Costa Rica 1992: A Disappointing Los Lagos Park

      The following day, was cloudy with a few sunny breaks, but they broke in a way that never allowed us to see the tip of the volcano.  The Hotel Ambugue Bureo, where we stayed was a bed and breakfast, and our breakfast consisted of Corn Flakes, juice, and fruit (watermelon, pineapple, carrots, and some kind of orange melon).

    After breakfast we donned our jungle gear (heavy duty pants with a lot of pockets, and the “gum” boots (“Wellington” or rubber boots), which I had lugged all the way from McBride).  We walked out to street to find a taxi that would take us to Los Lagos, a park featuring two lakes, that was mentioned in our guide book.  Our plan was to hike the jungle trail, maybe swim in one of the lakes, and then have the taxi bring us back to the hotel four hours later, from the restaurant at the trail’s end.

    We felt fortunate when we got a taxi, driven by a guy named Jorge, who said he would take us to Los Lagos, then pick us up at 1:00 at the restaurant for a fee of $12 CAD round trip.  As is often the case, when we got to Los Lagos, the reality didn’t quite live up to our expectations.   We forked out the $2 to get through a gate on the road and the little girl, who was the attendant wrote out a receipt and gave it to us, then unhooked the gate to allow the taxi to drive through.

    I had thought that we would be hiking to the lakes, but instead Jorge drove us down a rough “road” made up of two parallel concrete strips for the tires, with periodic speed bumps every 50 meters.  The speed bumps seemed pretty redundant considering the already bumpy concrete strips.  The “road” took us through a huge pasture complete with cows milling around, standing on the road (flashes came to me of every grazing lease in the many back valleys in the Robson Valley), to a grassy park beside one of the lakes.

    When we got out of the cab, we were dismayed, because the surroundings were nothing like the natural jungle we had expected.  Instead there were some picnic tables and shelters, a chapel, complete with Bible verses on signs nailed to the trees.  In the lake there were pedal-bike boats.  The only redeeming thing we found about the park were the big trees that had fortunately been spared by the developers, and the low clouds that gave the trees a primal feel.  We spotted some tropical birds, including a toucan-type bird with a large puke-colored green bill.

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