A blur!

Well the days since my last post have literally been a blur! We have visited a private school, a coffee plantation, and zip-lined!

I'll start with the private school, it's called "Creativa" by the locals. This school is simply amazing! The school itself is on 106 acres and has about 180 students. The population is about 90% ticos and 10% international. There are about 16-20 students per class (similar to the private school I went to, Hobgood).  This school's mission is to foster students who are environmentally conscience and bilingual. They take classes in all their subjects in English and also have a Spanish class. They give the students a lot of freedom to explore and walk around the forest and foster hands on learning opportunities in that way. They also have a garden (in which each student is responsible to find seeds, plant them, care for them and then they get to take them home to eat with their families), they also plant trees in a reforestation effort, and have a compost program that they use for their plants. I really enjoyed getting to see this refreshing attitude about learning and exploration.

Yesterday we went to Cafe Monteverde Coffee Plantation. We began with Don Guierrmo (1/10 of the owners of the company and 1/6 family members who are owners) talking to us about their ideaology, processes, and how the fair trade system works. We then started walking and he asked us to find some seeds that had fallen from one of the trees. We collected them and then planted them. Next we all grabbed some trees that were ready to be planted and headed out to a pasture they are going to convert to cropland and planted the trees in a line that will be used to block wind, protect the soil from erosion, and attract natural wildlife. I got to plant an avocado tree so I now have an avocado tree in Costa Rica!

Yesterday morning our whole group went zip lining at Sky Trek! It was awesome! There were 9 zip-lines that each had an awesome view! I got to go on one with the guide and I got to video tape as he turned me around to get the best views!

This morning I got to go with my Tio (uncle) Ronald to the Original Canopy Tour! It was awesome. Because both of my parents here work there I got to go for free! It was just me and 2 other people from Georgia. This tour was a lot more natural and had more options! I got to do a giant Tarzan Swing, climb up through a Strangler Fig tree, repel straight down 40 meters and zip line! It was incredible!