BAHIA DRAKE TO PANAMA

June 30, 2014

Gordo

The boat back to Sierpe left at 7:00 am, so I got another early start.  The howler monkeys were in full cry before 5:00 am, anyway, so it wasn’t as if I were in danger of over sleeping.  I got up, took a cold shower, and joined the guys for breakfast by 6:00.  Larry and his friends were also going back to civilization and his friend, John, offered to give me a ride back to Palmar Norte where I could catch a bus to Neilly.  It was early, so the surf wasn’t too big and our only real excitement on the way back was surfing one really big wave over the bar.  Getting in was a lot easier than getting out.  The mangrove forest along the Sierpe River was very tall.  There were lots of little waterways in which one could take refuge during a bad storm.  We saw one large turtle sunning on a log.  Aside from Larry, John and Arnoldo, we also had Celso with us because he had a badly injured finger and needed to see a doctor and the camp dog, Gordo, who needed to see a vet about a big cyst on his tail.  We were quite the motley crew.  Somehow, we managed to pack all of us and our luggage into John’s RAV4.  Gordo had to ride in the trunk where he burrowed his 100 pound bulk behind the luggage until he was almost invisible.

Bus Terminal in Neilly

The guys dropped me off at the bank, where I needed to withdraw $500 to show at the Panamanian border.  I had also had to buy a plane ticket I had no intention of using because they required a plane ticket out of the country before they would let travelers enter.  I bought a fully refundable ticket so I could cash it in later.  I bought a ticket to Neilly from a booth in the back of the Panaderia (bakery) for about $1.25 and waited an hour for the next bus.  The bus to Neilly was very popular.  The luggage compartment was full, so I had to sit on the steps up to the rear seats so as to keep my bag from tumbling out the rear door when we stopped.  The aisle was completely full of standees.  It was a nice, comfortable bus, but it was packed like a chicken bus and stayed that way all the way to Neilly.  I took the bus all the way to the terminal in Neilly and then switched to another bus going to Paso Canoas, which is where the road crosses into Panama.  That bus cost about 75 cents.  There was an old man in a security guard uniform playing blues on a Spanish guitar in the line and then on the bus ride to Paso Canoas.  It was the first time I had heard blues in months and I really enjoyed it, even though it sounded like he was singing John Lee Hooker tunes badly translated into Spanish.

I arrived at the border during the lunch hour.  For the first time, no one tried to “help” me cross the border.  I had to wait half an hour or so for the bank to open after lunch before I could exchange my remaining colones and pay my $7.00 exit fee.  Panama uses U.S. dollars, but the coins are a mixture of U.S. coins and balboas, which have the same value and are used interchangeably.  They use a lot of one balboa coins instead of the one dollar coins that were used in El Salvador. Once I had my receipt for the departure tax, it was quick to get my passport stamped.  It poured down rain during that whole process, but had fortunately stopped by the time I needed to walk across the border.  I just had to dodge the puddles.  Panamanian immigration wasn’t bad, either.  I had been told I would have to pay $5 for a tourist card, but only had to pay $1 for some sort of sticker in my passport and then show the immigration agent my $500 and a copy of my airline reservation confirmation.  He really wanted a printed copy, but allowed me to show him the PDF file I had saved on my laptop, since I hadn’t had a printer with me at the tent camp.  During the process of crossing the border, I had observed a woman helping an old, blind man with his paperwork and walking him across to Panama where he had someone waiting for him.  While we were standing in line at Panamanian immigration, I told her that it had been nice of her to do that and we started up a conversation.  She was living in Panama in a town called Pedasi, gave me a card, and offered to host me for a visit.  I had no idea where she was located at the time, but told her I would see how that worked into my plans.  I walked a short distance further and easily located a minibus headed to David.

The minibus to David was perhaps the nicest bus I had yet encountered.  It was plush and comfortable and almost over air conditioned.  I even enjoyed waiting for the bus to fill.  As soon as the bus was filled, we headed off for David.  The first thing I noticed about Panama was that the highways were much better than in Costa Rica.  What had been a two lane asphalt road, suddenly became a four lane concrete freeway.  Everything in Panama seemed much more permanent.  The bus shelters looked institutional, instead of looking like something that the neighborhood people had erected to keep themselves out of the rain.  I saw the first pedestrian overpasses I had seen since Mexico.  Despite the exotic vegetation, I suddenly felt like I was traveling through rural America instead of a third world nation.  The road to David climbed gradually.  David is the second largest city in Panama.  It sprawled over a large area, but was not particularly dense.  It did not sport high rises like Panama City.  It did, however, have a large bus terminal that stretched for two blocks.  The conductor on my bus wasn’t particularly warm, but he did make sure I got delivered to a spot in the terminal where I had only to walk through the building to the other side to catch my bus to Boquete.  The ride cost me $2.10.

The Road to Boquete

The bus to Boquete was a different story.  I found myself back on a yellow chicken bus.  There were a few other tourists on the bus and they tossed our luggage in the back.  I grabbed a seat where I could keep an eye on my bag, although that probably wasn’t necessary and no one else did.  The road to Boquete was good, although not the super highway that the Interamericana had been.  It climbed sharply up into the mountains.  Boquete lies in a valley on the side of Panama’s only volcano.  As we climbed, the jungle thinned and we passed through pastures dotted with trees.  Foreigners had transplanted pine trees to the valley to make it seem more like home.  Bananas were a common crop.  Boquete was named one of the four best places to retire and was experiencing a growth spurt.  It was still a small town, but condos were popping up on the outskirts.  It was raining most of the way from David to Boquete (about half an hour, frequent bus service) and the mountains were shrouded in clouds.  The best part of Boquete was the temperature.  They call Boquete the city of eternal spring because it is always a mild temperature and always green. 

The Palacios Hostel

When I got off the bus, I had some trouble orienting myself as the buses from David do not stop at the bus terminal and seemed to have stopped at a different place than was indicated on my map.  I walked around the block, trying to find a street sign so I could determine where to look for my hostel.  Just as I encountered a street sign and had turned on my phone to look at my map, the owner of a hostel across the street approached me and asked if I was looking for a room.  I clearly was, so I agreed to take a look.  The Palacios Hostel was adequate and, at $20 for a private room with bath, the price was right.  The owner and his wife, Francisco and Jeanette, were very eager to please.  They had two WiFi networks and really wanted to provide good coverage, but the signal still didn’t reach into my room.  I had to hang out the door to send texts.  This would have been fine, as there was seating in the common area, if I hadn’t been exhausted from traveling all day after two mornings of being awakened by howler monkeys at 4:30 am.  I had an appointment with my cousin, Ronda, to discuss the possibility of her joining me.  She wasn’t available until later that evening and I had to postpone our Skype call because I couldn’t stay awake.  One of the reasons I was so tired was that I hadn’t eaten all day.  As soon as I got settled, I went out in search of food.  The institution in Boquete is Sabroson, a cafeteria style restaurant with three locations.  They served a variety of local dishes at reasonable prices.  It was good to be back in the land of affordable food.  I had a large plate of barbecued turkey, rice, beans, plantains and salad for $4.75.  It was more than I could eat and I left the rice.  After dinner, I worked on my blog for a bit, but I kept falling asleep, so I gave up and went to bed about 9:00.

