After a rough night’s sleep I was very excited to see the Upper Rio Toro. The guidebook describes the river as unbelievably beautiful and good Class 4-5 rapids. I was starting to really feel good about boating so was looking forward to the challenge. The road to the river doesn’t seem like anything out of the ordinary until you get very close to the put-in and you can see into the deep, deep gorge below and realize there are gorge walls above the road as well. You can’t see the river until the very end but just the sight of the sheer, cliff walls with jungle clinging impossibly to the walls is incredible.

View at the put-in

View at the put-in

Waterfall at the put-in

The road ends at a powerhouse set in the most awesome place I’ve ever seen. Waterfalls cascade several hundred feet down from the cliff walls on 3 sides of the powerhouse with lush jungle forest as far as the eye can see. Truly something I’d expect to see from Jurassic Park.

The tough rapids start right at the put-in with a marginally runnable cascade a couple hundred foot hike upstream of the bridge and a scrapy boulder garden directly below the bridge. After a half hour of taking pictures and marveling in such a cool place, I was anxious to put on the river. Ryan and Conor weren’t quite feeling up for the quick start so we put-on with just 4 (me, Conor, Diego, and Tom). Diego had done the run many times so he was going to let us know when to scout the bigger rapids. Of course, as we found out later, the river changes a lot and some of the lines and rapids had completely changed from the last time he had run it.

Scouting put-in rapid

Below the put-in rapid

Diego and I ran the first marginal boulder garden and I thoroughly enjoyed scraping down some rock for the first time during the trip. After the first rapid the river gains volume with some fun Class 4-4+ boulder gardens. I got out for a quick look at one of the rapids and we all got out at the first bigger rapid. The next 3-4 rapids is the crux of the run but there were recovery pools after all the rapids and generally at least one clean line. I did some funky rock brace down the face of one of the rapids but was able to stay upright at the bottom.

Scouting first big rapid on second trip

Another fun rapid just below

After these rapids there are just tons of fun Class 4 rapids of all shapes and sizes. The most intimidating rapids crashed straight into a sheer, cliff wall and then bounced 90 degrees downstream with lots of turbulant currents. Thankfully there were plenty of spots to stop and gaze up at the incredibly scenery as waterfalls continued to cascade down the gorge walls all the way to the river. Diego and I took some time to boat underneath a couple of the waterfalls and I was surpised to find that some of them were warm. Diego looked at me at one point with a huge smile on his face and shouted “Pura Vida, Pete”. That was the purest use of that expression I’d heard since we arrived in Costa Rica and I happily replied “Pura Vida, Diego”. For me, that was my first moment when Costa Rica lived up to all that I’d imagined it would be.

Really fun Class 4 rapid

Canyon scenery

Canyon scenery

From there down it was a short, fun trip down to some river-side hot springs where we met Ryan and Conor and relaxed for awhile before heading down the 4 mile section below the hot springs. I was happy we were able to talk Ryan into joining us for this run as it was almost as pretty as the upper section and lots of fun Class 3-4 rapids; most of which were the strange kind that crashed into the sheer gorge walls.

Lower river from the take-out bridge

All in all a great day of boating and we had plenty of time to grab dinner and a few beers, and a nice place to stay in La Virgen for the next couple days.

San Jose is quite an interesting city with very narrow streets, crazy traffic, and crazy drivers. After our initial bad experience in San Jose when we first arrived in Costa Rica we weren’t looking forward to passing through on our way to La Virgen. We were expecting an easier visit this time as we were planning to meet Conor, Conor and Tom (3 guys we met in Turrialba) plus a van and driver, Diego. After a pretty pleasant 3 1/2 hour bus ride to the infamous Coca Cola bus terminal (the guidebook warns about a lot of crime at this terminal) we only had to wait a couple minutes before Diego and the Conors showed up with the van and we loaded up and headed out. Here are some random pictures in San Jose and our drive up over the mountains to the rivers around La Virgen.

Typical traffic scene in San Jose

Vegetable stand in San Jose

Church in the mountains

Lunch in the mountains

The lunch in the picture above is pretty typical food in Costa Rica. It’s called “Casado” which means a selecton of side items and usually includes black beans, rice, fried plantaans, a meat in gravy and tortillas. This one had a tasty salsa and pork as the meat. It was cooked over a wood fired stove in a small place called a Soda. These are typically small, family places that are open for breakfast and lunch. It is kind of like walking into a local’s house and having a grandma or mom cook you a meal. Very satisfying experience.

The drive through the mountains from San Jose to La Virgen is just beautiful. Rugged, steep river canyons surrounded by lush rainforest. Simply some of the prettiest scenery I saw anywhere in Costa Rica. I found myself constantly gawking out the van window imagining what the rivers and creeks were like way down at the bottom of the canyons. About 20 miles from San Miguel the shift linkage on the van snapped. After some poking around we were able to get the van into 2nd gear which was enough to get us up the hills and then we would coast wildly on the downhills or creep down in 2nd gear. Thankfully we were only had a little ways to get to the put-in for the Upper Sarapiqui. We unloaded all the kayaks and while we boated, Diego went off to try and find parts to fix the van.

The Upper Sarapaqui is a beautiful river with fun, long, boulder gardens, clear water and dense jungle on the banks. The first rapid is the hardest on the run; a long, steep boulder garden that disappears around a right bend from the bridge at the put-in. This is my kind of rapid and I was super excited to start boofing and eddy-hopping down the rapid. I was just starting to get a feel for my boat and really beginning to get some confidence in its performance.

Upper Sarapiqui

Upper Sarapiqui

The river turned out to be at a perfect level; plenty of rocks to make things interesting and some really fun, big waves. The scenery in the first half of the run was also exceptional. We boat-scouted everything which worked out well for the most part although we might’ve had better lines down a few rapids if we had looked at them quickly. Everything turned out to be very forgiving even with a few missed lines. We were able to find the take-out as there were 6 rafts full of tourists beginning a trip on the lower section. I always feel a little bit more at home when I see a commercial raft trip since commercial trips look the same whether they are in the US, Costa Rica or some other country.

Anyway, the take-out is at a rafting outfitter base, complete with lodging and a bar. Of course, most of the guys couldn’t resist visiting the bar while we waited for Diego to show up with the van. We were happy to see the van as it pulled in and even more happy to hear that the gear shift worked again. Well, not exactly. Diego had rigged up a system with a piece of rebar so that the person in the passenger seat could shift the gears while the driver worked the clutch. Pretty humorous to see it in action but at least we had all 4 gears.

From the Sarapiqui we headed back up into the mountains hoping to stay at some hot springs near the Rio Toro. Somehow we ended up in someones backyard which happened to have some rather crappy rooms for rent. We ended up paying $10 night and while Ryan and didn’t have any problems, the other guys had some interesting bug experiences.
I got the small, baby bed

Some unhappy people after a rough night

Hoping to improve our day we headed off to the Rio Toro.