Price from:
$75
Community, Culture & Conservation - Arenal Tours - Arenal Activities Costa Rica
Details:Community, Culture & Conservation
| Price |
US$75 per person (Minimun 4 people). |
|---|---|
| Includes |
|
| Start times |
Departs daily at 8:30am |
| Duration |
Around 6 horus. |
| What to Bring |
Your camara and a love for animals. |
Arenal Costa Rica has many aspects to its treasures. Alongside the adventurous tour opportunities near Arenal, Volcano, there is now a great chance to get to know the 'real' Costa Rica with Desafio Adventure Company’s new Culture, Community & Conservation tour. This unique tour is a relaxing, peaceful way of going behind the scenes and putting you in direct contact with some of the promising cultural and rescue projects happening in the area.
The tour starts with a drive to the Proyecto Asis Animal Rescue Shelter. Along the way you are encouraged to ask questions about the local agriculture and surroundingfarms.
Asis is a privately-run wildlife rehabilitation center that rescues and cares for up to 40 animals at any given time. Named “Asis” for the patron saint of nature, the shelter was founded by a locally-famous veterinarian to house the many orphaned and injured animals brought to his practice. The shelter’s eight acres of primary and secondary forest included swampy areas that attracted local species like alligator snapping turtles, caiman, boat-billed herons and black-billed whistling ducks.
At the center you will be greeted by the owner or manager and treated to an easy 30-minute walk through secondary rainforest. You will then be introduced to the current resident wild animals such as crocodiles, wild boars and monkeys and learn about local efforts to rehabilitate injured, abandoned animals and release them back to their environment (where possible) as well as educational programs underway to help prevent hunting and poaching of the surrounding Children’s Rainforest. Proyecto Asis also rescues animals, like Hercules the spider monkey that had been chained up as tourist attraction at a hotel. You will meet Perla, a white-lipped peccary (native wild pig) with a lot of personality! Perla was brought to Proyecto Asis by a forest ranger after her mother was killed by poachers near the Nicaraguan border. Peccaries are social animals and would likely ostracize Perla in the wild, making her survival as a wild pig a challenging.
Everyone's favorite animal is Benjamin an absolutely tame and darling kinkajou. - the absolute star of the tour! Benjamin is a curious kinkajou that fell from his nest in a tree. Every evening the shelter staff takes Benjamin on a hike to get him used to being in the forest. They leave his cage door open at night in hopes that one day he will be ready to be a wild kinkajou once again.
At the moment Asis is trying to raise money to build a new monkey cage for the residents that cannot be re-introduced to the wild.
The next stop is Luna Nueva. Started in 1994, its 208 acres encompass a medicinal plant farm, organic fruit and veggie garden, as well as a working ranch where pigs, goats, chickens, water buffalo and cattle are raised. One of the farm’s main purpose is to connect people to their food: an important, forgotten concept in an era of frenzied work schedules and fast-food consumption. The farm cultivates and exports over 50 tons of turmeric and ginger each year (extolled for their anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties, these spices along with other healing plants are used in conjunction with conventional methods to treat everything from cancer to Alzheimer’s).
You will go on a one easy guided hike with hands-on exploration of the medicinal plant farm. Visitors will amble through a maze of earthy patchouli plants, sweet lemongrass and spicy wasabi.
Among other plants to be spotted are the nutrient-dense plants such as chaya, which contains ten times more calcium than spinach, and the healing but foul-tasting noni fruit. Among the sixty varieties of fruit trees, the farm also grow jatropha, a new source of biofue. It is a fascinating tour and you'll learn all about their 'sacred seed project'.
The helpers at the farm or the owner will be happy to answer any questions and you can feel their enthusiasm and interest as they do their best to make you feel at home and inform you on the projects they are involved in. A delicious organic buffet lunch will be laid out with many products from the farm so you can taste as well as learn about the plants.