July 1, 2014

I tried to sleep in without much success, although I did sleep an hour longer than I thought I had because I hadn’t realized that Panama was in a different time zone than Costa Rica.  I only realized something was amiss when I saw the World Cup games were scheduled an hour later than they had been the day before.  Laundry was a priority, so I dropped my clothes off at the laundry and went to a café to have a latte and use the WiFi.  The latte was great, but the café the hostel owner had recommended didn’t actually have WiFi.  I managed to pirate a signal from the fire station next door, but it was slow.  My computer wouldn’t connect at all.  Having failed at doing any research on travel to Columbia, I decided to visit a local travel agent.  I talked to a couple, but they didn’t really handle anything except local tours and shuttles to Bocas del Toro.  I did sign up for a hike the following morning to make one last attempt at seeing a quetzal and a horseback ride in the afternoon.  I had an hour before it was time to go riding, which was just enough time to collect my laundry, change my clothes, grab something to eat and return to the tour operator.  The laundry had a very interesting plumbing system instead of using the usual washing machine water lines, the owner had run a 1” PVC pipe above the row of washers.  Above each washer was a “T” with a ball valve protruding from it.  When it was time to fill the washer, he just opened the valve.  I guess it was faster that way and he didn’t need to worry about burst water lines.  He did a big load of laundry for three dollars, which was a record low.

Me on Janero

We went horse-back riding in a place called Caldera, which was back down the mountain towards David.  My horse’s name was Janero.  He didn’t give me much trouble, although getting him to move above a crawl was a challenge.  The other people in our group had trouble keeping their horses from eating and turning in circles, but Janero knew who was boss.  He had the roughest gallop I had ever experienced.  I kept looking down to make sure he wasn’t bucking.  The other horses went even slower.  I think he just didn’t want to leave them.  My reins were short, so I had nothing to use to inspire him to move faster.  We rode up and down some very steep, muddy hills for an hour or so.  It wasn’t much of a ride, but the scenery was nice and it was good to know I could still sit a horse.  After the ride, we went to the local hot springs and sat in a hot pool for a bit.  Then we went down and cooled off in the river.  There were hot springs at the edge of the river and the guide and I sat in the warm sand at the edge of the river and chatted about the state of national parks in Panama for half an hour or so.  It was late afternoon by the time we left and we heard the goatherd calling his goats.  They bleated in response.  It was cute.  We had to keep our clothes close to where we were swimming so the goats wouldn’t eat them.

It was dark by the time we got back.  I went to a local beer garden/restaurant near the park for dinner because they had good WiFi.  Service in Panama is notorious for being slow.  They actually weren’t too bad about taking my order and bringing my food, although I never did get a chance to order a second beer and they closed before I ever got the check, even though I had asked for it.  I finally had to go to the bar and wave money at them.  At least no one hurried me out, so I got to catch up on my email and Facebook.

July 2, 2014

I tried the Kotowa Coffee House on Wednesday morning, but they didn’t have WiFi, either.  The place was packed.  I could sort of understand why they wanted to hurry people along.  Boquete has a shopping plaza called Establos (Stables) Plaza which is full of tourism related businesses and a Spanish school.  It is a good place to find package deals on tours and public restrooms, but the shuttles to Bocas del Toro from the travel agent associated with the Mamallena Hostel off the Central Park are cheaper.  I had just enough time to run to the post office to buy stamps before I was due to go hiking.

The Elusive Quetzal

Glasswing Butterfly

I met up with my tour guide, Pat from Panama Pathfinders, and two other hikers at 8:30.  A driver took us to the trailhead for the Quetzales trail.  You can take a taxi to the trailhead and do the hike on your own, but if you have your heart set on seeing a quetzal, it is worth hiring a guide.  The Quetzales trail goes generally uphill, but only gains about 400 feet.  It involved crossing several streams on narrow metal bridges and some scrambling over downed trees, but wasn’t a difficult hike.  We stalked along through cloud forest, looking for quetzals.  The forest wasn’t as spectacular as the cloud forest in Monteverde, Costa Rica, but had plenty of aguacatillos (a tiny species of avocado) that quetzals like to eat.  There were also some old growth cedar trees, which I found interesting because they had small compound leaves instead of needles like the cedars in the USA.  One exceptionally large one was estimated to be 850 years old.  We did see one female quetzal on the way up, although she was in shadow with her back to us and quite a distance away.  I had been hoping to see a quetzal since Guatemala, where they are the national bird, and wasn’t satisfied with that
sighting.  Perhaps more interesting than that quetzal, was the glass wing butterfly that we saw.  Pat said it was the world’s rarest butterfly.  It was certainly different.  The wings were actually transparent.

Waterfall at the End of the Quetzal Trail

The path eventually ended at a tall waterfall.  Scrambling up to the base of the waterfall was the hardest part of the hike.  We spent a short time there, enjoying the scenery and looking for quetzals, and then headed back down.  On the way down, we saw two more female quetzals.  I never did get a photo of one, but Pat did.  The second one, at least, I was able to see clearly.  I finally felt like I had seen at least a female quetzal, although I hadn’t seen a male with a spectacular long tail.  Pat told me that they had started migrating to the Caribbean side, so I hoped I might still get to see one over there.  We all felt like walking some more when we got to the trailhead, so we kept walking down the valley until our ride came along.

I really wanted to find decent backpack to replace my now shredded duffel bag, so I went to the local department store.  They had some very nice small packs, but nothing big enough to hold my belongings.  They also had some decent running shoes, but not in any size larger than 7.5.  My attempt at shopping was a dismal failure.  I continued up the road and walked to the top of the town, which was very pretty.  There were lovely homes and a nice hotel and spa up there.  I ate a chicken Caesar salad at an Argentinian restaurant up there that had decent WiFi.  Panamanian restaurants are notorious for bad service.  I felt as if they provided WiFi to keep the customers happy while the waiters refused to make eye contact.  I sat there for a good two hours before I could get the check and I was the only person there.

