Day 10, May 21, 2015.

We embarked on a journey today. A journey of the mind and the body. A journey that would require raw physical strength, a focused attention, and the ability to shrink one’s body into a 2’ x 2’ x 4’ invisible box.

We traveled by bus (I use the term loosely) across the Continental Divide to the Pacuare River. The bus sat exactly 30 people including the driver. Each seat was barely large enough for a single cheek of butt flesh. Squeezing into this seat was hard enough for the fairly considerable amount of petite women on our trip. It was even harder staying in this position for two hours. However, it was nearly impossible for a man whose legs are so long they alone could meet the height requirement on amusement park rides. Saved by the distractions of Jack’s endless amount of brainteasers, riddles, and games, I was able to survive relatively unscathed and cramp-free by the time we reached breakfast. Breakfast was eaten at the top of a large mountain overlooking yet another gorgeous Costa Rican landscape. After a quick breakfast on an open-air porch, we were ready to take on the Pacuare River.

We were split into five rafts with six people each plus a guide (except for Cat who had to sit on the back end of the raft forcing her tour guide to play “Keep the Little White Girl on the Raft” the whole way down the river). Our team consisted of Kala, Faaiza, Kavi (who we’ve just recently discovered is a famous spoken word artist), her friend Kenny, Professor Aurora, me, and our tour guide who, for the sake of this story, we will call Jose (primarily because I think that was his name but mostly because I don’t actually remember and this is a pretty safe guess).

Now, Jose was quite the seasoned veteran as he has been riding the waves of the Pacuare for 20 years. Despite the lack of any real safety discussion (this ain’t the sue-happy, thirsty-for-lawsuits U.S.), it was good to see that they provided us with some form of protection in the form of helmets and life vests. With my GoPro strapped to my chest, we hit the river. The right side of the raft had me, Aurora, and Kenny paddling (all experienced rafters) while the left side had Kavi, Faaiza, and Kala anchored by Jose.

Considering each of them is barely bigger than a grain of rice, it was fair to assume one of them could easily be ejected from the raft with just one wrong spin…foreshadowing or nah? Kavi shared with me that on last year’s trip, Aurora tumbled out of their raft and hurt her knee so it was no surprise to see this lady dive into the middle of the raft every time we so much as grazed a sizeable rock. I started the trip very comfortable, as I had rafted many times before so I thought I knew what to expect. Let’s just say this — a category 3 rapid in the Blue Ridge Mountains is VERY different from a category 3 rapid in the Costa Rican rainforest. A conversion chart would’ve been fairly helpful.

The river hit us right in the mouth in the first 100 meters, but we escaped unscathed and excited for more. According to Jose, they like to make the first rapid tough to show that there is time for fun, but also time for focus and seriousness. A good system, I feel. This process continued. We’d manage through some easy rapids and wave trains, and then Jose would tell us to relax and he’d laugh to himself. That’s when we knew to sit up straight and brace ourselves for some whirlpools. We rode past treehouses and bungalows up on the forest cliffs that looked like something out of a movie. I felt like at any moment we were about to be attacked by indigenous native tribesmen. Thankfully, we were never attacked by indigenous native tribesmen. However, we were caught off guard by a vicious boulder in the middle of a rapid.

We began working as a team, with Jose shouting “Forward!” and counting “Uno, dos” and paddling in unison with all our might. The waves had another idea. The current caught the back of our raft and whisked it to the right too fast for us to correct. The raft dipped down on the right side and said vicious boulder jacked us right back up into an 80 degree angle with the churning water. This led to a cannonball of water that popped over the raft and onto Kala and Faaiza, tossing them backwards into the Pacuare.

One would assume that tiny Kavi would also find herself wading through the rapids, but her tiny legs had wedged themselves so deep underneath the inflated tube in the middle of the raft that she found herself dangling helplessly into the water while still attached to the raft. Aurora was curled up in the middle of the raft with her paddle in the air shrieking for dear life, while Kenny and I clung for dear life to the side/bottom of the raft’s right side. Not sure what Jose was doing during all of this, but Kavi flailed around trying to grab onto any part of Faaiza or Kala. Quickly, we dipped over the rock and the weight of the boat shifted towards Kenny and I, so we followed suit and dived to the floor with Aurora. Once the raft had regained balance, we hoisted Kala and Faaiza up and out of the water. From that point on, we were Pacuare Pros.

