Our first full day here at Posada Colonial. Grant, the owner, came to wish us farewell as he is returning to Vancouver today. When he originally moved here he drove down through the USA, Mexico, Guatemala and Nicaragua. Joan was envious as she would like to do the Panamericana in its entirety. He brought us some fruit to put on the bird table and the birds descended, with all bright colours and shapes. A new group of birds to us are tanagers, who come in many sizes and plumages. We were entranced and watched for hours, taking photos when we could. There are lots of hummingbirds too but they dart off before you can grab your camera.

Our house is a the top of a valley. You can hear the river down below and the valley is very wooded. We heard a noise like maybe a bull or even a dinosaur and realised these were the infamous Howler monkeys who have voices that can penetrate 3 kilometres in the rain forest.

One of the reasons for coming to Arenal was to visit some of the hot springs. Soaking in warm water in the open air is one of our favourite things to do. In Chile and Peru, hot springs can often be just a simple pond in the ground with bubbles percolating upwards - often in a far flung place. Even the more developed ones can be quite basic - a concrete pool filled with rotten egg smelling water. But here they are highly commercialised - more like theme parks with bars, spa treatments and water slides. The majority of the hot springs are on the road between La Fortuna and Tabacon. We chose Baldi - which boasts it is the biggeest in the world. We turned up early doors and virtually had the place to ourselves. Bliss!

It starts getting dark around five and that's when the insects bite so we headed indoors and made a dinner of cauliflower mac n' cheese.