Boquete

July 3, 2014

Reservoir

I needed to be at my shuttle at 7:30, so I just munched a couple of granola bars for breakfast and headed out.  I was there on time, but there were several stragglers.  We didn’t actually leave until about 8:15, even though the scheduled departure time was 8:00.  I figured that wasn’t bad for Latin America although, in all fairness, we had been waiting for Canadians.  We headed off down the mountain towards David and then took a short cut across to the highway between David and Bocas, where we started to ascend once again.  It was somewhat clearer than it had been when I arrived, but I still couldn’t see the top of Volcan Baru, the only volcano in Panama, but a pretty good sized one at nearly 11,000 feet.  We climbed for a couple of hours.  The two lane road was mostly pretty smooth, except for some major pot holes that were big enough to warrant driving around.  After a couple of hours, we crossed a pass and dropped down to a reservoir that powered a hydroelectric plant.  We stopped at the visitor center to use the restrooms.  When I was walking back from the hot springs with Eric, our guide, the day before, he had told me that the rivers used to be much wilder before the government built a lot of damns to generate power.

From the reservoir, we wound our way back down the mountain for another hour and a half to the ramshackle village of Almirante.  There was nothing attractive about Almirante.  The shore was lined with large warehouses, probably left over from Chiquita Banana days, and scruffy docks serviced by water taxis.  The shuttle parked just up the hill from the docks and we had to be vigilant when they unloaded our luggage to avoid having it swept away by local youths demanding tips for carrying it 50 yards.  These same youths followed us all the way to the boat house.  At first, I thought they actually worked on the boats and were just trying to pick up some extra cash.  This belief was dispelled when one of them demanded a tip for putting my bag on the boat.

Water Taxi to Bocas del Toro

The water taxis to Bocas del Toro town were packed with passengers, but they did require all of us to don life jackets, which somehow did not make me feel safer.  The ride took a half an hour or so.  Our fare had been included in the price of the shuttle, but I believe that they charged $6 for the service.  The waters on the first half of the journey were sheltered and smooth.  The second half was more exciting, but still nothing compared to the boat rides to and from Corcovado.  At the Bocas end of the trip, luggage carrying boys were replaced by taxi drivers waiting to take people to their hotels.  I was headed for the island of Bastimentos, so I just walked to the next dock to wait for another boat.  I waited for 10 or 15 minutes until there were enough people to make the trip worthwhile and then we headed off on another 10 minute boat ride, past the island of Careneros where Columbus once careened his ship, and on to the village of Old Bank on Bastimentos.

Old Bank

Old Bank is a West Indian settlement left over from the heyday of banana farming in the early 20^th century.  It is very picaresque, but crumbling.  Tourism has arrived, but has yet to benefit the infrastructure.  The town has only a (mostly) concrete footpath for a main street.  Houses and hostels straggle up the hill and restaurants and hostels occupy numerous docks jutting into the bay.  Three grocery stores are operated by Chinese families, one of which my host told me would, “try to steal from you,” which I took to mean that they charged excessive prices.  The occupants spoke a local dialect of a mixture of Spanish and English overlaid with a thick West Indian accent that baffled me completely and left me wondering whether it was best to speak English or Spanish when addressing them. 

Larry, the owner of Corcovado Adventures Tent Camp, had recommended the Jaguar Hostel where he and his daughter had once stayed.  My boatman brought me to their dock where I was greeted by the Jaguar himself, a friendly schoolteacher and musician of about my age who ran the hostel with his wife and daughters.  The hostel was built on a dock over the waters of the inlet.  The floorboards had gaps between them where one could see (and hear) the water sloshing below.  Seven rooms opened off a central corridor.  A large covered porch swung with hammocks contained a tidy kitchen and some tables and chairs.  It was a great place to relax and enjoy the view.  I had the entire place to myself for $20 a night.

My Room at the Jaguar Hostel

It was raining when I arrived, so I lounged in a hammock for a bit.  One of the daughters pulled a router with a cellular chip in it from out of her backpack and she shared her excellent internet connection with me while she did her homework or whatever teenagers do with their computers.  Finally, I got hungry enough to tear myself away from the internet.  It had stopped raining and I set out in search of food.  I heard loud music issuing from the restaurant called Roots, so figured they must be open.  They were hosting a children’s birthday party in the main part of the restaurant, but welcomed me to take a place further out on the dock.  Six dollars bought me a plate of tasty chicken, gallo pinto, and salad.  Beer was a dollar.  I could have drunk excessively in Panama if it weren’t for the fact that it was impossible to attract the attention of a waiter or waitress to order a second drink.  They invariably vanished after serving the food and I always had to ask someone for help when it came time to pay.  This was no exception, although the owners were quite occupied serving hors d’oeuvres and drinks to their numerous guests, so I didn’t blame them as much.  I had a good time watching the kids enjoy the party and soaking up the scenery.  After a couple of hours, when it looked like it might start raining again, I asked the owner if there was someone I could pay.  I found it interesting that he summoned one of the women instead of handling it himself.  I had to wait a while longer for my change, although that may have been because they were rummaging through everyone’s pockets and purses to locate it.  Only in Costa Rica and boquete had I ever seen a business with a proper bank of change.

I stopped at one of the local grocery stores on my way back to buy some beer and snacks for dinner.  Having eaten lunch at 3:30, I knew I wasn’t going to be up for another restaurant meal.  I lay in a hammock, drinking a beer and trying to read, although I kept dozing off.  I lay there, soaking up the ambiance, until it got dark.  The owner locked the front gate, said goodbye, and left for the evening.  I retired to my room to read, but soon fell asleep again.  Several days of poor sleep in noisy Boquete (and two beers) had caught up with me.  I slept until morning, waking only long enough to undress and turn out the lights about 11:00 pm.

July 4, 2014

Kids on the Public Dock

It was the waves crashing into the shore under my bed that woke me about 6:00 am.  I lounged in bed until just before 7:00 and then picked up my phone to look at the electronic version of my Lonely Planet guide, but got sucked into a novel and ended up reading until nearly 8:00.  When last I had checked the weather, it was supposed to be sunny in the morning and I hoped to go to the beach.  Having failed to write the night before, I took my laptop out to the picnic table on the porch to catch up on the previous days adventures while I ate some granola bars for breakfast.  A group of small children was waiting for the water taxi on the next dock over.  All the boys were dressed identically in navy blue trousers and white shirts with suspenders and matching white hats with blue bands.  They looked like a miniature barbershop quartet or something.  The little girls sported fancy dresses with full skirts.  I snuck a couple of photos.  Despite the encouraging weather report from the day before, it was overcast and even rained a bit while I was eating breakfast.

I hung out for a bit and then headed out for the beach about 10:30 when it looked like the rain had passed.  The path to Wizard’s beach headed uphill from the main sidewalk near the right hand side of town.  I had been warned not to take anything of value to the beach as there had been thefts and even muggings on the path.  I could see how it could happen.  The path wound upward along what appeared to be people’s front walkways until it passed out of the town and into the jungle.  It wasn’t really very far, but took a half an hour to get there because it was so muddy that I had to plan where to put each foot.  Once the path left the town, it was pretty lonely.  A robber could disappear into the jungle easily.  I didn’t see anyone except a lot of big black ants that bit if I didn’t walk fast enough to keep them from climbing up my ankles.  The path went up to the spine of the island and then down to the beach on the other side.  It was really a shame that I couldn’t bring my camera because Wizard’s Beach was one of the prettiest beaches I have ever seen.  It was like having Manuel Antonio all to myself.  There was a crescent of fine golden sand with shady trees arching over the strand.  The water was turquoise blue and the Caribbean stretched endlessly before me.  I was the only person there.

