I thought shark attacks only happened during shark week

Alright, before you freak no I was not bitten by a shark. I am however going to hold off on that story so you read the rest of the post. Cruel, I know. The weekend after Emma and Luke cam, our entire group visited Manuel Antonio, apparently the best park in Costa Rica.

We arrived pretty late in the afternoon and, I deterred by the clouds and threat of rain, hit up the hotel beach. The water and sand and view were gorgeous. I felt like I walked out onto a beach in paradise and then remembered that I was actually on a beach in paradise. The waves were huge. They look deceiving lay s,all until you get 15 meters out and suddenly you find yourself smashed to the ground and washed up on the beach. That however became the challenge and didn't diminish the fun even the tiniest bit. We made a game to see which waves we could jump and ride at the top and which ones you had better go under for or you'd be eating sand and spitting salt water. Not to mention most likely naked. As we were headed I. To go change for dinner we found some monkeys just chilling on the beach, they declined to have their picture taken.

The next day we went with our whole group for our planned tour of the park and guess what we got to do! Hike. Yep, more stupid steps. More mud. Once again, shoes ruined. The views would have been cool on our hike had it not been at 100% humidity and then decided to rain. That again diminished our enjoyment of the beaches in the park. The one beach we spent the most time at did have these cool rocks that had pools in them, so being the 16 year old boy I've become on this trip, my friend and I decided to climb and explore them.

They were really slippery and sharp, but the stuff we found was pretty cool. It became a game of, let's poke it and see if it moves. The eel we decided to let alone. We headed back early to our beach to spend some more time playing in the waves before again finding a place to eat. {Can you see the resemblance to a pubescent boy?}

Our final day there dawned sunny! We didn't have to leave until the afternoon so we spent all morning on the beach alternating playing in the waves and lounging on the beach when we couldn't stand being battered anymore. And that's when I saw the shark. We were no more than 20 meters from shore {probably less} and playing in the waves, as I was getting ready for the next wave I looked into the wave and saw a large dark form, and then a fin. I have never swam faster or been so scared in my entire life. Grabbing my two closest friends and using my lifeguard voice telling them to get out of the water we raced for the shore. Not knowing what was wrong, they asked me if I was okay. When I explained the situation everyone was s,exotically, but I know what I saw. While it was probably equal to if not less than ,y arm span wide, it had a fin and was most certainly not a dolphin.


Needless to say I stayed near the shore after that.