Iguanas in the House and Birthday Cake

            Good day today. Very good indeed.  Mom and Dad had a very early morning stand-up paddle board lesson this morning (they called it “old people surfing”) and after they left I took Luke’s bike that he had left for me and biked down to his house.  I had really been wanting to bake a cake for Arden and my birthday so when I had biked over I took along with me a backpack of cake baking supplies. I got there even before Anna had left for school (about 7:15) and got to talk with her a bit before she left.  Haven’t been seeing much of her these days as she has normally been super swamped with school!

             Arden was still asleep so after Anna left Luke and I just sat around and hung out for a while, eating a very relaxed breakfast together.  After Arden woke up we decided to go about baking that cake and while I held Arden and read the recipe off the computer, Luke threw all the ingredients together.  There were a number of things we didn’t have and had to substitute for or omit entirely so was certainly a very interesting cake. While we were waiting for it to bake, we decided to take a walk down the beach and look for those coconut venders that I have been trying to find since I got here.  We had no such luck finding them but still had a great time collecting shells before we headed back.  Mom and Dad were waiting for us at the house when we got there and the cake still wasn’t done so we just hung out for a while hearing about their super fun time paddle boarding.

            Once it did finish, Mom and I went about making our respective frostings. She was going to frost half of it using her famous chocolate frosting and I wanted to frost half using a fondant idea I wanted to try.  Turned out alright if I might say so myself! At least, considering the utensils I was using; a glass cup for a rolling pin and a serrated knife instead of a straight edge…

            We also had a bit of an incident with an iguana getting in the house and that was a super short, but super funny, ordeal getting it out of the house! It was scrambling all over the place and at one point we had a human barricade made up of my dad and it ran right over the top of him! We finally got it outside though and I’m sure it will think twice before walking inside another building anytime soon…

            With the cakes done, we decided to head down the road and try and feed the local crocodiles down the way that we were told always hung out under this specific bridge.  We had bought some hot dogs as recommended and acquired some string from Luke’s very friendly neighbors.

            After I had spent a short time holding the hotdog into the water over the bridge with no success, a young couple from Germany came by and said they had seen the crocodiles yesterday.  They said a local had helped them and he had tied a coconut to a string and splashed it in the water continuously to make a lot of noise and attract the crocodiles

            We decided to give it a try and sure enough a crocodile showed up shortly thereafter!

            After that we decided to head back for an early dinner as Luke was planning to go with Anna to a school function later in the evening.  On our drive back past Carillo beach what should we see passing our way but a coconut vendor! We stopped the car right there and he happily came over to let us choose a coconut.  I got the 500 colonies one (about $1) and watch as he pulled it out of the bucket of water, whacked it with a machete a couple of times to get the top off and handed it to us with a straw. It honestly tasted a lot saltier than I was expecting but boy Arden sure loved it! We passed it around the car to begin with and gave her a sip. When I got it back she did all she possibly could to get me to give it back! She was waving her arms all over the place, screeching up a storm and trying to crawl over the front seat to get it! It was actually pretty funny.

Ardens first birthday party!

             Dinner with the family was pretty fun as well, complete with a birthday cake and presents for Arden. She had a lot of fun ripping into the wrapping paper and digging her hands into some chocolate cake J.

Digging into that birthday cake :)

Surfing Lessons and A Friendly Kinkajou

            Today was super fun seeing as I got to get up early this morning and take a several hour surfing lesson! Luke met us at the surf shop around 8:30 with Arden (whom he handed off to Mom and Dad) and then we strapped our boards to the top of the 4-wheeler and headed down Samara Beach.

            The first 15 minutes or so, our instructor gave us the rundown of how it was done, figuring out which foot went where, and drilling us on popping up into a standing position on the board. Apparently I am a “goofy footer” because I ride the board with my right foot foreword. Good to know J. We then headed out to the water to hopefully catch some waves!

            The waves at Samara beach are quite a bit smaller to begin with and apparently everything was exceptionally low today. Pretty good for beginners I guess but it also meant we spent a bit of time sitting on our boards and waiting for waves.  Honestly, that was ok with me though since we got to talk with our instructor a bit and get to know more about what he’s doing.  He grew up in Costa Rica, though not in Samara, and is actually leaving for Ecuador in a couple days to judge a surfing competition!