The tide was very high, which kept me from walking further to the right for fear I couldn’t get back.  I chose a spot under a tree and sat there trying to build a sand castle and watching the crabs scuttle sideways along the beach and dig holes in which to hide.  The crabs were the same color as the sand and looked almost transparent.  Only their eye stalks stood out against the background.  When the tide threatened to wet my towel, I moved uphill and lay in the sun for half an hour.  The temperature was perfect.  It was warm in the sun, but not so hot that I couldn’t cool off by wading into the surf and then sitting in the shade.  Being alone, I didn’t dare swim because the area was known for strong currents.  After sunning, I walked all the way to the left side of the beach where the sand met a rocky point.  The beach was actually pretty clean, but I picked up what plastic I found on the way back.  I was a Girl Scout once upon a time and was trained to always leave a place cleaner than I found it.  Bastimentos is trying to overcome the cultural propensity to leave trash everywhere.  There are frequent trash cans (although they are often overflowing) and signs reminding people that tourists don’t like litter.  My hostel separated their garbage, which led me to believe that there was some sort of recycling program on the island.  Unfortunately, there were still piles of refuse in some places.  I couldn’t help thinking that if everyone left Bastimentos (and everywhere else) a little bit cleaner than they found it, the litter problem would soon be eradicated.  Maybe that is one thing that tourists could do to actually improve the environment for a change. 

I was sandy and sweaty after my walk and getting hungry, so I headed back over the hill when I got back to the path.  One couple had arrived during my walk, but the beach was still largely deserted.  I picked my way back through the mud, which was slightly improved after a few hours of hot sun.  After returning to the hostel and washing the mud and sand off of my lower extremities, I ate a can of Vienna sausages and some crackers for lunch while I chatted with the owner for a while.  My only complaint about Bastimentos in the low season is that there were so few tourists that the restaurants weren’t really open.  It didn’t seem right to demand that they drop whatever else they were doing to cook a cheap meal for me.  The owner left about 2:30 to be sure he didn’t miss the Brazil vs. Columbia game.  I was sorry that there wasn’t an open bar with a TV where I could watch.  I read for a while and then went out to buy some groceries for dinner.  Even the Chinese grocers were watching the game, so I got to see that Brazil was winning.  The whole town cheered when they missed a point because of a foul.  You would have though Columbia had scored a goal.  Unfortunately, they did not and Brazil won 2-1.

The Jaguar's Neighbor

I spent a lazy afternoon, reading and drinking beer in my hammock in the shade.  Just before dark, the owner brought the router back for me so that I could have internet for the evening.  Once he locked the front gate, it really did feel like I had the whole house to myself.  I lay in the hammock, surfing the web on my phone until 9:30 or so and then retired to my room to watch Netflix in bed in case I fell asleep.    Unfortunately, there was not much chance of that happening, even though I had consumed a few beers, because the neighbors were running their heat pump air conditioner and the sound of water splashing back into the bay and the humming of the blower drove me nearly to distraction.  There must have been some Americans in the area, because there was the intermittent sound of fireworks being lit for the 4^th of July.  It was after 1:00 am before I could get to sleep, even with ear plugs.

July 5, 2014

Despite the late night the night before, I was up by 7:30.  It was a beautiful, sunny morning and I enjoyed eating breakfast on the porch and writing for a while.  I planned to go to Bocas later in the day, but didn’t expect to like it well enough to want to hang out for long, so planned to spend a lazy morning on the porch.

About 1:00, I walked out to the end of the pier to hail a water taxi.  One appeared almost immediately.  We circled the bay for a few minutes, picking up additional passengers, and then made the crossing to Bocas.  It was a beautiful, sunny afternoon and everything looked like a Caribbean postcard.  I got off at the Bocas del Toro Hotel and started walking towards the main part of town.  Before long, I came to a nice looking restaurant with a great view and I stopped there for lunch.  I hadn’t eaten anything but snacks for two days and was ready for a real meal.  I had a nice BBQ hamburger with grilled onions and fries.  The service was much better than normal and I managed to get out of there within an hour.

Crazy Tico Fans

The restaurant didn’t have a television, so I walked towards town, looking for a sports bar where I could watch the Costa Rica vs. Holland game.  (The name of the country may be the Netherlands everywhere else, but in Latin America it is Holland and its inhabitants are Hollandeses.)  I walked all the way through town to the ferry dock, looking for an ATM so I could pull out enough money to buy a Panamanian cell phone.  I didn’t find one.  Having taken a survey of the town, I decided that the place to be for the game was El Pirata, a waterfront bar that was packed with folks wearing Costa Rica jerseys and chanting, “Ticos, ticos!”  I forced my way through the crowd by the door and actually found a bar stool.  It took me almost until halftime to order a beer, but that was fine since I didn’t really want to drink that much.  The place was a zoo.  They were having a devil of a time producing enough cold beer and waiters were running around with ice buckets full of beer, trying to keep the fans well oiled.

The game was a repeat of the game with Greece.  Costa Rica hardly tried to score, but they had such a great defense that Holland couldn’t score, either, although they took shot after shot.  Every time the Costa Rican goalie, Navas, made some heroic save, the crowd went wild.  The score at halftime was 0-0.  The second half of the game was no different and the game went into overtime.  Things started to get tense.  The bar was running out of beer and was down to serving cans.  After another half an hour of play, the score was still 0-0.  Everyone breathed a sigh of relief and got ready for the penalty kicks.  Unfortunately, the Dutch goalie managed to stop two of the Costa Rican kicks and they ultimately lost 4-3.  That was very disappointing, but most of the crowd just seemed to be proud that they had at least made it to the quarter finals.  Semi-finals would be between Brazil and Germany and Holland and Argentina.

Final Score

I had somehow managed to pay during the break before the penalty kicks, so left as soon as the game was over.  The weather was still nice, but it was starting to get late, since the game had gone on so long.  The first boatman I tried wanted $10 (instead of the usual $1.50) to take me to Bastimentos.  I finally found the Bastimentos guy and managed to make a hair raising crossing (We got air off of every wave.) for a mere twice the normal rate.

I spent the evening on the porch in my hammock watching Netflix until my battery got low and I had to retreat to my room.  Shortly thereafter, a thunderstorm hit, bringing with it a deluge.  The sound of the rain drowned out any possible noise from the neighbor’s air conditioner, but the thunder and the shuddering of the house every time the owner’s boat slammed into the dock kept me awake until very late, anyway.

