Where's the lava?

Haven't posted in awhile so I've got quite a bit to write about, but I'm going try and break things up into three different posts. So anyways, two weekends ago I went to the town of La Fortuna with my friend Julia to check out Volcán Arenal, which is the most active and impressive volcano in Costa Rica, it regularly spews lava and causes rockslides down the sides of its perfectly cone-like form.
Julia and I ran into a few people from my exchange program and together we all took a tour together. The tour had a pretty busy schedule, we hike through the forest or should I say jungle of the national park in which the volcano is located. There were plenty of tropical flowers and exotic birds and spiders around, but some of the trees looked liked the belonged to the forests of northern Michigan, so I'm not really sure how to decide between forest and jungle. Our hike led us to a small waterfall, where got to swim, before heading to the park's observation deck to try and catch a volcan-backed sunset. Unfortunately this being the rainy season we saw more clouds that fading rays. By then it was dark and bit chilly with the coming rain, our next activity was natural hot springs. So wonderful, we went to a public spot so there were no nice tourist details like lighting or railing around the natural pool. After the hot springs we were supposed to check out the nightly lava show, but we were thwarted again by the rain.
Considering all we packed into our first day, I think we could have just hung out in our hotel pool all Saturday (only $10 a night, amazing deal!), but Julia and I decided to be ambitious a rent bicycles. This was more ambitious on my part than hers, because I hadn't ridden a bicycle in probably two years, and never did have very strong skills even then. We tried to bike to another waterfall but due to the difficulty often encountered here of following directions (go east 200meters and then take a left and keep going, there will be a sign....), we got lost. Still had a fun if a bit of a physically taxing time. The countryside was absolutely beautiful. Sunday we headed back to Heredia, lava unseen. I guess it just wasn't meant to be.

Tough Week Ahead :P

This my first tough week: two tests and two presentations. Consequentially most of this past weekend was spent doing work in my room, though I did manage to break away Saturday for a visit to Monte de La Cruz, a beautiful park up in the mountains north of Heredia. I also completed my first translation assignment for the university NGO I'm volunteering with. They are in the process of updating their website and want to make it available in both Spanish and English so I've been given the task of translation. I had 15 documents last week and to be honest the 12 page document almost killed me, thankfully most of what I translated was less than a page. Good, but tiring practice, haven't lost my interest in translation as a career yet.