I left Ometepe in Nicaragua and spent one last hot and sweaty night in Granada. The next morning I was in a shuttle to the airport in Managua and then winging my way to the next country on my list, Costa Rica. I had to spend about six hours in the Panama City airport because my connection got delayed, but I finally made it to San Jose, rented a car, and then drove myself to nearby Grecia, where I’ll be spending the next few nights. It was a very long day, but at least it was all air conditioned. There’s really nothing to do in Grecia, it’s just a quiet and peaceful little town to base myself to explore Bajos del Toro up in the mountains to the north.

Bajos del Toro is a small village up in the mountains, but really this whole region is referred to as Bajos del Toro. It’s famous for the many many many waterfalls all around. So, that’s basically all I did. Drove around the twisty turning mountain roads and hiked from one jaw-dropping waterfall to another. Car equals freedom! I began my waterfall-a-palooza with one of the biggest and most popular waterfalls in the area, Catarata del Toro.

To get to the viewpoint seen above wasn’t a hike at all, it was just a couple hundred feet, but getting down to the bottom was another matter.

After ignoring all the warning signs and enjoying the flowers on the knee crushing descent, you finally get up close and personal with the falls. The Poás Volcano is not far from here and this waterfall is apparently in the ash field, so the mist from the falls makes my eyes burn a bit. It’s a pretty unusual sensation.

To get here I walked down about a million steps of doom. The views were great on the way down, but now it’s time to climb back up.

It’s too bad Nicaragua was so insanely hot and humid because there was a lot of cool things to see and do there. The weather here in Bajos del Toro is downright refreshing by comparison. It’s warm, but with lots of shade and cool breezes and less humidity, I’m absolutely loving it so far!

I bought a combo ticket for Catarata del Toro that includes a visit to Blue Falls just a short hop down the road. Blue Falls is just the collective name of the six waterfalls you can see there. I have a feeling there are more steps of doom in my immediate future. Let’s get started.

I was right. Each waterfall involves walking down its own steps of doom, enjoying the awesomeness at the bottom and then hiking back up. Rinse and repeat.

I went to the furthest waterfall first, Catarata Tepezquintle, and then worked my way back. Everything here is so beautiful, and the sounds of thundering water from all of the falls and the river comes at you from all directions and never quiets down. This place is amazing!

Next was Cataratas las Gemelas, two waterfalls right next to each other.

From what I read, Bajos del Toro is supposedly the undiscovered part of Costa Rica… FALSE! Actually, there really aren’t a lot of other tourists here, but I made the mistake of visiting during holy week, when every Central American between Mexico and Panama has the week off. So, locals and their families are here enjoying the falls too by the hundreds. Getting pictures has been challenging.

Moving right along, Catarata la Celestial was the next on the trail. I’m climbing up and down steps to all these waterfalls like I was climbing up and down Mayan ruins a few weeks ago. I’m gonna have thighs and calves of steel when I’m done here.

The only “waterfall” from the Blue Falls Trail that I didn’t include in this post is Pozo Azul. It was more of a swimming hole with rapids and it was covered in people. The last waterfall I saw today was Catarata la Pintada. They don’t allow you to go down to the actual falls on this one, only to a viewpoint, but what a view it is!

This whole region is a cloud forest. Sometimes the sun is shining and sometimes the clouds and mist roll through. This is really an incredible place! And wow are my legs are wobbly. Time for a big dinner and some sleep. Luckily, the best restaurant in Grecia is attached to my hotel and owned by the same people.

The drive between Grecia and Bajos del Toro involves a lot of winding roads and steep ups and downs, but holy crap is it a fun and scenic drive!

Day two I was back to waterfall hopping, starting at Tesoro Escondido. All of these waterfalls are along the same one lane road too by the way, which is pretty convenient.

Tesoro Escondido is the name of the main waterfall here, but there are actually three to see on this trail. First I have to cross another suspension bridge that I hope was constructed well and try not to anger any locals hiding in the bushes.

After that a bit of hiking and some more steps of doom.

And then finally I reached Catarata Tesoro Escondido. Also, with the volcano nearby, there are tons of minerals in the water, which is what makes it so blue and a lot of the rocks are yellowish and white.

Just a short way downstream from Catarata Tesoro Escondido are the other two unnamed waterfalls. They may be smaller, but it’s hard not to be beautiful in a place like this.

I should also mention that all these places are owned and operated by local farmers. These unbelievable waterfalls just happen to be on their property. So waterfall hopping here is a super fun experience, but it’s also expensive as hell, anywhere from ten to twenty dollars a pop. These farmers apparently know exactly what they have here.

In addition to all the different flowers, I also found some wild blackberries. I’m no expert, but I don’t think they were ripe yet because they were kind of bitter.

Due to the ridiculous prices at some of these places, I’ve been trying to maximize the experience by going to the ones that have the most to offer. For my next stop, I picked Finca Dos Ríos, partly because there are four waterfalls here and partly because it’s a bit out of the way. Most of the holy week holidayers seem to have skipped this one. Awesome!

Turns out I was right. There weren’t very many people here. The first waterfall on this hike was Catarata Pilas, but it was facing the wrong direction. Time to take the shoes off and do some wading.

Now that’s more like it! That cold water felt really good too.

I saw this very scary tree on the way back up from Catarata Pilas. I think about it now every time I reach out to grab a branch for balance walking up and down the steep slopes and the steps of doom.

The next three waterfalls were all right near each other. As I came around the bend I could spot the last waterfall, Catarata Amarilla, in the distance. It made for an incredible photo, but we’ll come back to Catarata Amarilla in a minute.

They were nice enough to build a bridge passing in front of Catarata Dos Colores so I could get up close. That’s the pic below left. The other was a look back after passing on the other side.

Just a few steps beyond that was La Caverna. If this one doesn’t have ambience, then I don’t know what does. The best part was being able to go in the cave and see the waterfall from behind. The picture kind of looks like it was raining, but nope, that’s just a wonderful waterfall.

Finally I made it down to Catarata Amarilla. It’s hiding in a tight little cove, so I had to get in and do some more wading from here to see it, but wow!

What seems to be the most popular place overall in Bahos del Toro is Río Agrio, also known as Dino Land. Ha! They apparently have statues of life sized dinosaurs all over the place in addition to their amazing waterfall. As you can imagine it’s the kids favorite one and the place was a zoo. Just driving past it was a traffic nightmare. Thankfully though, the Greenstar Restaurant just up the road has a viewpoint, so you can see the waterfall without having to deal with all the kids and dinosaur nonsense. So I went to take a look before driving back down to Grecia for the night.

The next morning it was time to leave Grecia for my next stop, but on the way I made a little detour to Parque los Chorros just a short distance to the south. This place is also on a locally owned farm. After parking I had to walk through a couple of pastures, past a bunch of cows (be sure to close the gate behind you), and then through a hole in the fence.

There’s actually two waterfalls here, but it was really crowded and more and more people were flooding in, and I didn’t feel like swimming to get to the second waterfall right before my long drive. So I just enjoyed the first waterfall for a bit before hitting the road.

After Los Chorros, the drive up and over the hills on my way northwest was incredibly beautiful, but it came with a lot of traffic too. I’ll be glad when holy week is over and the locals go back to work and school. How dare they take a week off and go out to enjoy their own country!

I’ll end this first post from Costa Rica here. Now as I said, I’m headed northwest to see more. It’s a good thing too because my legs really need a day to rest. Until the next post…