CORCOVADO NATIONAL PARK – “THE MOST BIOLOGICALLY INTENSE PLACE ON EARTH”

June 28, 2014

Catching the 4:45 AM bus out of Dominical gave, “getting up early,” a new meaning.  I had been unable to find anyone to pay at the Piramys Beachfront Hostel the day before, so I put my money and my key in an envelope and tossed it through the window of the reception area.  I hoped they didn’t think I was trying to skip out without paying, but they would have had no way to track me if I had because no one ever took my name when I arrived.  It was definitely the most laid back place I had ever stayed.  I tiptoed out of the hostel at 4:30 AM and dragged my bag up the road to the bus stop.  The bus had parked overnight on the dirt road through the middle of Dominical.  It was a little bit late getting started and I was relieved when it finally got moving.  The bus went all the way through to Neilly and I figured I would eventually be taking it the rest of the way after my detour to Corcovado.

Water Taxi Dock in Sierpe

We left Dominical and followed the coast to Uvita.  We drove past palm groves and rice paddies.  We made a circuit through Ciudad Cortez and finally stopped in Palmar Norte, were I got off about 7:00.  The first taxi driver who approached me wanted $20 to take me to Sierpe.  I told him I would wait for the bus at 8:00.  The next taxi driver only wanted $5, so I caved in and let him drive me.  The roads to Sierpe weren’t bad, but you had to know where you were going because Sierpe was way out in the country.  All the boats that take people to Bahia Drake and the Osa Peninsula leave from Sierpe.  At this time of year, they leave at 11:30.  I got to Sierpe about 7:30, so I had plenty of time to wait.  There was a restaurant by the river’s edge and I had coffee and breakfast and hung out, reading and using the WiFi until the boats arrived.

The boat ride from Sierpe to the Corcovado Tent Camp turned out to be much more interesting than expected.  We saw a crocodile almost immediately.  A family from Toronto with three children were sharing my boat and the kids had a blast looking for crocodiles as we made our way down the Sierpe River through a tangle of islands, waterways, and mangroves.  Our boat was a launch with a panga hull and a 250 hp motor on the back.  We were hauling, but the ride still took an hour.  Eventually, we reached the mouth of the river at Bahia Drake and the mangroves gave way to rocky shore interspersed with pretty little beaches.  We dropped a couple of people off at lodges on the river and then headed over the bar and out into the ocean.  The waves going over the bar were large and we got air a couple of times.  It was an “E” ticket ride for sure.  We crossed Bahia Drake and landed at the town to let off a large group of passengers.  Bahia Drake looked like a nice anchorage and I saw a few cruising boats on hooks there.  There was a town for provisions and a good beach to land a dinghy.  The scenery wasn’t too shabby, either.

My Tent at Corcovado Adventures Tent Camp

Observation Platform

Beach Near the Tent Camp

                                                                                                                            We continued past the town and out around a point before landing at the Cordovado Adventures Tent Camp.  The tents were pitched on platforms and had big oilcloth rain flies over them.  There was a large pavilion housing the dining hall with showers and bathrooms up the hill behind that.  Behind the bathrooms, a path led up a steep hill and then across a hanging bridge to a platform anchored to a tree, 70 feet above the ground.  The platform had a lovely view of the creek and surrounding trees and gave one an opportunity to observe the wildlife in the canopy. The camp was fairly empty, so I got a tent right on the beach with a nice view.  I saw a scarlet macaw almost immediately.  Lunch was served shortly after we arrived and then I went for a walk along the coast to the Rio Claro.  I saw a troop of capuchin monkeys before I even got out of the camp.  

Troop of Capuchin Monkeys Playing

Capuchin Monkey

Further along the path, I saw spider monkeys.  The spider monkeys are the rarest type of monkey.  All four kinds of monkey found in Costa Rica (squirrel, capuchin, spider and howler) are found in Corcovado.  At high tide, the path was sometimes under water, so it took some time to determine where I was going.  I trudged across lots of pretty little beaches, dashing across creeks when the waves receded.  I saw several more scarlet macaws and a troop of capuchin monkeys who were having a wonderful time playing on a water pipe that was strung across a small valley.  They were chasing each other and wrestling, swinging from vines and then running along the pipe.  I watched them for a long time, but couldn’t get a decent picture because they were in constant motion.  I got to the Rio Claro just after 4:00.  At hide tide, I would have had to swim across, so I elected to turn around and head back before it got dark.  Coming back, the pathway was just seething with tiny hermit crabs wearing multi-hued shells.  It was impossible to walk without crushing some of them, but I did my best to avoid them.  By the time I got back, I was exhausted.  I took a nap until dinner, lying in a hammock watching the bats come out at dusk until I fell asleep.  Thankfully, there were no mosquitoes.

Hermit Crabs

 Dinner was served family style and it was nice to talk to the other guests.  The owner, his friend and the family from Toronto had spent the afternoon fishing, so we had fresh sashimi, ceviche and grilled fish for dinner.  I had plenty to eat even though I passed on eating the rice, corn salad and pasta salad.  I didn’t quite have enough willpower to pass on the homemade bread, however.  It was moist and delicious.  By 8:00, everyone was tired and ready to head for bed.  We had to get up early the next day to go to Corcovado National Park.

June 29, 2014

Breakfast was at 5:30 and we waded out to the boat at 6:30 for the hour long boat ride from the camp to www.corcovado.com, info@corcovado.com, 866-498-0824 from the US, 506-8386-2296 from Costa Rica, VHF Channel 11) and either meet them off the shore of the camp or have the tour pick you up in the fine anchorage at Bahia Drake.  Tour boats originate from there, anyway.  The owner of the camp is an American who has lived in Costa Rica for decades.  His name is Larry and he was very receptive to the idea of working with cruisers.  He also offered to arrange the delivery of provisions from Sierpe, since he frequently has things delivered for the camp.  Celso and Antonio, who run the camp when Larry isn’t around, are also very helpful.  There are other lodges in Bahia Drake who cater to yachties, but they charge higher prices and could not possibly be more helpful.  The tours would be the same, in any case.

Wading Ashore at Corcovado National Park

Corcovado National Park.  The waves were pretty large, so we had a wild ride.  The water was clear and blue and we stopped twice to observe two different kinds of dolphins that we encountered along the way.  Our boatman backed his panga in to shore to let us off and then beached the boat on the flat, smooth rocks of the shore as the tide went out.  Cruisers could probably anchor off of Corcovado National Park and come ashore in a dinghy, but getting back to the boat through the surf would be hazardous.  It would be much better to arrange a tour through Corcovado Adventures Tent Camp.

Coati

Our guide’s name was Roy.  After donning our hiking shoes, we walked along the beach until we reached the Rio Claro.  I counted at least three Rio Claros in that part of the world, so it could be confusing.  On the way, we saw lots of different kinds of birds and a coati. A crocodile slipped into the river just as we arrived, so we didn’t really get to see much of him, but there were a pair of tiger herons courting and making a huge racket.  We made a U-turn at the river and walked back through the forest.  We saw lots of spider monkeys and squirrel monkeys and a purple throated mountain gem (hummingbird) sitting on her nest.  Kites followed the troops of monkeys, scooping us the insects the monkeys disturbed as they foraged through the trees.  

