Our final port of call on this cruise was today in Limon, Costa Rica. My sense is Limon itself isn’t high on the list of Costa Rican vacation destinations nor is it the principal playground for expats. But, it’s obviously a convenient stop for southern Caribbean cruises and provides an opportunity for jungle/rainforest based ecotours. For our part, we opted for a half-day “Meet the Sloths” tour, which visited a sloth sanctuary made famous by a 2013 Animal Planet series of the same name.
Many of the sloths that we saw were permanently injured, abandoned as babies, or orphaned at too young of an age. As a result, they’ve become full-time residents of the sanctuary for the rest of their lives, which could last up to 40 years.
They’re fascinating creatures — not lazy, just “energy efficient.”
After visiting the residents and nursery, we took a canoe out onto the local canals in search of sloths in the wild. Being arboreal and colored as they are, they’re remarkably difficult to spot by the untrained eye. Indeed, even when expertly located and pointed out, they’re still remarkably difficult to see. But, we did ultimately see one well up in the canopy, and we certainly enjoyed the peaceful ride in the canoe.
On the way back to the ship, we stopped at a local shop selling Costa Rican coffee (which we heard from our guide is the coffee origin “best in the world” having just “won an international competition” — somewhat suspiciously we heard the same story from our guides in Colombia and Panama too) and local produce (which I have read in numerous books is considered to be wonderful in its quality, abundance, and affordability):
The coffee was ok. But, the bananas were wonderful!
Dinner tonight–although Thanksgiving–was at “Rudi’s Sal de Mer,” which is really the Pinnacle Grill with a higher priced menu ($50 per person) focused primarily on classic French, mostly seafood dishes. Here’s Emerson tucking into a classic preparation of escargot:
The food was good, but I don’t think it was worth $50/pp. Watching Emerson happily extricate and willingly consume snails? Priceless.
Yup, this was another “typical” Thanksgiving for our family. Indeed, in reflecting upon it, I believe Emerson’s spent every Thanksgiving of her life traveling somewhere outside of the country. One the one hand, that’s just very different from the more traditional Thanksgivings that Libby and I experienced in our childhoods. On the other hand, the variety of experiences she’s enjoyed is something in and of itself to be especially thankful for. In the end, we’ve just established a very non-traditional tradition.
Today’s box score: +1 country (Costa Rica)
