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Hacienda Baru

one of the things you have to do as a tourist in costa rica is a zip line tour. the videos and images make it look like so much fun! brenda and i knew that many of them are not very ecologically conscious, so were hesitant to take the plunge, but luckily we found hacienda baru a mere fifteen minutes from our house in uvita. the hacienda is both a lodge and wildlife refuge, built on a large swath of land that was under heavy industrial farming until as recently as 1972. in just over thirty years the place has been transformed back into a young jungle, complete with capuchin monkeys, sloths, and all manner of birds. its crazy how well life flourishes in the heat, rain, and sunshine! hacienda baru offers a bunch of guided tours that marry adrenaline rushes with educational information about the area. plus they are ecologically minded which is awesome 🙂

our guides were friendly and knowledgeable, spotting sloths way up in places that we would never have known. seeing sloths (peresoso in spanish) was on my bucket list of things to do here, so i was happy to see them up close. they are smaller than i expected, and very cute. we hiked for about an hour through the forest, seeing all kinds of crazy trees alongside some monkeys and sloths.   

   
 nayou was sort of interested in this part of the tour, although he kept on asking when we were going to get to the zip lines. while we were gearing up we got to meet Elvis, the resident giant cockroack that lives in the shed where they keep their equipment. 

 eventually we made it to the first platform and from then on it was a thrill ride through about seven zip lines. the rides were exciting but not scary, and nayou absolutely loved them. you barely had time to take in the sights, but the speed rush more than made up for it.  

       

  

 the pool was a welcome treat once we got home, and i think we were all asleep before our heads even hit the pillow!