Tiger Herons Courting

Spider Monkey with Baby

Purple Throated Mountain Gem

Roy was looking for a tapir to show us.  When we returned to where the boat was beached, the captain mentioned that he had seen one on the beach a half an hour before.  Roy and I went off following the tapir tracks through the sand, while the family with kids trailed behind, distracted by the ocean and a profusion of hermit crabs.  At times, the whole beach seemed to be moving.  We followed the tapir tracks and
eventually came upon him sleeping in the shade.  Tapirs are the largest wild land mammals in Central America.  He did not seem to be took terribly bothered by us as we crept close and took pictures of him.

Tapir

Sirena Station

After seeing our tapir, we headed in the opposite direction and walked through the forest to the Sirena Station.  The Sirena station is located at the end of a grassy airstrip near the Rio Sirena .  It was a sprawling affair, with a number of decks and buildings connected by raised walkways.  It was possible to pitch a tent on the decks and camp there.  The park is 43 kilometers across.  Most people who hike across spend two nights camping along the way.  We saw a small caiman in a drainage ditch across the runway.  Monkeys

Black Iguana Enjoying the Beach

were swinging in the trees at the edge of the clearing as we sat on the deck and ate our lunches.  We kept hearing howler monkeys, but never did see them.  We didn’t see any peccaries, either, although we did see their tracks.  Roy nearly stepped on a seven foot tropical bird eating snake that I fortunately saw and frantically pointed out.  I wasn’t familiar with that type of snake and only knew that there were lots of poisonous ones around.  Fortunately, he wasn’t dangerous and Roy didn’t quite step on him.  Shortly thereafter, we came across another tapir escaping the heat of the day by lying in a wallow of cool mud.  We walked back to the boat along a beautiful beach.  The sun came out and the water turned a gorgeous turquoise as we sped back to the camp.  We got back just in time to watch the World Cup soccer match between Costa Rica and Greece.

Larry, the owner of the camp, had a couple of his buddies visiting from the city.  Once the family headed off to the beach, I was the only remaining guest.  Larry invited me to watch the game with them at his place, since he had the only television.  Costa Rica had never before made it to the second round at the World Cup and everyone was ecstatic.  It was really fun to watch with them.  The game was a real nailbiter, too.  Costa Rica scored the first goal and it looked like they were going to win until Greece got a goal and tied them in the last few minutes.  Since the second round of games was not a series like the first round, there had to be a winner.  They were forced to play two more 15 minute periods.  No one managed to score a goal during that time.  Greece really should have won.  They took shot after shot, while the Costa Rican team did very little, but the Costa Rican goalie, Navas, was so wonderful that he blocked every shot.  After another half an hour, the game was still tied.  Then each team got five penalty kicks.  Costa Rica made all five of theirs, but Navas managed to block one of the Greek shots.  Costa Rica won to advance to the quarter finals.  Everyone went nuts.  I was sorry that I wouldn’t be in Costa Rica to watch the next game.

WHERE THE JUNGLE MEETS THE SEA – MANUEL ANTONIO, COSTA RICA TO SURF PARADISE IN DOMINICAL

June 23, 2014

Arenal Backpacker's Resort

I got up (I really have to concentrate on not omitting pronouns, now, when I speak English, after so many months of speaking Spanish.) even earlier than usual, because my shuttle was coming at 8:00 and I wanted to be sure I was breakfasted and ready in time.  That turned out to be fortunate because, when I returned from my shower, the mechanism had jammed and I could not get my key into the padlock on my tent.  It took two men from the maintenance department and some big bolt cutters to get it off for me.  That was stressful, but it all worked out fine and I was packed and ready long before the shuttle arrived.

Not wanting to spend the night in San Jose, I had booked a ride on an Interbus Shuttle.  It was a wonderful service.  They drove me door to door for $49, which I would have spent, anyway, if I had taken the bus, because I would have needed to pay for a hotel and taxis in San Jose.  The van was clean and comfortable.  When the driver learned I spoke Spanish, he invited me to sit up front with him, so I had lots of room and he offered a running commentary as we crossed the country, which was very interesting.  It took us about five

Interbus Shuttle

hours to make the drive.  The first part of the trip involved climbing up over the Cordillera de Tilaran and down into the city of San Ramon.  That took us about an hour and a half.  The road was very curvy and we were soon in the clouds where the visibility was poor.  I was very impressed with the driver (and Costa Rican drivers in general) who was very courteous and sane compared to the drivers I had in other nations.  There was no honking or passing on blind curves.  San Ramon was a city of 100,000 people up in the mountains.  Its primary industry was coffee.  It was an unattractive place, made even more unattractive by the fog that obscured what would otherwise probably have been pretty mountains surrounding the city.

Bad Visibility Near San Ramon

From San Ramon, we headed towards Punta Arenas on the Pan American Highway.  We passed through Esparza and finally sighted the Pacific near Caldera.  Caldera is a bay at the mouth of the Gulf of Nicoya.  We could see mountains across the Gulf and the scenery was pretty spectacular.  We continued on another hour to Jaco Beach.  At one point we crossed a large river with at least a dozen big crocodiles sunning themselves on the banks.  We followed the Pacific coast through Parrita and finally arrived in Quepos about 1:30 in the afternoon.  Quepos is a nice little town in the jungle, slightly inland from the water.  While there are many tour operators located there, it still didn’t feel like a tourist town.  Most of the hotels and restaurants were along the 7 km road between Quepos and Manuel Antonio National Park.

I stayed at the Pura Vida Hostel.  “Pura Vida,” (pure life) is the slogan of Costa Rica.  It connotes a sort of

Pura Vida Hostel Outside of Quepos

green, “Let the good times roll.”  The hostel rambled down a steep, jungle covered slope on the narrow, curvy road just outside of Quepos.  While a quick walk from town, it was still quiet enough that we saw squirrel monkeys and a sloth right outside.  While the other guests were young, they were friendly enough and not hard partyers.  I was happy to hang out with them.  It started to pour down rain as soon as I arrived.  I didn’t want to walk to town in the rain, so I spent the afternoon in my room, researching Panama.

