So last weekend was quite sad because two of my closest friends from school left, Mike and Martina. Friday night was spent celebrating our last night all together. Then Saturday morning, me and Isabel had to be up at 6am because we were escaping Tamarindo and going to Monteverde, a cloud forest. Feeling rather fragile, we just about managed to survive the 5 hour bus journey. We stayed in a cute little town called Santa Elena, very different to what we have been used to - cold and quiet! We spent the afternoon in a butterfly garden (there's not that much to do in Santa Elena!) and then we went on a Twilight Walk through the forest. We saw a sloth, a porcupine, a goti, toucans, a huge tarantula, lots of fireflies and a big yellow snake, which was thankfully up a tree!

On Sunday, we did a tour on canopy swings - 11 ziplines suspended in mid-air over the cloud forest. The highest was 160 metres, the longest 770 metres and the fastest you are travelling at a speed of 55km/hour. I have to say, alot of screaming went on as I'm sure all who know me can imagine, but after the first couple, we were loving it! And obviously, the views were amazing. Then we did the more relaxing activity of the sky walk on the suspension bridges through the forest. After a busy morning, we enjoyed lunch in the Tree Top Restaurant, which actually has a huge tree going right through the middle into the the 2nd floor, so you are sitting amongst all the branches. A bit of a health hazard, I hit my head twice, but very cool!

After an exciting weekend, it was nice to arrive 'home' in Tamarindo on Sunday evening. This week at school has been quite hard, my brain is overloaded with so many verbs and tenses after 7 weeks. But having said that, I am still enjoying every minute. The rest of the week has been fairly quiet, everyone has running out of steam I think. Although me and Mike did hunt down the only casino in Tamarindo and I doubled my money on roulette!

Lots of love to everyone xxxxxxxxxxxx