“So last December I went on a trip to Costa Rica with two of my friends, one of them being an experienced surfer and solo traveler. He pretty much planned the whole trip and I was just kind of along for the ride.
So we stayed in a small tourist surfer town called Tamarindo. It is a really beautiful town with a beautiful beach that just so happens to be right next to the mouth of a river, creating brackish waters where apparently crocodiles love to hang out. We were two sections over from the river surfing, pretty much worry-free because the crocs don’t really like pure saltwater.
So I was sitting in the water on a 9-foot board, and I felt something hard brush my leg. I thought it was just some rock or something. I looked down and all I see is this MASSIVE tail that’s obviously connected to a behemoth of a crocodile.
So a few things went through my mind really quickly as soon as I first sighted that monster:
First: You’re about to get chewed up into tiny pieces so tell your friend to swim to safety. I had a friend sitting on a board about 15 yards away so I told him to swim to shore as calmly as possible.
Second: You’re about to get chewed up into tiny pieces, better pray so if heaven is real at least you can snag that last-minute ticket in. Went something like, ‘Please God don’t let me die, Please god don’t let me die, Please god don’t let me die!’
Third: You’re still about to get chewed up into tiny pieces, but maybe you won’t if you put your legs on the board and pretend like ur driftwood. So I put my legs up and slowly paddled with nothing but my hands on either side super slowly because I didn’t wanna make any splashes.
So flash forward about 10 seconds and I see the crocodile under me. I mean the WHOLE crocodile. Head to toe this thing was a foot longer than my board and wider… keep in mind I’m riding a 9-foot board and THAT’S NOT INCLUDING THE CROCODILE’S TAIL!
So it circles me one full time after the first sighting, and then just goes under me and out to sea…
I had never experienced raw fear until this moment. Feeling like you are being hunted by an apex predator is something else.
So I swam back as fast as possible to where the other surfers were grouped and tried for a few minutes to convince them of what I saw but I wasn’t giving them a very good account because I was pretty shaken up.
I swam back to shore and sat on the sand for the next two hours contemplating life. All in all, a pretty solid vacation.”