 

I have the best brother in the world who agreed to take a surfing lesson with me :)

            He also answered a number of my questions I had on how to tell when a wave is coming and about paddling a long ways out when you know the waves going to break soon versus waiting till it’s pretty close to start swimming.  So many details! I guess it's simply going to take lots of practice J. I kept forgetting one thing or another and would sometimes use my elbows to pop up instead of my hands, or place my knee on the board for balance which is a big no-no. I started to get it a bit by the end but I certainly have lots to work on.  Something I would definitely do again!

             After our surfing lesson we said out goodbyes to our instructor and hung out with Mom, Dad and Arden on the beach for a while.  Arden was evidently super tired and fell asleep in Mom’s arms while we were surfing.  The second time she has fallen asleep with someone other than Luke and Anna!

             We hung out in Samara beach for most of the afternoon, Mom and Dad taking the snorkeling gear down the beach and swimming out to Isla Chora. Luke and I decided to take a break from the water and instead walked with Arden down the beach. It was her 1^st birthday after all! I know she had a great day just hanging out with her daddy and having a very relaxing day J. 

            There were also a couple of horses at one point who decided to take a joy run down the beach. Honestly not too strange of an occurrence here.  There are a good number of pastures with lots of horses and I'm not sure whether they let the horses loose to graze along the road or they pop the fence but there is often a horse or two just walking through town or ambling down the road.

              We dropped by Luke’s house around 2:30 and hung out there for a while before saying our goodbyes since Anna was getting home early and they wanted the evening to themselves with Arden.

              After a bit of shopping for dinner supplies and tomorrows meals, we headed off down the road to a Wildlife Rehabilitation Center that I had really wanted to go visit.  It was really cool getting to see a ton of the native Costa Rican animals! There were a couple margays, a jaguarundi, a kinkajou, several crocodiles and a caiman, parrots, owls, a rainbow billed toucan, an armadillo, a spotted skunk, a peccary, some boa constrictors and a big cage of fruit and vampire bats. 

The mama Margay

               I think my favorite might have been the kinkajou.  A lot of the animals were sleeping when we got there since many are nocturnal animals but after sunset the all woke up including the kinkajou.  We were allowed to stick our hands through its cage and when we did he would come up, grab your hand, and just lick you incessantly. It was pretty cool and a little funny as well J.  

That funny little Kinkajou

Neature Walk

            This morning we had planned for us a “Natural History Tour” of part of Samara and it was to start pretty early in the morning.  We were ready and had Luke and the baby at the hotel by the time our guide showed up at 7:00 and then we all jumped into the back of his pick-up for a short ride down the road.

            Our guides name was Alvero and his grandfather was one of the first to homestead Samara a number of years ago.  Just about everyone in Samara knows of Alvero and his family, even Luke knew him! Apparently the house that Luke and Anna will be moving into (actually, did move into today) is owned and managed by Alvero’s family.

            Anyways, about 35 years ago Alvero's grandfather had purchased a giant chunk of land that neighbored his original plot and in an attempt to keep the forest and habitat much like its natural state, had converted the whole lot from a cattle farm to a dense and natural rainforest. That was where we went and spent about 4 hours hiking and learning about the natural history of the area.

Of course we had to look at all the birds as well :)

            We learned a lot about a number of plants in the area, which ones were good to eat and the original uses for some of them. There was one that was so rough it was used in the past to scrub dishes and such and another that you could peal the seed coating off and eat to gain energy. Another one contained tons of oils and was often fed to cattle to fatten them up.

            We learned what vines you could use for water if you were stranded in the forest, and how to cut them for the most effective extraction.  He showed us how to collect these certain termites from their nest for eating purposes and even gave us all some to try.  Not bad! Rather woody though…

            He talked about much of Samara’s history and one of the main reasons that much of the coral reef is now gone from the area. Apparently there is this one tree that was cultivate in abundance for a while, the Teak tree, that has leaves that are extremely difficult to erode and so during the rainy season soils and sediments are washed down into the ocean which kills the corals. Of course he showed us a ton of bird as well and helped us in identifying them by their sounds.

Gorgeous view of the landscape! Carillo beach is in the little cove on the left and the rest is Samara beach

            All together it was a fantastic hike and when we got back to our hotel and went to pay him, he let me go by for free because it was my birthday and gave us a discount on top of that because Luke was his friend.  An all around nice guy J.

