we moved thirty two miles down the coast to another beach town, Sámara. The road was dirt and quite rough so the drive took two and a half hours.

This afternoon we walked down to the beach.

For dinner we had one of the best meals of our trip. We went into town to an open air barbecue restaurant called El Lagarto. For our first course we had mussels.

Then I had stuffed squid and Duke has red snapper.