Rafting the Rio Pacuare

Saturday of this past weekend, I went on nearly my final paseo here in Costa Rica. I was super excited when I saw that there would be a chance to go White Water Rafting here, for it is something I've always wanted to do, but have never before had the opportunity.
So at 6:00am our small group of 17 students loaded up into a van and drove the hour and a half out from San Jose to the Pacuare River located in the midst of the Native Indian National Park. After a quick breakfast of the ever famous Gallo Pinto with Scrambled Eggs at a road-side restaurant, we arrived at the river bank and went through the basic safety measures of rafting. You know - what to do if you lose a paddle, if your instructor should fall out of the raft, if you would get trapped under the raft . . . basic things :)
Actually, we didn't have any of these problems, Gracias a Dios, and had a really pleasant trip. It was rather cool and cloudy, and the water was a cool 65 degrees which made it a somewhat chillier trip than we all anticipated. We were on the river for approx. 4 hours and traveled 18 miles of lever 3 and 4 rapids. For those of you like me who have had no prior rafting knowledge, the hardest and most dangerous rapids are rated level 5's. So we were doing pretty well!
It was so much fun, and for me it was quite possibly my favorite trip I've taken so far. I was surprised at how much I enjoyed it, but I do hope that there will be more opportunities in the future to do more rafting.
We arrived at the end of our journey around 2:30 in the afternoon, and after a quick change and a short drive, we arrived back at the road-side restaurant to enjoy a delicious lunch of carribean chicken and rice and beans! Once we had eaten, we said our goodbyes to the river guides and hopped back in the van for the hour and a half ride back home. The majority of us conked out as soon as we started moving and slept most of the way home.
We arrived back in San Jose around 6:30 and the rest of the evening was super tranquilo. After a hot shower, and a hot dinner, I settled into my room to get enjoy a VH1 rerun of Sleepless in Seattle. But I am ashamed to tell you that I was so exhausted that I fell asleep with the remote in hand at 9:00 and slept solidly until 10:00 the next morning. Rafting is one of the best workouts I've ever had!