Day 7 8/19/12 - Emily Mumford

This morning was our last day in Los Chiles. We got up really early, had breakfast, and said our goodbyes. We were sad to leave the farm. We all came to love Don Tony's beautiful smile and our spanish conversations with the boys there. We got on the road and traveled to Arenal which is an incredible active volcano. We took pictures of it and made our way to Baldi hot springs resort. It was amazing. It was strange going from such extreme poverty to such luxury. The resort had many awesome hot springs ranging from 93 degrees to 116 degrees. We went down the fun slides and explored looking for the hottest water we could find. There were awesome hidden spots all around. There were water falls, beds in the hot springs where you could lay down, secret steam rooms hidden in the rocks, even secret cold pools in the middle of the larger hot ones. It was so much fun. Once we divided and showered we ate at a buffet.  There where many of us who were excited to not have rice and beans again. After the hot springs we set off for a canopy tour and the sky darkened a bit. It looked like a storm was rolling in but because we were in the mountains it was hard to tell. The canopy tour was a series of zip lines set up in the forest. It was incredible. we got our harnesses and gloves and we trekked to the learn how to get on and off the zip lines. It was so much fun to fly through the air on these awesome lines. You could hear the howler monkeys and the trees were pretty dense so you couldn't feel the rain that had started to fall. We got to one part after zipping through a number of obstacles. It was called the Tarzan swing. They clipped your harness to a rope and just pushed you into the jungle. It honestly felt like you were suspended in mid air, flying. It was an awesome experience. We made it through a few more lines and the bus was waiting. The last line was the longest and it was glorious. It was through the awesome jungle and you just went forever. After the canopy tour we made our way to San Jose. We swapped stories on the bus ride, sang along to some Michael Jackson, and we were at the AMCA house before we knew it. Matt shared an intense testimony after dinner and we all went to bed happy our sheets weren't damp anymore.