Cerro Santa Cruz

OK, so it wasn’t exactly a mountain, just a hill but near the top it felt like a mountain! I didn’t make it all the way up, deciding to be sensible and not stress my sore knee any further, so some of these photos were taken by Joel.

Our Target, as seen from the entrance of our neighborhood. Joel made it up to the top where you see the bushy tree above the gray roof. I made it maybe 3/4 of the way.

I think we took a difficult route up. The higher we went the steeper it was, and it was hard to get a solid footing in the dry leaves and loose dirt. We found out later that there are easier routes so if we go again, we’ll try something different.

But, we did manage to get some photos. Click on one and you can go through the gallery.

We head out across the field

This is a shack next to the field, and a man says he has lived there for 20 years. I need to write a blog post about him one of these days!

OK, continuing through the field approaching the hill.

Starting to climb, looking back down on the field

It’s getting steeper as we head up the hill

We’ve come up quite a ways. That’s the field way down there through the trees.

and then it gets more steep.

Joel leads the way

Wow, we are really getting up there

the vine!

You can see our neighborhood and the rest of the city below. This is about as far up as I went.

We usually look UP to this water tank.

Joel goes higher still with the camera

Joel makes it to the top! The sun in shining through the clouds over Volcan Baru, making an interesting rainbow effect in one part

And then, we get to make our way back down the steep hill!

I’m glad to report we both survived relatively unscathed except for a bunch of seeds clinging to us, some scratches, and tired legs. I hope we give it another try sometime because I’d like to see the view from the top.

Joel also took a bit of video.