Best Laid Plans...

The plan was to meet at the Plaza arch at 8:00 this morning...  and from there we'd walk along a trail and end up in San Pancho a couple hours later.

That was the plan...

Memo takes those who wish to go on walks..  a 1 hour "by the river" walk on Monday's and a 2 hour, more rigorous walk on Thursdays.

There were 19 of us ready to go on the walk today...  a lot more folks than were expected...  only problem was, the guide didn't show up.  Christian was supposed to guide us on the cow path... along the seashore and over the mountain.  We had planned to walk the (about) 7 miles to San Pancho and take a bus back to Lo de Marcos....

Here's part of our group...  not the caballero or horse...  I think maybe questions were being asked about the trail up the mountain...

There we some really big houses along this road...  this one looks like a castle!  The landscaping around these places was like a botanical garden.  More about those things later...  let's stick to the trail...

Even if that means climbing over a wall and scooching under a barbed wire fence!

That's Memo holding the strands of wire up high enough for Bill to clamber through....

We walked up, up, up....

And even more up, up, up....

We'd come to a couple of forks in the road cowpath, and each time someone would make a decision about which way to go.... 

Did I mention that the back-up guide who was lined up didn't show up either? 

We all made it to the top (I'll admit I was doing a lot of huffy-puffing by this time)...  and the view was fantastic!  Worth the hike!  I should mention here that the day was very overcast...  in fact, a couple of folks wondered aloud if rain were imminent....  and the humidity can almost be seen in the air.  Anyway, if any of you were on our hike last Thursday, you are looking across to the mountain we climbed then.  

When I say mountain, I'm not talking using special equipment and scaling rocks...  I'm talking trails that are steep at times, very steep at times...  through the jungle, but mostly visible trails...  didn't really expect to do any bushwhacking...

However......  we could have if any of us had had a machete!

I think we were all wishing we did...

But the scenery was outstanding...  

Look at this banyan tree!

I hate it when all I can see is the back-side of a bird...  and I didn't carry my "big" Canon on this trek...  just the little 30X zoom.  I have no idea what this guy is...  and he was a long way off.  If his tail were longer (much longer) I'd have gone with Magpie Jay...  but.....  Oh well...

After trudging through jungle growth shoulder-high (or higher) and no real sign of any kind of a trail a self-respecting cow would walk along, we turned around and headed back to the Plaza Arch.  

So we didn't make it to San Pancho...  but we'd been walking about an hour.  I think most of the folks went for coffee...  Bill & I decided since we were psyched up for a longer hike, we'd head up the paved road that we hadn't been on yet.

Look at the gorgeous butterfly we saw!  I don't have field guides for the flora and fauna here, so don't know the species.  If I get decent enough photos I'll be able to identify them later.

We walked along the paved road, which then became a dirt road...  and then dropped down to a small community of lovely houses...  all with a view of the ocean...

We're on the beach, just below houses that hung right on the hillside....

The lava rocks jutted out more here than they do at Lo de Marcos, but the beach was soft and sandy.

Look at the waves pounding those rocks!

We stopped and looked at small tidal pools as we walked along the rocks, but didn't see many little critters and such.

We walked back along the road..  and headed back home.

I know you can't really see well enough, but how many folks do you think are riding on this motorcycle?

There are FIVE!  

I think it's the perfect photo for...

"The End"

That's All For Today!