A day at Arenal

Arenal reminds me a bit of some of the alpine towns in New Zealand. There are many adventurous things to do, like white water rafting, canyoning, tubing and crazy hiking. As we had a spare morning we opted to go to an organic chocolate farm, our kind of adventurous. It was a fantastic experience as our guide took us through the whole process from ‘paddock to plate’. We started with a coffee and Deb had a hot chocolate, successfully ordered in Spanish … Chocolate Caliente 🙂

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Firstly, our guide took us around the farm and explained the different varieties of the cacao plants and the other trees that they plant alongside them to provide the right amount of shade and to attract the right insects to pollinate them. They have also done a lot of cross-breeding (no genetic modification) to find more resilient fruits, particularly to combat common diseases. The beans themselves come out of a fruit, not dissimilar to a custard apple, but with a hard shell. Being an organic farm there is a rich array of wildlife which presents challenges because sometimes the squirrels and birds eat the fruit.

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After that we looked at the fermentation and drying process, prior to tasting some of fresh chocolate and making some chocolates of our own. We got to pour it into moulds and then add ingredients like salt, ginger, cardamom, chilli and coconut to name a few. The guide made the whole experience a lot of fun with lots of extra ways to grind flavours into the chocolate … we certainly learnt a lot. It was a highly recommended thing to do if ever you find yourself in Arenal.

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After lunch we went on another tour where we walked part way up the Arenal volcano through the lava fields from the last big eruption in 1968. It is mainly loose stony basalt which has new growth trees and grasses on it, but there is no forest here. It is mainly occupied by birds and small animals, like bats because the rainforest has not yet regenerated in 50 years. There were some good views of the Arenal Lake, which was built to provide Hydro power and currently provides about 30% of Costa Rica’s power needs. The clouds did not lift for any views of the Volcano, but that only happens about 60 days per year… so we can count ourselves lucky for the couple of shots we got yesterday.

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Following the walk, we needed to relax and the tour dropped us off at the Tabacon Thermal Springs. This was an amazing collection of hot pools of different depths and temperatures and cascades you could even stand under. The water comes directly from springs under the Arenal Volcano and was by far the most interesting hot pool experience I have had… even though we’ve done hot pools recently in Taiwan and New Zealand (Hanmer Springs). This place a doubly amazing with the number of beautiful people adding to the atmosphere… how romantic!

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A truly great day… I’ll leave you with one more photo from the chocolate farm.

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Until tomorrow!