What’s crackin! BBL (Bread Basket Lieutenant) and BBR (Bread Basket Rookie) here. Today was our final full day in Aquiares and at Casa Aquiares Lodge. We woke up bright and early at 7:30 and went to the kitchen at 8:00 for a spectacular breakfast cooked by the amazing Diego and Rosa. We had french toast, fried egg with green onion, yogurt accompanied by granola, fresh fruit, and fruit juice. After breakfast, we were able to all sit down, let the food settle, and have some downtime. Some of us hung out, others played a game called four square later on going to the market for some crazy good snacks.

Following three hours of downtime, many of us got ready and prepared for a trip to Turrialba. Upon walking down to the core, we awaited the arrival of the bus, our first experience with public transportation in Costa Rica. We got on the bus and to no surprise, there were many people on it. By some stroke of luck, we were all mostly able to find seats for the 15-minute ride ahead. We talked to some locals sitting near and met another traveler who we had seen previous to this drive. Going on, we walked for a while before stopping at a church and entering to take a look at this magnificent structure and interior. Despues de la Iglesia, we got ice cream at a very nice shop where we were able to get delicious tasting desserts. Continuing on, we walked over bridges, seeing how the recent storm and floods affected different houses. Afterward, we went to the stores to purchase stress balls at some and different baked goods at others. Finishing off our trip we got back on the human dense bus until we got back to Aquiares.

Back at the hostel, we settled in for lunch and some more downtime before our intensely saddening final reflection. We had group discussions on each other, the experience and ourselves before coming back together to share our thoughts and consecutively continuing onto a “Start” “Continue” & “Stop” activity. In this activity we shared things we want to start when we get back home, things we want to continue on from this trip and into our daily lives, and finally things we want to focus on not doing upon arriving back home. After sharing some highlights, we went on to share some feelings we had for each other by forming a circle, with our backs facing the middle, and tapping each other on the shoulders depending on if the question applied to that person we tapped. Finishing off the night, we passed a paper around that had the respective person’s name on it and shared some “Big Love” about that person. After receiving our papers back, we read some of the comments and shared out, forcing many of us to cry about the sad ending of this unbelievable trip.

We can’t wait to see you all tomorrow!!