Gorilla Pods and Watermelon

It was a lazy Saturday.

9 AM came and went.

We casually decided to go for a bike ride across the island to a waterfall.

A leisurely adventure.

Mountain biking on volcanic rock halfway across an island was far from leisurely, but it was pretty fucking awesome.

It only took me less than 5 minutes of figuring out how to maneuver over volcanic rock on a mountain bike (truth be told, this was actually my first time really, truly Mountain Biking) to wipe out, but that was my first and only fall of the day.

We biked in peak sun hours to spectacular views of the island with blue skies and water for about an hour and a half, only stopping for some sandwiches and jugo natural and continued biking until we reached the entrance to the waterfall maybe 45 minutes after our stomachs were satisfied.

That is when The Amazing Race really began. Our legs had already turned to guava jelly before we began hiking, so even though the hike really wasn't too challenging, we were worn out enough to think it was.

Maddy actually booted it; ie threw up from exhaustion and then kept on hiking. I think her exact words were 'I didn't bike all the way here to not make it to the top of this waterfall, c'mon.'

It was definitely worth the pains to get to the top of this waterfall. It brought back memories of one of the spots we'd set up camp when I was hiking the Rockies- a day where I'd fallen earlier (surprise) and we stumbled upon the perfect camping spot right next to a waterfall. An epic picture followed of me smiling bigger than ever with a waterfall in the background and a wrapped up leg with a blood stained wool sock. If this isn't perfection, I don't know what is.

We enjoyed some self timed pictures, por su puesto, and then 3:30 rolled around and we realized we had to hurry up if we wanted to make it back before dark.

I don't know how we mustered up the energy, but we did actually make it back to Balgues right as the evening's darkness settled over the town. I thank Jim, nearly entirely, for this feat- as he was responsible for biking ahead and meeting us with watermelon and sweet bread that I think saved our lives and gave us the extra second wind we needed to make the hilly ride back in one piece.

Biking to a waterfall and back felt like one of the most extreme things I've done and it was the best way to say goodbye to Isla de Omatepe.