Finally, about 4:30, I decided I had to go to town before it got dark, even if it was raining.  I donned shorts and flip flops so that everything not covered by my raincoat could be easily dried and headed off to town.  I explored a bit and discovered the supermarket, but wanted to go to the bank first.  I got to the bank just after 5:00 when they closed.  I was using the ATM when the power went out and the machine rebooted.  My card was lost inside the machine.  I only had about $20 worth of colones, which wasn’t enough to pay my hotel bill or the balance of the rafting trip I had booked.  I started to get concerned.  I grabbed a cheap dinner at a chicken restaurant and then went to the grocery store and bought a few things for breakfast and a couple of beers.  Then I sloshed my way back to the hostel and spent the evening distracting a young woman from the pain of her burned calf.  She had crashed a motor scooter in Monteverde and burned herself on the exhaust and was steaming the scab off the burn with hot salt water at the suggestion of her friend’s nurse practitioner mother.

June 24, 2014

As much as I would have liked to get to the National Park before the crowds, my first order of business was recovering my ATM card.  The bank didn’t open until 9:00, so I was able to sleep in a bit.  I arrived at the bank just before they opened and there was already a long line of people waiting.  The bank was very efficient.  A touch screen monitor at the entrance gave us the opportunity to state our business and then printed out a ticket with a number on it.  Monitors over the teller windows directed each person to a particular window when his or her turn came.  Despite the line, I waited less than 10 minutes.  Fortunately, I had no trouble collecting my ATM card.  I just had to show my passport and sign for the card and I was on my way.  I walked back up the hill to the hostel, collected my day pack, and waited for the bus to Manuel Antonio.

Public Beach at Manuel Antonio

The bus picked me up across the street from the hostel.  The fare to the National Park was 285 colones (about 50 cents.)  The buses between Quepos and Manuel Antonio ran every 15 minutes and were clean, safe and reliable.  They stopped wherever you flagged them down.  We climbed up over the peninsula and then descended to the beach on the other side.  Hotels and restaurants lined the road nearly the whole way.  The views were gorgeous.  The Manuel Antonio area looked exactly the way you expect a tropical paradise to appear.  Lush jungle and palm trees reached all the way to white sand beaches and clear blue water.  Rock outcroppings jutted from the water.  The Manuel Antonio National Park occupied a peninsula and offered several coves with gorgeous beaches.  As a pale person prone to sunburn, I found tree shaded beaches to be delightful.  The entry fee to the park was $10, although the fee is scheduled to increase to $16 as of August 1, 2014.  The ticket office was on the street, a block or so before the entrance to the park.  T-shirt vendors lined the road and guides solicited business, although they weren’t too interested in me, since I was traveling alone.

Three Toed Sloth

Squirrel Monkey

Capuchin Monkey

Once inside the park, a dirt road led from the entrance out to the beach where the trails split.  Manuel Antonio is a very small park and gets the largest number of visitors of any park in Costa Rica.  In the morning, when the road was crowded with people and guides, it was easy to spot animals.  One had only to look in the direction that the guides were pointing their telescopes.  Within 50 yards of the entrance, I had already seen a sloth.  Shortly thereafter, I saw a troop of squirrel monkeys playing in the trees and on the power lines.  Next, I saw a large iguana creeping through a tree.  He moved almost as easily from tree to tree as the monkeys did.  Further down the road, I encountered a troop of capuchin monkeys.  Several of the paths were closed for maintenance.  Indeed, there seemed to be quite a bit of construction going on.  At the beach end of the road, there were several nice restrooms with changing rooms and showers. 

View from Cathedral Point

Beach at La Trampa

Thieving Raccoon

                                                                                                                                                                                   I followed a path along the beach and saw numerous raccoons, boldly trolling for food.  I continued past the beach and explored the Cathedral Point trail, which led out and around the tip of the peninsula and offered spectacular views and some tiny beaches.  The trail passed through groves of palms and then into a forest of very tall trees, before returning to the main beaches.  I stopped at the beach to admire the water and take a nap.  While I was sleeping, a raccoon attempted to drag my day pack out from under my head.  He was very cute, but was so persistent, that I started to worry we were going to have a confrontation.  I had been warned not to leave my bag unattended, but didn’t realize that it was non-human thieves I needed to fear.  After an hour or so of chasing raccoons, I decided it was time to leave.  As I walked up the path, I saw a capuchin monkey climb up onto a trash can, open the lid like he did it all the time, and proceed to remove the trash.  Several more monkeys appeared and they carried the garbage up into the trees where they divided the spoils.  Several raccoons milled about below them, snatching anything they dropped.

Monkey Opening Trash Can

Dragging His Spoils into the Trees

Iguana

 I walked slowly back along the road and saw a large lizard and several small ones and a northern jacana, along with a few more capuchin monkeys.  I stopped into a restaurant and had a late lunch and a couple of beers while I tried to watch two soccer games simultaneously.  Then I bought a tank top, checked out the fairly awesome public beach, and talked to a surf school about possibly taking a lesson.  The water looked much gentler than it had at the Surfing Turtle Lodge where I had tried unsuccessfully for a week to take a surf lesson.  The price was the same $30 as in Nicaragua, but the lessons were an hour instead of two and a half.  The park closed at 4:00, so the bus back to the hostel at 4:30 was quite crowded.  The nearest place I could disembark was actually inside the edge of Quepos, so I visited a liquor store and bought a couple of more beers to have on hand before I trudged back up the hill to the hostel.

June 25, 2014

I had a lazy morning, since I had booked my rafting adventure for the afternoon when I hoped it would be warmer. I lounged around the hostel until about 11:30 when the rafting company picked me up.  They took me up the road to their office where we ate a nice lunch of chicken and rice with beans, salad and vegetables while they collected the rest of the group.  There were two rafts full of people.  One held a family of five and their guide.  Our raft only had three clients and a guide.  Our guide’s name was Flippy.  This did not inspire confidence.

We drove for about half an hour up the Rio Naranjo.  The van let us out a short walk from the put in and Flippy led us on an interesting nature walk while the other employees readied the rafts.  We nibbled cinnamon bark and ate star fruit fresh from the tree.  There were limes and oranges and several types of bananas growing along the road, including some purple ones.  Everything was ready to go by the time we got to the rafts.  We donned life jackets and helmets and picked up our paddles. 

The Rio Naranjo Where We Pulled Out

The stretch of the Rio Naranjo we rafted was mostly class II and III with a few class IV rapids thrown in.  The guides seemed intent on getting us as wet as possible.  They aimed for the holes where we got stuck while water poured over us.  Our raft was completely full of water and I thought we’d never get out of there.  Fortunately, the water was a reasonably pleasant temperature.  After a while, it started to rain and it rained pretty hard.  We heard lots of thunder and saw some lightning.  I did see one sloth, but after a while, my glasses were so wet I could hardly see anything.  The actual rafting part of the adventure lasted about two hours.  The last stretch was much calmer and we could relax a bit.  I was actually cold by the time we got to the van.  Fortunately, it was a much shorter drive back and I was the first one to be returned to my hotel.  I went straight for a hot shower.

