For three weeks this summer I decided to leave the hustle and bustle of London to experience a completely new adventure in Costa Rica. For the first two weeks I lived with a local family in the capital, San José, whilst volunteering as an English teacher for adults. I spent my last week on the Pacific coast in a town called Quepos, a short bus journey from the beach where I surfed every day.
Whilst I was in Costa Rica, I saw many beautiful places and did some amazing things. In one weekend I did a zip-lining tour through a jungle and visited a volcano and several stunning waterfalls. During my final week I visited Manuel Antonio National Park several times and saw sloths, iguanas and plenty of monkeys (who love to steal people’s belongings).
Even though I have countless memories from the trip, there are a few which I will never be able to forget. I like to call these memories moments of true happiness. I define these as moments when my mind completely lets go of all worries and problems and replaces them with a feeling of complete happiness.
The first time this happened in Costa Rica was when I went zip-lining. The final zip-wire was called the ‘superman wire’. On this wire, you wear a full-body harness and you travel horizontally, instead of in a sitting-up position. For a couple of minutes I felt like I was flying and I could see the beautiful jungle beneath me.
It happened again during one of my surf lessons. I had fallen off many times, but finally I managed to catch a wave with no help from the instructors. It felt incredible!
The final time it happened was at the end of an afternoon of hiking. It was a really hot day and I had been walking all the different hiking trails in the National Park. After a while I stopped at one of the beaches, buried my bag so the monkeys couldn’t steal it and ran into the water to cool off. It was the best feeling!
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