Gypsies in the Palace

Park entrance.

First glimpse of the Blue River

This morning we started our morning early with an American breakfast of coffee, eggs, bacon and toast before we headed out on our hike. Joe began our tour at the Blue River Estates' lots. We walked around a little getting our baring of the beautiful scenery, before heading down to the Blue River National Park.

The waterfall.

 Upon entering the park, we were met with the sounds of the jungle and a few critters. It was beautiful! We continued our tour towards the sound of the river. The river was an amazing blue color. The most incredible part of the river was where two waterfalls from either side of the river joined the main river at the exact same spot.

After we finished the tour, we did one more walk though the butterfly and hummingbird gardens. By noon, we were on the road towards a friends farm. We decided to save some time by taking the back road. Once again we only had one mishap, the original hotel we planed on using didn't receive our reservation. So we headed towards Rio Celeste.

It only took another 2 hours, but it was an adventure, like most things in Costa Rica, because we had no idea where we were going. We ended up finding a sign for the Rio Celeste Hideaway Hotel, which we navigated towards for over 40km.

Bridge with just 2 sturdy pieces of wood.
Lining tires up is a must!

Look its the female version of Ready,
but Ready was cuter!

We crossed so many rivers, including one without a bridge.
I held my breath in fear that I might be the 2nd person in my family to sink a  Costa Rican rental car.

We could see Nicaragua for most of our drive.

When we arrived to the town of Rio Celeste, we checked out two hotels before arriving at the Hideaway.  We pulled into a gated hotel and Kayla and I looked at each other with wide eyes, knowing we were way out of our price range. We had no intention of staying in fancy 4 star hotels for the whole trip, but luckily and against better judgment, we decided to check the price. We ended up hitting it off with the staff and they gave us an astounding deal that we couldn't pass up.

We were lead to our stunning room and right then we told the staff we would be staying a second night. Our room was equipped with 2 large beds, a balcony looking out into the jungle, a jacuzzi tub and an outdoor shower with HOT WATER!!!

Our fancy room

Our outdoor shower.

During dinner we went with the When in Rome philosophy  and decided to go big and eat in the hotel which ended up being a great decision. Our waiter has the day off tomorrow and offered to take us to see snapping turtles. We finished out luxury night with a trip to the hot tub and borrowed the movie Midnight in Paris from the front desk.