            We walked down the road shortly after that because I had a craving to some ice cream at a little shop down the road. After quickly eating out melting cones, we headed off to the house Luke and Anna were staying at a short while later to pack up their stuff and clean out the house.  Luke and Anna had made a deal with Scott that their payment for his letting them stay in the house was for them to clean it well when they left.  My job was sweeping and mopping the floors, at times a tricky task with Arden crawling all over the place.

            After everything was all packed up Mom and Luke took off to the new house to settle stuff in while Dad and I finished up cleaning.  While we waited for their return after the cleaning was done, I spent a bit of time playing with Arden.  She was super fascinated with the Costa Rican coins when I would wind them up and spin them on the floor.

            I could tell she was getting super tired and thought I would give it a try putting her to sleep even though she has never fallen asleep for anyone but Luke or Anna before.  No sooner had I picked her up and started walking the room than she zonked out and stayed that way for a good half hour. Luke and Mom came back during that time and after Arden woke up we made for the new house.

            To end off a fairly relaxed and fun birthday day, I had really been wanting to see the sunset on the beach so shortly before sunset we headed to the beach.  The sunset was super pretty with red and orange right above the ocean and across the horizon as it came down. It was the perfect way to end a very good day.

Waves That Will Knock Your Socks Off

Despite having such a long and early day yesterday, Mom and Dad decided to wake up early again to go on a birding walk.  I said thanks, but no thanks to the offer and chose to sleep in for another couple hours.  They came back for me around 8:00 by which time I was up and ready and we headed off to Luke’s for breakfast. It was a nice relaxed breakfast of pancakes with honey, jam, and fruit before we packed up the car and the baby and headed out on the day’s adventures.

Since we never actually made it to Barra Gona beach the other day, we decided to give it another shot today and again traversed the windy gravel road to the river crossing which we again forded with no problems. This time we took the 4^th turn on the left instead of the 3^rd.

The beach was just as was described, about ¼ of the size of the bigger beaches like Buena Vista with sand that was pearly white. 

Starting out the beach day on a positive note, what should I see first thing upon getting out of the car but a sign saying to watch out for the dangerous waves and currents because someone had been killed in the currents several years before. Great, and I was planning on going into the water…

Luke was hardly phased as per usual and proceeded to sunscreen Arden, hand her off to Mom, and head off to the water with snorkel and spearing gear in hand.  Dad and I shortly followed suit, as was the decided plan, and after putting on our gear, waded into the water. I started getting nervous a little ways in with the ferocity of the fair sized waves and shortly after a fairly large wave came up with such force that it smacked all three of us to the ocean floor.  My mask was almost ripped off in the ensuing current and unfortunately Dad’s was.

Not so fun waves and currents close to shore...

We all exited the water at that point in favor of searching for Dads trusty mask (the one he has had for over 30 years).  Unfortunately our efforts proved fruitless, but refusing to let that dampen our day Dad went and acquired Mom’s mask and we made for the ocean once more.  Once we got past the wake break the current wasn’t all that bad to be honest.  We just had to wait for that one big wave to pass and then jump in and haul flipper out towards the open ocean. I think I was a lot more nervous than the boys were; they have both had a ton of experience swimming out in open water while I have had not so much. Just getting me prepped for Australia! 

Despite the raging waves, the water was super clear and the only murk to speak of was the sand that would get kicked up from the ocean floor from time to time.  I saw a number of fish, even a few skates that Luke almost stabbed with the spear, but overall the trek was unfruitful for spearing (mainly because Luke’s mask kept fogging up).

Mom and Dad heading out for their swim (Dad is either under or behind that wave)

Thinking we would give Mom a shot at snorkeling, we all headed back to shore to hand off some of the gear.  While Mom and Dad were out for their swim, Luke and I took Arden up and into the rocks where we looked at tide pools and searched for shells.  Arden had lots of fun sticking her hands in the small pools and grabbing at any snail she could find.

Arden having way too much fun in the tide pools among the rocks

Mom and Dad came out a while later, Dad taking a little longer while he took another swim through the area where he lost his mask in an effort to possibly find it. With Mom back, Luke handed off Arden again and made for the ocean once more with Dad, this time taking to the opposite end of the beach.

