La Paz Waterfall Gardens (Part 3 of our 3-part tour)

Our final stop: La Paz Waterfall Gardens! By now, we and the other five tourists (3 girls our age from Mexico and two middle-aged men from the U.S.) were getting to know each other, making the tour experience even better. 

When we first got to the gardens, I expected to see a bunch of beautiful waterfalls and have a nice lunch. I was pleasantly surprised to learn that we would be walking through a wildlife refuge as well. We saw hundreds of hummingbirds zooming from flowers to feeders, jaguars wrestling, snakes slithering, butterflies fluttering, and red-eyed leaf frogs snoozing in the sun. Brett and I even made friends with a toucan!

 

After walking through the wildlife refuge, it was time for the lunch that was promised to us. There was a delicious buffet which included pizza and garlic knots. Of course, there were chicken, rice, and beans options, too, but I was ready for some cheesy pizza. The food was great and so were the BATHROOMS. Hah. I walked in and the sinks were waterfalls. It took me a while to find that to turn the waterfall sink on, I had to twist a rock. Brett even said that he didn’t pee in the urinal because even though he was "pretty sure" it was a urinal,  it was so pretty that he wasn't positive and didn't want to be that guy that peed on a decoration.

Finally, it was time to walk the two-mile paved trail through the waterfalls. Between the five different waterfalls, we were able to stand in front of them, see them from behind the falling water, and look down onto them.

At the end of the tour, we waited in line for a bus to take us back up to where we started. In the meantime, a man’s vehicle broke down and people started jumping up to help the guy get off of the dangerous, hairpin-turn road on which cars and large semi-trucks were driving way too fast. My superhero fiancé jumped up to join in the rescue.

Once we loaded up into the van, our tour guide, Milton, noticed that we had a flat tire! He was sure that we would be able to make it around the tight turns for the next 10 minutes until we got to the nearest gas station. Luckily, we made it safely and had a new tire to replace the flat one.

The entire tour from getting picked up at Gaudy’s for the coffee tour in the morning to returning back to Gaudy’s after the waterfalls that evening lasted about 12 hours. We were able to see so much and we would recommend this tour to anyone. It was a long day, but so worth it!