Today is our only stop in Costa Rica. Because of an air show in Puntarenas, our ship was diverted to the nearby commercial port of Puerto Caldera. This was unfortunate because we had already booked an excursion with an outside vendor (not via the cruise company). More unfortunately, the captain told us about the detour after we left Huatulco, so we needed to sign up for the ship’s expensive Internet in order to notify the tour company. Even more unfortunately, the tour company could not enter the port and security would not let us walk out of the port and no taxis were willing take us out. (Later we learned that the taxis are only allowed to enter the port a limited number of times per day and didn’t want to waste an entrance on us.) Luckily, a group of Chinese tourists graciously allowed us to share their taxi to the main entrance of the port. As far as we (and port security) could tell, this was the only cab that was willing to drive to the port entrance.

About an hour and a half after disembarking the ship, we boarded our tour guide Alberto’s van outside the port entrance. He drove us to the zipline area run by Vista Los Suenos that includes 12 exhilarating ziplines through the beautiful Costa Rican forests. The staff was very professional and helpful. Afterward, we quickly walked across the “Crocodile” bridge in the rain. Next, we visited a monkey mountain that sadly had no monkeys at the time we visited, but it was entertaining to watch Alberto and the owners try to summon monkeys down the hill for about 20 minutes.