They were in the water for quite some time and we were beginning to wonder what had become of them when we finally saw them emerge onto shore a ways down the beach. The trip proved quite a bit more successful for fishing and Luke had succeeded in spearing four. He was quite happy with his success and knowing Anna had requested an early dinner, we decided to call it a day. 

Success!

Monteverde Cloud Forest

            Super early day this morning, whoo boy! Mom, Dad and I set our alarms for 4:30 and after dragging ourselves out of bed and getting everything packed, were up at Luke’s house by 5:30 to pick him and Arden up.  Then it was a three or so hour drive to our final destination for the day; Monteverde.  I remember going there once the last time we were in Costa Rica about 14 years ago (I was 7 at the time) and I remember it was a truly amazing place, and fun as well.  What I DON’T remember from that trip was the drive to Monteverde. Oh. My. Goodness.

            The first two hours were anything but extraordinary, fairly well paved roads, well marked road signs… the usual.  But the last hour… wow. I would say the roads were gravel, but this wasn’t just any gravel.  This was gigantor gravel, stone sized, some verging on boulders.  And then there were all the tight turns and the stretches that shot straight up or straight down. Oh, and then you had the combination of a hairpin turn WITH a straight up.  And this all the while you were clacking your teeth together for the consistent bumps and jolts.

            Some of you may know me as not the best passenger in the world as I tend to be a little on edge and overly jumpy sometimes while sitting in the side seat. Mind you, sometimes. It depends on the situation. Well, I can tell you I spent that whole hour on edge. I think Luke was actually quite entertained at my terrifiedness and I’m glad it at least made someone feel better. 

I’ve already made it quite evident that this little car is not the most gung ho, blazing its own trail, crazy driving type car.  It’s a great car for city driving and parking in tight spaces, that’s about it. That and great gas mileage. Just to give you a glimpse into my mind during that hour, here’s a bit of a picture ran through my head at one point;

From all the strain put on the poor car it finally decides it’s had enough and the transmission blows up, sending shards of metal into all four tires which then explode from the car, disintegrating into smithereens. This then causes the car to smash down onto its undercarriage which breaks off the exhaust pipe, cracking the oil pan and spewing oil all over the car.  The oil leakage than bursts into flames, igniting the entire car on fire, and we are left standing there in the middle of nowhere, with a baby, watching our blazing inferno of a car disintegrate into ash.

            That’s how bad the road was.

            Moving on from that lovely image… We got to Monteverde around 10:00, a little later than we had hoped but we still made good time. We had had some difficulty with directionality again once we got into a rather confusing town, and we learned that there was more than one place to do what we wanted to do.

No wonder we got lost...

Finally finding our way to the highly recommended Selvatura Park, we paid our entrance fee and got started on our day in the cloud forest! First was the several hour self guided tour of the Sky Walk which was a combination of about 8 suspension bridges that spanned the canopy of a good part of the forest as well as some well maintained foot paths.

Felix and I on one of the Sky Walks

 That was super cool! We got to see over the canopy of the forest as well as walk through parts of the forest and there were tons of butterflies and birds around.  I think we probably took twice as long as the estimated completion time since we like to stop every ten paces to take a picture, locate a calling bird, identify a strange fungus… Oh biologists J.

View of some of the forest canopy

We finished up with the Sky walk around 1:00 and made it just in time for the next tour of the butterfly sanctuary.  

The Butterfly Sanctuary 

We got to see a bunch of the native butterflies that they raised in this giant dome garden and they even had boards of the chrysalises that they collected in preparation for their hatching. A bunch of them were wiggling too!

The box of chrysalises 

One of the hundreds of butterflies

A recently hatched butterfly

After that tour, we made our way to the hummingbird garden where they had tons and tons of feeders set up and even more hummingbirds of various varieties buzzing and zipping around.  We sat in there for quite some time, Dad and I both content to sit and photograph and Arden completely enthralled by all the pretty, flashing birds.  

Female Violet Saberwing

At one point, this old and beat up looking Coati came ambling up out of the woods and walked about right around our feet looking for food and licking up the sugar water that had accumulated on the ground.  That was cool and it didn’t really seem to care that we were there.

We finally dragged ourselves away from the hummingbirds and left the park, driving a little ways into town to a café that was recommended to us as a good place to sit and watch birds.  We got some coffee and lunch and sat outside by the feeders to see what we could see.

