Costa Rican adventure

"If you see a jaguar, don't run," the taxi driver advised me. I knew he was not joking. Pumas attack people here quite often.

I do not even know what made me decide to walk from Monteverde to La Fortuna. Sometimes I have a tendency to gamble with my life, and at twenty-five everyone probably feels immortal. In the end, ten kilometers through the Costa Rican jungle did not seem like much to me, especially when the bus detour was supposed to take an entire day.

I had already been staying in Central America for a few months as a digital nomad, and I knew the local conditions fairly well. Or at least I thought I did. The people of Monteverde said the crossing was possible; it was just that nobody had done it for a few years. Maybe only the taxi driver's advice planted a seed of doubt in my head.

It was raining, which, after all, is almost constant in Costa Rica. The road was wide and offered a beautiful view of Lake Arenal, where I needed to get. So far it seemed easy. But the road began to narrow until it turned into a streambed, and eventually even the little that remained of it disappeared. I tried to descend into the valley and follow the river that flows into the lake.

A walk along a path soon became a struggle through the jungle with my bare hands. Somehow it had not occurred to me to bring a machete.

For a while it was fun. I felt like a Spanish conquistador. But El Dorado was not waiting for me. I was moving at a hundred meters an hour, and from my wrists to my elbows my arms were scratched bloody by thorny vegetation.

At the place where the offline maps said there should be a ford, I found a wild river that was barely passable by raft, let alone fordable without equipment. The alternative was climbing up a steep, muddy slope. That was still the friendlier option, even with the snakeskin at its base. My shoes and clothes were starting to soak through with mud, but in the rush of adrenaline and concentration I did not notice. The same went for hunger and thirst. All needs were slowly reduced to the last one: survival.

Beyond the slope the descent became gentler and the vegetation thinner. A forgotten trail found me and led me out of the jungle. Before long, several cows welcomed me in a meadow. I was on the other side, and I felt a little relieved. But the worst trouble was still to come.

The river curved across the meadow and joined another river. Here there was no way to continue with dry feet, even if I still had any. On the other side, a clear track used by a local farmer was already tempting me, and perhaps even the hint of a building somewhere in the distance.

But every attempt to ford the river was useless. Even with improvised sticks for balance, I got no farther than a meter before the water reached my waist. The current was strong even at the very edge of the river. I started worrying about the company laptop in my backpack. If I drowned it, my digital nomad life would be over. But the river threatened the loss of life itself, not just a lifestyle. I could not go on and hoped the farmer would come to check on his cattle. But nobody came, and nobody answered my calls.

I settled down, ate my can of food and a sweet bar, and thought about what to do next. Crossing the river was impossible, not to mention there was no phone signal or internet. Go back? So close to the goal? Through all that insane jungle? Absolutely not.

There was the option of fording the milder tributary, but at its far end there was no longed-for road. Instead, there was another sharp, muddy slope. I admit that my will and judgment were under serious pressure, yet I did not panic. In fact, I loved it. That is the answer to the question of why I had set out in the first place. I wanted to get myself into that situation and under that pressure.

It was getting dark, and with the darkness all further attempts ended. The night was endless, but beautiful and full of brightly shining stars. Thank God it did not rain all night, and I was not in danger of hypothermia. The jaguar did not appear either; only now and then the head of a snorting ox emerged from the darkness. I wandered in my thoughts and let the sky hypnotize me. What would happen when dawn came?

In the end, the farmer did find me in the morning. He stared in disbelief and waved. He brought two horses, and despite everything I had been through, I crossed the river with dry feet on the back of a horse that was itself belly-deep in the water. The Nicaraguan was very surprised and kept asking how I had actually got there.

When I explained in broken Spanish where I had crossed from, he approvingly declared that I had given myself a fine adventure. I gave him the rest of my cash as thanks. After all, it had only been a matter of life and death.

The rest of the journey felt almost euphorically beautiful and easy. I marched enthusiastically through ankle-deep mud, my shoes squelching with every step. As soon as I reached the road, I stuck out my thumb, and the first passing pickup gave me a ride in the back. In my state, it would have been inappropriate to sit on the seat.

Before long I was on the edge of La Fortuna, and all the adrenaline began to fade. Survival instincts retreated, and the painful sobering-up from all the hormones kicked in. I was completely chewed up by the jungle, wet, dirty, and exhausted. I had drops of mud all the way behind my neck. I was not even able to peel an orange; the juice from the peel seemed to seep into every scratch on my hands.

I was sitting in the hostel at a small table for two when a complete stranger sat down beside me. She started talking to me. She was a lovely Canadian, clean, put together, and in absolute contrast to me. When she spoke, she looked me in the eyes and completely ignored my terrible condition.

That evening, after sunset, when I was finally clean, she rewarded me with the sweetest kiss. I had never felt more alive.