Teamwork combined with everyone’s desire to limit the amount of any more potential pant-crapping scenarios got us through a number of difficult rapids. That doesn’t mean we didn’t have fun. One of the things I love so much about raft guides is how well they know the river and its behavioral tendencies. Kavi s;ays, “Can we like almost fall in, but not? That’s really fun.” Jose jams his paddle into the river, the raft jolts to the left and the back left of the raft where Kavi is sitting dips down about four feet and jacks her up into the air. The resulting wave erupted behind her and soaked her britches. If you can’t trust these guides to get you down the river unscathed, you can’t trust anyone.

Rafting with this group is such a blast. Ahead of us at one point, Spenser’s raft took a sharp corner and all we heard was his high-pitched howl. Immediately, I’m like “what?” We take the same sharp corner and an ocean of water hits me straight in the waist and pops me with a nice bowel cleansing. Cue my own high-pitched howl. We planned to stop halfway down the river at the staff campsite for lunch, but my favorite part of the rafting ride was before halftime. We fought through a tough category 4 rapid, but handled it great, as a reward, we spin out at the end of the rapid and fall smack dab underneath a massive waterfall.

The wind from where it hit the river ripped our screams right out of the air. The best comparison I can make is the wind blast that ensues when a helicopter lifts off. Wind blast comes. Followed by a mist cannon. Then, I found myself with a high-powered machine gun firing onto my skull as the back right end of the raft where I was sitting spun directly underneath the falls. Easily the coolest moment of the trip.

We parked our rafts on the shore and made our way up a steep hill to a giant hut in the middle of the rainforest overlooking the river. I immediately hopped in a hammock as the tour guides prepared burritos for lunch. We dodged horseflies and watched as one of the guides proposed to his girlfriend out on the porch of the hut. Pretty scenic view too.

We were productive at lunch, as we tried to teach Arnelle how to eat a burrito because she apparently “does not eat this food normally.” Sooner than later, we were off to tackle the second half of the Pacuare River. The second half was much more tame. I’m not sure if it was because the rapids were simply less volatile, or if our team had just gotten the hang of the river or not. Right before we ended our tour, we entered into a patch of cool, calm water in a narrow passage way. We were surrounded on both sides by tall cliffsides and waterfalls. Everyone jumped in and waded around in the river.

As much fun as it was, it did seem like one of those movie scenes where the female protagonist gets attacked by an anaconda or something. Unfortunately, that just wasn’t in the cards for our trip. Maybe next year. We leaped back into the rafts, conquered a few more rapids, and unloaded onto the world’s tiniest bus. Cramped, sore, and squarshed, we endured a three-hour traffic bonanza. Eventually, I escaped from my tuna can and took a real shower at our beloved Don Carlos Hotel. For dinner, Constanza led us to Café Mundo.

At Café Mundo, we made a startling discovery. If you watched Disney Channel in the mid-2000s, you know about the beloved, short-lived cartoon series Brandy & Mr. Whiskers about a sassy blonde dog who always showed her mid-drift who got trapped in the rainforest and lived in an inflatable raft in a tree with an annoying bunny rabbit voiced by the actor who plays Spongebob Squarepants. WELL, Catherine Green…is…Brandy. Yes, I know, it sounds crazy, but if this side-by-side collage doesn’t convince you, then you’re dumber than that show’s concept. Spenser and Maggie were late to dinner, but right as our food came, they marched into the dining room with flowers in hand singing Feliz Cumpleanos to Aurora!

After a long day of rafting, we turned in early and were at the hotel around 10pm. We packed our suitcases preparing for our trip to Arenal in the morning, and a group of us met in the hotel’s lobby to play games. We ended up just playing get-to-know-you games with Arnelle. We discussed our favorite seasons (and why), our favorite meal to grab on the go, and whether we prefer to drink out of a cup or a straw. Really riveting interviews. In an attempt to combat Arnelle’s series of questions, we felt it would be appropriate to search for Top 10 Questions to Ask on a First Date…according to BlackCupid. Obviously, the most important question on the list was “Did you vote for George Bush?” Priorities, man. The conversation turned educational when Arnelle took the time to teach me about weaves and the danger of “not having edges.” The night ended when we attempted to conquer the world’s hardest riddle:

I turn polar bears white, and I will make you cry. I make guys have to pee and girls comb their hair. I make celebrities look stupid and normal people look like celebrities. I turn pancakes brown and make your champagne bubble. If you squeeze me, I’ll pop. If you look at me, you’ll pop.

Can you guess the riddle?