We didn’t actually really see any birds, to our disappointment, so after a while we packed up again and headed down the road.  We took a short detour along the way to a park that we had spent a lot of time at the first time we were in Costa Rica, the Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve. It was cool to just walk around for nostalgias sake and some of my memories as a 7 year old started coming back.

As we were getting ready to leave Luke started cutting up some fruit for our drive home and we had this rather curious coati come within arms distance of us.  It was pretty funny to watch it stalk up as close as it possibly dared and then just whip around and dart off a ways.  It did that several times!

The drive back home was rather uneventful, though of course there was that horrendous excuse for a road that we had to travel back over.  Yeesh! By the time we got home we were all happy from a fun filled day and ready for a good nights sleep.

The Taste of Ocean Water

            I got up well before Luke and Anna this morning, having slept overnight in the loft, so I hung out for a while downstairs by myself before Scott came back inside a little while later. Apparently he had been up since around 5:00 and had gone outside so as to not wake anyone up. That house is certainly not the most conducive to quietness!

 He made some coffee for the both of us and then we quietly took our cups outside and sat overlooking Samara while we awaited Luke and Anna’s arousal.  It was really cool getting to talk to him about his life and what had made him decide to change careers to massage therapy so late in life.  He’s done a ton of traveling in his past as well and he told me numerous stories about his times abroad and the children he has sponsored over the years.

Gorgeous view of Samara

Luke and Anna finally got up around 9:00 and we had a pretty simple breakfast of fruit and leftovers.  Church service was to start around 10:00 so as to not be late Scott offered to drive Luke and me into town.  We met up with Mom and Dad at the hotel shortly thereafter and walked the two minutes down the road to the church. We made it just as they were finishing the first song. Success!

The church service was really cool and I really like the pastor.  He talked a lot on the story of David and Goliath and put the story into a perspective that I hadn’t really thought of before.  We got to meet a couple of people after the service that Luke and Anna have befriended in their time here and then we said our goodbyes and headed back to the hotel for the car.  We made our way up to Luke and Anna’s temporary house and got there just as Arden finally fell asleep for a nap.  Impeccable timing I must say. While we waited for Arden to wake up, Dad and Luke took a birding, sightseeing tour around the neighborhood, Mom worked on some reading and Bible study stuff, and I entertained myself watching a line of ants traverse the cracks of the patio. 

One of the six or so Coatis that were roaming around beside the house

When Arden finally did wake up, we packed us all in the car and headed off for the beach.  The plan was to meet some of Luke and Anna’s friends from church at Barra Gona beach and Luke had gotten fairly detailed instructions on how to get to the out of the way beach. Apparently it’s supposed to have super clear water at any tide and be great for snorkeling and spear fishing. While following the direction, we came upon a fairly nice sized river that crossed the road and apparently it was pretty low and not as full as normal.

Fording the River

We looked at the car (i.e. glorified skateboard), looked at the water level, then shrugged our shoulders and said “Alight! Let’s see what happens!” There have been few time that I can honestly say that I was proud of the “Gutless Wonder” but by golly that was one of them.  That little car came chugging through the river with water almost covering the tires and never once went astray. It came chugging out the other side, happy as could be (if a car could be happy) and we all hopped back in without so much as a delay in the world.

We followed the rest of the direction to a T, came up behind a line of pared cars, parked at the end and got out to organize out stuff (well, the babies) for an afternoon on the beach.  Only then did we realize that we were still only at Buena Vista beach and not at far as Barra Gona beach (apparently the person who gave us the instructions had miscounted one turn). But we decided to just stay where we were since we were already ready to go.

This baby LOVES water!

I still want to go to Barra Gona beach, but I am honestly super glad we stayed because that was one fun afternoon! We played in the waves with baby, went body surfing on some pretty big waves, splashed each other, dived, hung out on the beach… It was fun.  Relaxing and really fun.  Aside from the multiple nosefulls of ocean water I got… That was not fun.  Kind of burns as it goes down your throat, leaves a nasty taste in your mouth and a slight twist in your stomach...  Let me tell you that water is anything but pleasant… other than that though, everything was great!

Dad catching a nice wave

It started to get a little on the darker side when the sun fell behind the big rock outcropping of the cove on its way to the horizon so we decided to pack up and head out before we lost the daylight we needed to find our way out of the unfamiliar twists and turns. The river crossing was uneventful again (Yay!) and almost a little bit better for the horrified looks we got from some Ticos (natives Costa Ricans) who were sitting on the river bank across the way.  I really think they were just in awe of the feat they had just seen. 

