I spent a couple of days
on the Caribbean coast in Costa Rica with a French guy, Eric, who has
been living in Puerto Viejo for the last 8 months and who was able to
show me around. Nice Jamaican vibe to the place. It rained quite a
bit but was warm and tropical so didn't matter too much ... although
I did have to move from the beach when my book got too soggy. Thought
to myself one morning when showering that you know when you're in the
Caribbean when the water in the shower is colder than that in the
sea. Oh and bumped into a couple of lovely Israelis, Roei and Hila,
whom I'd first met at the airport in Panama and then again on our San
Blas Island. Ended up going out with them, an English girl and an
Australian girl for a falafel and hummus dinner on my last night and
then on to a Reggae/Salsa/Electronic bar on the beach front.
Surpassed my self-imposed midnight curfew, getting to bed around 2am,
not ideal for leaving on the 7.30am bus to San Jose. My camera broke
whilst in Puerto, rather gutting. What's more, I'd asked the security man at the hostel to wake me at 6am (my camera, which I've been using as an alarm clock too, has broken) and, for whatever reason, he ended up waking me at 5:20am! I
didn't dare fall back to sleep. On the plus side, the Australian girl
gave me her copy of Lonely Planet's Central America as she was at the
end of her trip so I've got a guidebook at last. :-)
From Puerto Viejo I
travelled inland, with views of dense jungle vegetation on both sides
of the bus. I tried to read the Lonely Planet's History sections on
Panama and Costa Rica but my head kept falling forward in rather an
embarrassing fashion. Getting to grips with these countries' history
on three hours of sleep is probably a little optimistic. I met
Anthony, a New York magazine layout editor, on his main annual
vacation, in the coffee bar at the bus terminal in San Jose where I
was connecting to go to Santa Elena. As it turned out, Anthony had
the seat next to me on the five hour bus to Santa Elena and, after
our bus bonding, we ended up travelling the next 4 days together. He
told me about his life in New York, how Americans tend to live to
work and not vice versa, and showed me photos of graffiti art he's
done. Both having limited time in Costa Rica (myself with just 4 days
left by the time I met Anthony), we planned our time well, fitting in
a guided walk through the Cloud Forest in Santa Elena (among other
things we saw a Quetzal and a Striped Palm Pit Viper), canopying
(which included zipping along cables over tree tops, repelling,
flying across the jungle in a superman position and the most
fantastic Tarzan swing I have ever done), a Jeep-Boat-Jeep journey
aka Van-Boat-Van journey to La Fortuna, a walk around the national
park below the Arenal volcano, night viewing of lava descending the
volcano and a visit to volcanic hot springs (some 20 baths with
temperatures ranging from warm to
so-hot-surely-your-skin-would-boil-if-you-were-to-dip-in). We parted
ways very early one morning as I was to embark on an all-day journey
to Isla Ometepe in Nicaragua and Anthony was to head for the Costa
Rican Pacific coast to do some surfing.
Luckily I adhered to my “Ask
Three People If You Want To know Something When Travelling” rule
for working out how to get to Isla Ometepe. If I had gone with the
advice from the first person I'd asked, I would have been crossing
the border at San Carlos and discovering that the boat to Isla
Ometepe no longer leaves on the day stated in the guide book. I would
have also gotten to the island around midnight ... that nice and safe
hour for a girl with a backpack to be wandering the streets. My
research indicated that I'd be better crossing from Costa Rica to
Nicaragua at Penas Blancas, although this had its own peculiarities
(borders really are unique places).
