The Oakley Girls Road Trip... Continued
Jul 19 2007 / Los Angeles, CALast month the Oakley girls took a trip to Costa Rica for surf, surf and a photoshoot. Follow mountain biker Darcy Turenne’s update of their adventures here.
Did you miss part one of this story published yesterday? Click Here to read it first!
Needless to say, the next morning we were an hour late showing up for our boat trip that would take us to the wildlife sanctuary. We boarded a homemade Costa Rican cruiser and within 10 minutes started making up for the lack of sleep from the night before. On the way to the sanctuary we warmed up our wildlife watching skills by seeing a pod of pilot whales cruise by our boat and captain Chris and I kept everyone entertained (or very annoyed, I’m not sure) by emceeing the events on the microphone.
After a very relaxing cruise we pulled up to a black sand beach framed by glowing green rainforest and were greeted by no other than Sweetpea the spider monkey. The guide gave us the lowdown on Sweetpea immediately. She said “Don’t come to Sweetpea, Sweetpea will come to you…and don’t worry, she will come to you.” Turns out Sweetpea was a showgirl. It was crazy how she would grab onto anything or anyone and use them as her own person jungle gym and there was no doubt by the way she strutted around that she owned the place! The similarities between her and a very smart small child were uncanny. She was ticklish, she loved to play, and she loved attention and would go to any lengths to get it. The only difference was that Sweetpea was as strong as a grown man and very hairy.
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I had my favorite lip balm attached to my camera bag and within 5 minutes of arriving at the sanctuary I felt something weird grab my arm. Before I knew what was happening I saw Sweetpea swinging on my arm by her tail and POOF, my lip balm was gone. After a minute I realized I was not getting it back (not that I wanted it back because she had eaten half the tube) but her mannerisms reminded exactly of a kid who had just stolen a piece of bubble gum and was egging her parents on to come catch her. I didn’t get the worst of Sweatpea though. Daniella, the marketing girl from Oakley, got a very unexpected visit from Sweatpea while using the restroom. It turns out Sweatpea is a little too inquisitive!
We also got to meet Lulu the howler monkey who wasn’t quite as rambunctious as Sweatpea but definitely liked attention and would make it be known by grabbing your hair if she wasn’t getting enough. A cute little green parrot took a real liking to Roxy and Kira and hung out on their heads for a while as we learned about the territorial nature and aggression of the beautiful Macaw parrot. You know, the ones in pet shops that say “Polly wanna cracker?” Yeah, those ones. Turns out they are endangered and vicious. They took over the grounds keepers’ house by nesting in it and will dive-bomb and snap your Achilles tendon if you try and get close. Now the tenants live in a camp on the fringe of the property. I guess I got too close because one of them decided to use the side of my face as a toilet! Now at least I can say I got pooped on by an endangered species!
Watching the monkeys and seeing all the other funky little creatures at the sanctuary was amazing, but it was the sloth that stole my heart. Sloths are amazing creatures. They are so slow that their heart only beats once every 11 seconds and they don’t move further than a kilometer radius in their entire life. The docile nature of the sloth was a nice change of pace from the monkey chaos and as soon as I held it I actually felt very mellow myself. I knew it wasn’t going to steal my sunglasses, pull my hair, or attack my face with its massive claws. Even if it tried to, I would probably have an hour to react because it was so slow. My sloth and I hung out for a while, then I passed her on to Niki who fell in love, then Jade who fell in love, then the photographer Chris who even showed glimmers of maternal instinct while holding her.
It was hard to say goodbye to our furry and feathered friends but the boat was threatening to leave without us, so we climbed back aboard and said adios. On our way back to Puerto Jiminez we stopped to do some snorkeling and check out some eerie mangroves. We didn’t see much snorkeling except for a few angle fish and a small stingray, but I almost choked on my snorkel when Ronnie mooned me underwater and I caught a glimpse of what was later to become know as the “New York whitefish”.
The next day it was time to get scared. Axel set us up with his friend Andy who guided waterfall-repelling trips in the jungle. Andy is an American who looks, acts, and sounds exactly like Super Dave Osborne. Seriously, this guy is the Costa Rican Super Dave reincarnate. When we were walking to the falls he stops at a side of a tree and got really excited because there was, according to him, a dead monkey carcass and their fat eats like a delicacy. We were all pretty grossed out and then he decides to get a big ball of what looked like fat and pop it in his mouth! After we freaked out he told us that it was only sap and that we were suckers. Next on the menu were termites. Axl and Liesl had told Andy that if he should make anyone eat termites it should be me, so when I saw his hand go into a termite nest I got a bit nervous. He pulled it out and began licking his fingers like they covered in chocolate, not termites, and told us that they were a great source of protein and made your teeth white. Curiosity got the best of me and I did it. I reached into the nest and ate termites. They tasted like pepper with a nutty crunch…something that you’d throw on a salad. Jade must have been hungry too because she got in right behind me and scooped herself a finger full. We both felt pretty adventurous after that! Our hike up to the falls was also very odd. It turns out that because of some chemical reaction in the water, the rocks had more traction if you walked upstream through the river itself, so instead of walking along the trail, we all walked effortlessly up the river and even scaled small waterfalls with ease. We must have looked like superheroes. I know I felt like one.
When we got to the top of the waterfalls there were mixed emotions throughout the group. I was SO pumped to feel some adrenaline and do something I had never done before and Mizuki was too. While we were looking at the first waterfall she had a huge grin on her face and said to me “I like danger!” Niki and Claudia looked intensely excited, but Kira and Roxy weren’t quite as stoked. Roxy hates heights and Kira doesn’t like the feeling of falling straight down so I can’t imagine the thought of repelling down a huge rushing waterfall was that appealing to them. These girls are tough though and ignored their fears like the true athletes they are and scaled down the first waterfall with ease.
Everyone felt alive after the first waterfall, especially Kira and I who messed up by grabbing onto roots with our brake hand and could have potentially plummeted to our death if it wasn’t for the very skilled safety rope handler down below. Woops! It was a very intense feeling letting yourself drop over the edge of a cliff into the unknown, and it was only about to get more intense. The first waterfall was pretty easy. There were places to put your feet and you could pretty much lean back and walk down it. The second waterfall was a bit more daunting. It was about twice the height and covered in slick moss. Andy told us we could ice skate down the side of it, but I’m still wondering how that was supposed to be reassuring?
I was the first one to take the plunge and it was surprising how nervous I was. It takes a lot to get me scared, but when I looked down only 20 feet into my descent I actually started to shake! This thing was high! By about a third of the way down I started to feel comfortable and had some fun jumping side to side on the ropes like Spiderman. Niki, Mizuki, and Claudia came shortly after me but Roxy and Kira opted to take the trail. It obviously wasn’t the same trail though because we couldn’t find Roxy until we met at the car at the end of the day.
The Oakley Girls Road Trip... Continued Read the final part here
