We arrived at the put-in around 10:00 and met Alex Fernández, the owner of, International Adventures Unlimited (IAU), our tour company.  He speaks perfect, unaccented English, having grown up in California.  We were underway in less than 15 minutes.  The river runs through virgin tropical rain forest with class 3-4 rapids over our 27 km run.  The bedrock was Pliocene-age basalts and andesites. I interpret these strata to be the remanents of an ancient volcano that has been mostly removed by erosion. Occasionally I saw explosion breccias and beds of ash. Rhyolitic ash flows are abundant in the lower part of the river. 

The highlight of the trip was definitely the lunch that the IAU crew prepared for us. It was served on the bottom of one of the rafts that they flipped over to use as a table. After gorging on all sorts of tropical fruits, I think most of us were ready for a siesta but we pressed onward instead.

My boat had Moises as a guide and Jennifer, Liz, Rachel, Lindsay, and me.  We worked well on the beautiful river with great rides on the rapids and nice flat water to swim in.  I managed to lose my glasses when I jumped in without thinking to take them off.
 

Most of the rapids on the Río Pacuare are Class III. During times of high  water, some are Class IV and Class V. This was a fairly dry year so we  really only experienced a couple of big rapids.

The river runs through an indigenous reserve.  We saw loads of beautiful birds and butterflies, trees, flowers, landslides, rocks, it was wonderful.  A few people fell out of one raft in one of the bigger rapids but they were quickly rescued.  The whole trip took about 5 hours with an hour out for the fantastic lunch.
 

No one complained of boredom as we descended the river. Each rapid  emptied into a quiet pool. It was hard to believe that we were passing  through a dense tropical rain forest that is almost completely unaffected  by human activity.

From the take-out we traveled an hour and a half to Sarapiquí where we stayed at the Hotel Ara Ambigua. Almost immediately, one of the students accidentaly broke a sink that was precariously attached (detached?) on her bathroom wall. At first the humidity seemed overwhelming but then the sun set and cooled things down enough to make it bearable as long as we stayed outside. Naturally, the evening evolved so that most of the time was spent inside.

When I arrived at the dining room, cocktail hour was in full swing. Margaret was a little disconcerted about the students' drinking and had tried to call Brevard to update them on the situation with Lauren's passport/plane ticket/money/etc. While we were talking in the middle of the dance floor, a small snake slithered across the tiles between our feet.
 

A floatable feast was prepared for us on the Río Pacuare by the  IAU crew.

Jeremy Campbell and IAU's Alex Fernández accompanied the group in kayaks. Here, Jeremy skirts along the base of one of the many waterfalls we passed as we continued downriver.

I had an esophageal spasm at dinner and couldn’t swallow.  It caused some excitement but I was okay after 15 minutes. Margaret and I talked for about an hour before she retired for the night.  The students persuaded me to come back to the restaurant for an evening of karaoke.  It was a riot.  We sang a bunch of numbers and numerous Costa Ricans did too.  A guy named Franklin did "The Great Pretender". Some of our hits were "To All the Girls I Ever Loved", "Country Roads", "Fire and Rain", and "The Gambler". Everyone in the place sang "Guantanamera". We had a blast in spite of the oppressive heat and humidity. Perhaps the most memorable image of the evening was our whole group singing and dancing. Most of the students tried out their Spanish which was really appreciated by the very patient locals.  They were excellent ambassadors and the Costa Ricans really enjoyed our presence and participation. We broke up at midnight and I fell asleep in an instant.