Quepos Bus Terminal

Pez Vela Marina

My room had been shut up all day and was nice and warm.  It didn’t take long for me to recover from my chill.  I had been thinking of staying an extra day to enjoy the beach, but the weather looked wet, so I decided to head out into the rain to locate the bus station and check out the marinas for my sailor friends who were coming behind me so I could leave the next morning.  I donned my shorts, flip flops, and raincoat and grabbed my umbrella before heading out into the rain.  I walked down the hill into town and quickly located the bus terminal.  Quepos is quite compact, so everything is convenient.  Quepos actually lies two feet below sea level.  Back when United Fruit used to have huge banana plantations in the area, they constructed a sea wall and built the town on what was once a mangrove swamp.  They also built a big pier for loading bananas onto ships.  Today, that pier has been converted into a marina.  There is still a lot of construction going on there, but the harbor is tucked behind a substantial breakwater.  There were a few sailboats in there, but most of the boats were sport fishers.  There were also many boats docked in the estuary of the Rio Naranjo, but it looked like the channel might be hard to find and probably would be best navigated at high tide.  The official marina was called Marina Pez Vela.  It looked like it was meant to be high end with some nice restaurants and good security.  It was within easy walking distance of Quepos and the bus terminal.  It would be easy and cheap to catch a bus to Manuel Antonio from there.

I had been searching for a replacement for the day pack I bought in Mexico almost from the first day of my trip, since I had had to repair that pack before I ever even used it and had mended it several times since.  It was also poor in the water resistance department and everything I kept in it had to be wrapped in plastic bags if I wanted it to stay dry.  After I went to the bus terminal to determine the times for buses to Dominical, I spied some decent day packs outside a store near the bus station.  It was not a store that catered to tourists, but the packs were imported and it cost me nearly $40 to buy a new one.  I didn’t realize it at the time, but when I got it home I was pleased to discover that it had a padded compartment for my computer.  It was nice that it wasn’t obviously a computer backpack.  I spent all the money I had brought to buy dinner on the backpack, so had to trek back up the hill to get more cash. 

I ate roast chicken and French fries (I have never eaten so many French fries as I have in Central America.) for dinner at a fast food place and then picked up a small bottle of cheap hooch and some fruit juice at the local liquor store.  I spent much of the evening sipping cocktails and chatting with Mauricio, a young man from Mexico who was working at the hostel to earn enough money to take his motorcycle on a sailboat to Columbia.  Having just checked out the sailing trips from Panama to Cartagena, I knew that taking a motorcycle along was possible, but cost double what it cost for a person alone.  Unfortunately, it is impossible (or at least seriously inadvisable) to go overland from Panama to South America.  One has to either fly or go by boat.

June 26, 2014

I spent the morning packing and planning a trip to Corcovado National Park.  Then I caught the bus in front of the hostel that took me to the bus station.  The official schedule says there are three buses a day going to Dominical, but it turns out that there are really many more.  All the buses to Uvita stop at the edge of Dominical.  One has only to walk down the hill to the beach, which I was easily able to do, even with my rolling duffel bag.  The ride to Dominical took less than an hour.

Piramys Beachfront Hostel

Dominical was the opposite of Manuel Antonio.  The main street of the town was a dirt road.  While there were a few nice small hotels, the majority of the place was decidedly surfer funky.  Restaurants advertised organic juices and there were yoga classes available.  Most of the signs were made from broken surf boards.  I stayed at the Piramys Beachfront Hostel.  The sign out front said private rooms cost $26, but I got one for $12, which must have been the low season price.  The room was a concrete cave, but it had large, high screened windows, a private bathroom with hot shower and a comfortable mattress with a mosquito net.  I didn’t see any mosquitos, but it was comforting to know it was there.  Sitting under it made me feel like a kid in a fort.  The room was cool and well ventilated and the walls were painted with colorful murals.  It was funky, but comfortable.

My Mosquito Net

Surfer in Dominical

Dominical revolves around surfing and the waves were spectacular.  The beach wasn’t particularly attractive.  There as a lot of driftwood and plant debris and much of the beach was rocky.  The action was all in the water.  I got to Dominical just before noon.  I checked into my hostel and then went to the tourist information place to determine how to get to Sierpe before 11:00 in the morning to catch my boat to Corcovado.  The collective shuttle from Quepos had been full and a private one would have cost $70.  A taxi from Dominical was an even more outrageous $115, but there was a public bus at 4:45 am that would get me there in time.  It would be painful, but the price was right.  I was kind of hungry, but decided to wait until 2:00 when the soccer game came on to eat lunch.  Rain was predicted for later in the afternoon, so I took advantage of the sun to sit and watch the surfers and walk along the beach to the river and then back through the town.  Much of Dominical was hidden in the trees.  It felt a bit like a campground, rather than a town.

At 2:00, I went to the restaurant attached to one of the nicer hotels that was advertising a casado and a smoothie for 3000 colones.  A “casado” (married man’s meal) is a piece of meat (I had steak.) with rice, beans, and salad.  I even got spaghetti with mine.  It was a huge platter of food and I left most of the rice and spaghetti.  The steak was tender and flavorful.  It was the best piece of beef I had had in months.  All beef in Costa Rica is grass fed.  They even export organic beef to the United States.  I ate my lunch and watched Belgium beat Korea.  It was the most violent soccer game I had ever seen.  They seemed to be tackling each other constantly.  Both teams were extremely aggressive, which seemed odd to me since neither of them had a chance to progress in the World Cup.  Maybe Korea just wanted to win one game before they went home.  The Koreans never did get a goal, but they made some spectacular flying kicks.  They were entertaining to watch.

After the game, I went back to my room to rest a bit.  It soon started to pour down rain and it continued to rain all evening and into the night.  I never did go back out for dinner.  I just stayed in and watched Netflix.

June 27, 2014 

View from The Southeast End of the Beach at Dominical

Rocky Beach at Dominical

Friday was my day to emulate the sloths I had been seeing hanging out in the trees.  I got up latish and went out for a latte and a smoothie at a cafe near the highway.  In Dominical, the closer you got to the highway, the more civilized things were.  After breakfast, I went for a walk down the beach.  Rain was predicted, but the sun was out and the beach looked more attractive in the sunlight.  The southeast end of the beach was sandier and more attractive than the part closer to town.  There were parrots squawking in the trees.  The surf looked seriously sick.  I considered moving to Uvita, but knew the bus schedule from Dominical, so decided not to risk it, as I had to be in Sierpe by 11:00 am the next day to catch my boat to Corcovado.  At this time of year, the 3:00 pm boat was not running and it would cost me $20 to hire a private boat if I missed the 11:00 one.  There was no one to pay at the hostel, anyway.  I looked on and off all day, but couldn't find anyone working there.  It was very quiet.  I spent the afternoon working on my blog.  Around 5:30, I went out to the San Clemente Bar and Grill for a grilled chicken salad.  Dinner with a beer ran me about $11.00.  Beers cost just over $2, but food prices were pretty comparable with the United States.

Dominical Definitely Had the Breaks