There were rustles and snorts in the bushes.
Then a rattle like the sound of castanets - bone castanets - and the air was filled with a pungent, acrid smell.
"We are lucky," whispered Jose, my guide.
"These are chanchos del monte: wild peccary - bush pig.
They are champing their teeth because they have smelt us and they're frightened...
" I began to feel nervous, too.
I'd seen peccary on one of those bush survival TV programmes.
They were one of the few animals the gung-ho presenter didn't go chasing after - unlike the crocodile he taunted and the poisonous snakes he'd grabbed by the tail.
"Peccary", he'd said, full face to camera, "have got teeth like a leopard and a temper to match.
They maraud through the forest in bands attacking whatever they come across.
" "Are they...
er...
dangerous, Jose?" I asked nervously.
"Will they attack us?" Jose restrained a laugh.
"No, my friend - but if you are quiet they might not run away.
" I had been looking for a wildlife destination that I could visit without worrying about my carbon footprint, and Costa Rica was delivering everything I'd hoped for.
Animals are everywhere - protected in extensive wild rain forest backed by the tourist pound.
Costa Rica's wilderness wasn't always this healthy.
In the 1960s the country was on the Brazilian road - 50% of its forest was lopped for logs and cattle, and wildlife was hunted to the brink of extinction.
But then came a miracle: a turnaround in government policy brought about by a few determined, home-grown biologists, poachers-turned-gamekeepers and visionary politicians.
Now Costa Rica is better protected than anywhere else in the tropics and has the most advanced and progressive ecotourism accreditation scheme in the world.
Jose and I were following a trail on the beautiful Arenal Hanging Bridges route, in one of the many public and private protected areas that cover a quarter of Costa Rica's territory.
"We are the only country in the world where forestation exceeds deforestation," Jose had proudly told me at the start of our walk - and I could well believe it.
On my plane's arrival into San Jose, the tin roofs and tiles of the capital had looked like an island in a sea of trees.
We'd been immersed in nature ever since.
Everything is nearby in Costa Rica.
It may encompass 5% of the planet's biodiversity, but the country is only three-quarters the size of Scotland.
My visit began a few hours' drive from the capital in the high, wispy cloud forests near Poas Volcano, before heading to the sweltering lowlands on the country's north Atlantic coast at Tortuguero National Park.
The most important sea turtle nesting site in the Caribbean, Tortuguero is visited by five of the seven species including the world's largest reptile - the giant leather back.
We were lucky enough to witness a huge green turtle heaving its way across the long, narrow beach after laying its batch of eggs in the talcum powder-fine sand.
But I hadn't anticipated spotting so much other wildlife - especially on the rivers that cut through Tortuguero's swamps and mangroves.
Whitefaced capuchin monkeys seemed to gather in bands just to watch our little launch drift past, while kingfishers, herons and snowy clouds of egrets launched themselves into the air with shrill alarm calls at every other U-bend.
At night, when Jose shone his powerful torch across the river, the hundreds of red pinprick reflections glimmered back from lidless crocodile eyes.
In Arenal I'd seen tiny, squeaking squirrel monkeys, keel-billed toucans and a troupe of lemur-like coatimundis.
"They're gringos," joked Jose, explaining that coatimundis are raccoon invaders from the north who'd been pillaging birds' nests since wandering down from North America during the last glacial period a few million years ago.
And I wasn't even here to see the wildlife.
Every 20 minutes or so the cicada and tree frog symphony of the rain forest was interrupted by a rumbling boom as the volcano belched out a fiery cloud, expelling pumice and molten rock from the cone I'd glimpsed through the trees.
I didn't see its true power and majesty until that night.
The view from the window of my lodge, nestled on the mountain's flanks, was dominated by the mighty cone.
Framed like a painting, it looked beautiful and innocuous.
But the painting came with a roar, and tumbling, red-hot lava that glowed brilliantly against the dark carapace of the night.
