Santa Elena: Canopy Tour and Reserva Bosque Nuboso Cloud Forest

Diary:

In the morning we did one of the celebrated Monteverde treetop tours with Adventura Canopy Tours, the newest operator with the greatest number of zip lines. In these tours, you are fitted with a climbing harness and get attached via a pulley to a system of steel cables rigged from treetop to treetop. Once attached, you launch off the safety platforms and literally fly across to the next tree, using your leather gloved hand on the cable to brake. It is quite an exhilarating experience; some canopy stations are over fifty feet off the ground, and some lines pass through only minimal clearances between the branches of the huge trees, while other lines are over half a kilometer long and span small valleys which you fly across over one hundred feet above the ground. Despite the exposed nature of the attraction it seemed quite safe, with guides present on all the platforms to handle the safety lines and transfer us from one cable to the next. At all times we were connected via safety lines to some kind of fixed belay to prevent us falling.

In the afternoon we went for a 5km hike in the cloud forest Reserva Bosque Nuboso. It was a moist and lush rainforest that was a true wonder. Moss growing on every surface imaginable, giant vines and exotic ferns everywhere. We saw a family of white-faced monkees in the trees and also a red brocket deer.

Photos: (click on images to see full size)