Survivor - Costa Rica

A handyman-challenged dude, and a fan of Survivor dudette can come up with some interesting things when necessity arises. There is a waterfall with three pools about a 20- to 30-minute hike away from the hotel. Since the pools are in the middle of the jungle, they tend to collect a lot of leaves and other stuff in them. We clean the pools once a week, but if it gets windy, then a lot of stuff can blow down. Rather than drain the pools every time, we thought it would be a great idea to get a skimmer, like pool cleaners use. The only problem: no skimmers around here at all. But that wasn't a problem for Lucy as she came up with a great idea: make our own skimmer. She fashioned a round rim out of wire, then cut some black tarp for the netting on the skimmer. We attached the tarp to the wire with twist ties, and then Lucy found a stick that we could attach it to. The result is a jungle skimmer (patent pending). We took it down to the pool this afternoon and it worked just fine. You can see the results of Lucy's ingenuity in the pictures, and there's also some pictures of the pools, along with Bejuca, lurking on the steps.