Cool underwater shot of Dad swimming in the ocean

             Dinner was fish tacos (amazing Luke creation as usual) and while they were being made we were graced by the presence of no less than six Coati’s as they frolicked through the woods and around the back yard of the house. Those things are just so funny and definitely have a personality of their own! Certainly another animal I could just sit and watch for hours.

My favorite song from church this morning

Low Tides and Ice Cream Cones

We had a super laid back day today. We slept in super late and honestly didn't do a ton. We knew we probably weren’t going to hear from Luke until after 10:00 since they really wanted some time to themselves, so I didn't even get up until about 8:30 and then took my time getting ready. By 10:00, we still hadn't heard from Luke and we figured he might have just wanted to spend more time with Anna since it was her day off, so the three of us decided to take a stroll down to the beach. 

The exposed rock reef at super low tide.

It was another super low tide today so we spend quite a bit of time just walking the tide pools and seeing what we could see. The majority was just the little grayish brown fishes that swam in small schools but I also saw one little electric blue fish and a small sea slug.

Slug!

After a while when we had walked quite a ways down the exposed rock reef, mom and dad decided to try hiking over to Buena Vista, the next beach over, and finding a way up and into the mountains. I wasn't really up for another super strenuous hike, my legs were still super sore from yesterday! So I decided to head back to the hotel on my own while they continued on.

About half an hour later Dad called saying they were coming back, Buena Vista turned out to be a little farther than they had thought, so when they caught up to me a while later and we walked down the rest of the beach and back to the hotel together.

Samara Beach

Dad and I continued to just hang out, waiting for Luke's call, and Mom decided to head into town to inquire about various tour options. Luke called my phone a while later, around 1:30, saying he was on his way down from their temporary house to their old apartment to clean up the place and hand in the keys. Arden had apparently been really difficult all morning and had been super unhappy and grumpy since waking up. Anna had decide to just stay at home for the day with the unhappy baby and sent Luke down to clean up the old place on his own since they needed to be completely out by the first of the month. 

I had really been wanting to try some ice cream at this one shop Luke always raves about so I ended up walking into town on my own and meeting Luke at "The Monkey." After getting our "banana y naranja" ice cream cones I walked the rest of the way to Luke’s house with him and helped him sweep and clean the place.  While we were cleaning, Anna texted Luke with the idea that since Arden had been in such a bad mood and it likely wouldn’t be the best day to have a lot of people around, we could just give Mom and Dad the evening to themselves and I could spent the night over at Luke and Anna's place in the loft.

Luke liked the idea and after calling and talking to Mom she liked it too. So off to Luke's house it was, after stopping for a few groceries at the Iguana Verde, and getting attacked by licks from a rather friendly little puppy. 

View of some of Samara

On the long driveway, Luke and I heard this rustling coming from the bank to our right and looked up to find a Coati scampering up the hillside. I remember seeing a ton of them last time I was in Coast Rica about 14 years ago but this was the first one I had seen this trip! A little further along the driveway we came across a howler monkey with a baby on her back just sitting right on the side if the road. We got pretty close before she cut if the road and scurried off into the woods.

Pool time with Luke and Arden

We heard Arden screeching before we even reached the house and she was in a rather feisty mood to be sure. It was still fun though getting to hang out with just the four of us. We went for a swim in the little pool out front, we stalked an interesting sounding and rather large looking bird that decided to meander around the trees next to the house, and we ended the afternoon with Luke crafted piña coladas on the patio while we watched the sunset.

Just as we were finishing up and getting ready to head inside to make dinner, the guy who is lending us the house, Scott, drove up the driveway, returning a little early from a trip he had taken to another part of Coast Rica. He is a classmate of Anna's in the massage school and it was fun getting to know him while we cooked and ate a dinner of chicken and rice tacos. While we were cleaning up after dinner we heard this rustling and scratching coming from one of the side doors and we looked out to see and family of raccoon's! They hung around for quite a while, scampering around the house, and we even opened up the door and let Arden get a good look at them. It was the first time she had ever seen a raccoon I think and maybe the first time they had ever seen a tiny human. When she tried to crawl out to them they thought she was the weirdest thing and they backed up slowly and stiffly before turning and running back off into the night.