It was a slightly overcast Saturday on the road from Puerto Viejo to Punta Uva. The road, filled with potholes, meandered south between the beach and the jungle. Unlike Costa Rica's Pacific coast, the Caribbean side is far less developed, meaning instead of high rise hotels and massive marinas, each turn brought a small lodge or perhaps simply a local soda. Most turns brought more jungle.
There were nearly a dozen of us biking, and Avalon and I were at the end of the pack. We turned one corner and saw a group of bikers congregated a couple hundred meters ahead on the right side of the road. "Oh man," I thought, "I wonder whose bike went out?" (Several had already experienced issues with their tires and chains).
As we got closer I realized that there must have been an animal by the road, as several people had their cameras out and were carefully making their way off the shoulder. I assumed it was a monkey, but was pedaled faster to see because we had seen a lot more flora than fauna so far on the trip. I was pleasantly surprised, however, to find it wasn't a monkey, but a large sloth sitting in a tree by the road!
Avalon thought it was disgusting (apparently sloths house some sort of fungus on their fur) but I was excited, hoping to see a sloth for some time now. OK, excited may be an understatement. The lighting was pretty dark but I took some photos (since brightened by my completely uneducated hand in iPhoto--any photoshoppers out there want to take a stab at them, let me know) as well as a video, which I'll post at the end of this entry.
The skies opened up and we receieved an unwanted shower when we reached Punta Uva. It was fun for a while swimming in the Carribean in the rain, but soon we got pretty wet and miserable. Luckily, the rain stopped during the ride back, and we went from being cold and soaked to refreshed and damp. And, in the end, it was completely worth it to see the sloth. Now, if only we can see some monkeys...
More on Puerto Viejo to come soon
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