A night in the jungle

Once we arrived at our lodge in Talamanca we were a little surprised by the bedrooms but adjusted better than expected. We were staying the night in the middle of the jungle with nothing any where near us except bug, rodants and monkeys. This was one of the nights that was meant to test our boundaries and try something different. I know this was out of my comfort zone as well as a few others in our group but it was a really cool experience. I have rarely been camping, let alone spending the night in the jungle with no enclosed roof and a bug net surrounding my bed. We walked out from seeing our rooms and my friend Danielle had a lizard jump onto her head. She handled it really well but it made us realize that we had an interesting night ahead of us. I just tried to take in the experience as an adventure that would help me overcome some fears and take a peek at the naturalist side of life. Here is a picture of one of the beds in our room with us inside the net,

Spending the night secluded in the jungle was a great experience but I will not miss the mosquito nets and bugs on steroids. Where we stayed was very secluded and seemed like a scene from a scary movie at first. I knew that this was going to be something hard for me with my fear of bugs but I handled it better than I thought. The rooms were definitely rustic and all natural. The lodge, I guess you would call it, had an open roof type thing going on and the sides were screened in with big wooden doors. Inside the room there were bunk bed style beds with massive mosquito nets covering all four ends of the bed. The mosquito net gave me confidence that I could make it through the night without getting scared there was a bug or lizard in my bed but I was a little wrong. A secada (not too sure on the bug, let alone the spelling) got into my mosquito net while I was sleeping and starting making some crazy noise. I tried to stay calm and just overcome my fear because that’s what this trip is about. I got on my hands and knees underneath my net and grabbed the net on the side where I could hear the bug making noise and pulled the net out to attempt to let the bug escape. Eventually the bug flew out and I pulled the mosquito net tight really quickly.

Monkey noises greeted us throughout the night as well but that didn’t bother me because I have loved being able to see and hear the monkeys. Once we woke up in the morning I realized that I did not have it the worst while sleeping.  One of the rooms had what they thought was a bat in their room, which was very likely with the area that we were in. I could handle a bug over a bat any day. Needless to say, being secluded in the jungle and spending the night with creatures that I’m afraid of was pretty difficult for me. Overcoming some of these fears and getting through the night without a tear or shriek made me confident that these adventures are truly helping me get in touch with a whole new side of myself.