Bahia Ballena
This is a large round bay that is protected and calm. Our first afternoon we went ashore and walked along the wide, beautiful beach to the town of Tambor. Since it was Sunday, nothing was open, except a bar, and a hotel restaurant. We stopped at the hotel to get a drink and snack. It was in a lush, tropical setting around the swimming pool and all the buildings were highly varnished natural wood as were the pool bar and tables and chairs. It was a beautiful and very relaxing environment. The "town" has 1 market, 1 restaurant, 1 church, 1 hardware store, 1 bar, and a few hotels. Unfortunately, we were not able to go swimming from the boat because the red tide was in the bay and the water was ugly. The next day we decided to take the bus to a nearby town of Montezuma to hike to the waterfalls. We got on a comfortable bus and had a nice ride to the town of Cobano, where we had to get off the bus and get on another bus (a yellow school bus and uncomfortable!) for the rest of the ride on a bumpy dirt road to Montezuma. It's also on the coast and has a surfing beach and a small cove. It's very quaint, hippy town that reminded me of Santa Cruz, CA. in the 60's. It's full of young people and an international mix of tourists. There are some basic motels with communal kitchens and hammocks under the palm trees, and some better hotels too. Some hotels advertise that they have hot water! There's an interesting mix of restaurants, including vegetarian, and organic food places. We walked up the road and found the path to the waterfall. The path only went a short way, then we were climbing up over big rocks and small waterfalls, and following the rocky river bed until we finally reached the waterfalls. The waterfalls were high and fell into a big pool that was cool and refreshing to swim in. There were a lot of people there and it seemed like tourists and locals alike went there to swim in the pool. It was fun to swim under the waterfall and have it pound on my head and back. Some of the locals began climbing up the rocks and jumping and diving into the pool (sort of like the Acapulco cliff divers, on a smaller scale!) We enjoyed a long time of swimming and lounging on the rocks, before we decided it was time to go back to town. We discovered a unique restaurant on the beach, called Las Artistas (the artists),with chairs and tables under palm trees and more tables under a covered area. The table tops were made from 6 inch thick cross cut sections of tree trunks that were varnished. There was a table low to the ground where people could sit or recline on pillows to eat. The menu was written on the freestanding chalkboard because it changed from lunch to dinner and from day to day. The food was good and it was run by a young man in his 20's who spoke French, Spanish, and English. There were 2 other tables of French speaking tourists there. After lunch, we went to a Mariposarium, which means a butterfly place. An Entymologist gave a tour and explained things about the caterpillars and butterflies, which was very interesting, and we saw many beautiful butterflies. The caterpillars eat plants that have a high alkaline content and that causes the butterflies to have bright colors which keep away their predators. The bright colors stand out in the green rainforest and lets their predators know that they are poisonous. At the end of this wonderful day we caught the bus back to Tambor and back to the boat.