Then a rattle like the sound of castanets - bone castanets - and the air was filled with a pungent, acrid smell.
"We are lucky," whispered Jose, my guide.
"These are chanchos del monte: wild peccary - bush pig.
They are champing their teeth because they have smelt us and they're frightened...
" I began to feel nervous, too.
I'd seen peccary on one of those bush survival TV programmes.
They were one of the few animals the gung-ho presenter didn't go chasing after - unlike the crocodile he taunted and the poisonous snakes he'd grabbed by the tail.
"Peccary", he'd said, full face to camera, "have got teeth like a leopard and a temper to match.
They maraud through the forest in bands attacking whatever they come across.
" "Are they...
er...
dangerous, Jose?" I asked nervously.
"Will they attack us?" Jose restrained a laugh.
"No, my friend - but if you are quiet they might not run away.
" I had been looking for a wildlife destination that I could visit without worrying about my carbon footprint, and Costa Rica was delivering everything I'd hoped for.
Animals are everywhere - protected in extensive wild rain forest backed by the tourist pound.
Costa Rica's wilderness wasn't always this healthy.
In the 1960s the country was on the Brazilian road - 50% of its forest was lopped for logs and cattle, and wildlife was hunted to the brink of extinction.
But then came a miracle: a turnaround in government policy brought about by a few determined, home-grown biologists, poachers-turned-gamekeepers and visionary politicians.
Now Costa Rica is better protected than anywhere else in the tropics and has the most advanced and progressive ecotourism accreditation scheme in the world.
Jose and I were following a trail on the beautiful Arenal Hanging Bridges route, in one of the many public and private protected areas that cover a quarter of Costa Rica's territory.
"We are the only country in the world where forestation exceeds deforestation," Jose had proudly told me at the start of our walk - and I could well believe it.
On my plane's arrival into San Jose, the tin roofs and tiles of the capital had looked like an island in a sea of trees.
We'd been immersed in nature ever since.
Everything is nearby in Costa Rica.
It may encompass 5% of the planet's biodiversity, but the country is only three-quarters the size of Scotland.
My visit began a few hours' drive from the capital in the high, wispy cloud forests near Poas Volcano, before heading to the sweltering lowlands on the country's north Atlantic coast at Tortuguero National Park.
The most important sea turtle nesting site in the Caribbean, Tortuguero is visited by five of the seven species including the world's largest reptile - the giant leather back.
We were lucky enough to witness a huge green turtle heaving its way across the long, narrow beach after laying its batch of eggs in the talcum powder-fine sand.
But I hadn't anticipated spotting so much other wildlife - especially on the rivers that cut through Tortuguero's swamps and mangroves.
Whitefaced capuchin monkeys seemed to gather in bands just to watch our little launch drift past, while kingfishers, herons and snowy clouds of egrets launched themselves into the air with shrill alarm calls at every other U-bend.
At night, when Jose shone his powerful torch across the river, the hundreds of red pinprick reflections glimmered back from lidless crocodile eyes.
In Arenal I'd seen tiny, squeaking squirrel monkeys, keel-billed toucans and a troupe of lemur-like coatimundis.
"They're gringos," joked Jose, explaining that coatimundis are raccoon invaders from the north who'd been pillaging birds' nests since wandering down from North America during the last glacial period a few million years ago.
And I wasn't even here to see the wildlife.
Every 20 minutes or so the cicada and tree frog symphony of the rain forest was interrupted by a rumbling boom as the volcano belched out a fiery cloud, expelling pumice and molten rock from the cone I'd glimpsed through the trees.
I didn't see its true power and majesty until that night.
The view from the window of my lodge, nestled on the mountain's flanks, was dominated by the mighty cone.
Framed like a painting, it looked beautiful and innocuous.
But the painting came with a roar, and tumbling, red-hot lava that glowed brilliantly against the dark carapace of the night.
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