100% Aventura

Hello everyone!

"Adventure Faces"

A couple days ago, Vanessa and I decided we wanted an adventure. So, in talking to our good friend Luis who is a guide at one of the canopy zip-line tours, we got ourselves booked for a reservation at 100% Aventura yesterday morning. Before we left, we made certain promises to some of our friends. Dario made me promise 1) to do the Tarzan swing and 2) to not die. Michelle made us both promise that we would participate in and enjoy all 100% of the adventure. 80% or 90% would not do, but we were also not to go past 100% because we might die. Vanessa and I thought we could comply with all of these promises.

"Nice and harnessed up!"

We arrived at Aventure and found Luis behind the desk at reception. From this moment on, most people in our tour group thought we were creepy tourists trying to be friends with the tour guide because he kept pretending like he didn't know us. We thought it was clearly a joke; the rest of the group did not. We signed our lives away and got nice and harnessed up for the adventure. Before we walked out to the first baby zip-line, Luis walked by and said, "Good luck! You're going to need it," before promptly disappearing into the wilderness. I forgot to mention earlier that Luis is more monkey than human, so you never know when he's going to appear out of the darkness or a tree or something. That's why this job is perfect for him. At any rate, we did the two baby zip-lines and as we approached the third platform, guess who was there waiting for us! Our little monkey, Luis. This was when our reputation as creepy tourists escalated exponentially. When I got to the front of the line, I was joking around saying, "Oh hey! What's your name?" to which he responded, "Uh... Pablito!" A few of the other guides heard this, thought that we didn't know each other, and found this exchange rather amusing. Likewise, most of the other tourists were under the same impression as the other guides. Sarcasm and banter FAIL. Then, when Vanessa got to the front of the line, Luis started fumbling with her safety cable and harness saying, "Oh, sorry. It's my first day. I think this goes here?" as he attached her safety cable to his belt loop. Of course, this is a total lie since he has been working there almost four years, but the rest of the tour group behind Vanessa got more than a little ervous after that!

The Tarzan Swing Platform

The tour was absolutely amazing. As I have said in various posts prior to this one, Monteverde is one of the most beautiful places on the planet. Everything is so green and lush, and when viewing the landscape from hundreds of meters above the ground you can see for miles. Sometimes, however, it is easy to get caught up in the beauty around you and forget that you are speeding through the forest on a cable and that you have to brake yourself. I am guilty of this, and one of the guides had to give me a hand (or an entire arm) at the end of one particularly fast cable. It didn't help that the gloves I was wearing were about four sizes too big, leaving the ends of the fingers to get tangled in the harness and cables. So, by the third or fourth cable I had already broken some promises; I had had about 110% of the adventure. By the end of the tour, that number was upped to about 120%. The last thing they have you do is the Tarzan swing in which you stand at the end of a very high hanging bridge, get attached to a single bungee cord on the front of your harness, and jump off. I wasn't scared at all to do this; it was absolutely not the first time I have looked over an edge thinking to myself, "I'm about to jump off this very high point, and I have no idea how the landing is going to happen." However, I did not expect my neck to snap backwards at the first pull of the bungee cord. Don't get me wrong, it was a great thrill, and I'd do it again, but I was in a little too much pain that afternoon and the next day!

See? Cute picture! Thanks, Judgey Tourist!

The tour was topped off by us meeting up with Luis on our walk back up to reception, confusing more tourists as he gave us huge hugs and kisses on the cheek, and solidifying our creepy reputation by asking another tourist to take our picture with him. But todo valió la pena because it's a really cute picture and I had a great time!

I'm choosing to leave out the details of my work days this past week because it's not worth ranting about on a blog. That's way too 2002 for me.

I think I'll post one more before I leave tomorrow morning. Can't wait to see those of you who are reading from Texas in just a few days!

Love,
Erin