Vacaciones

So, sitting in the hostel in San Jose Thursday night, I couldn’t bring myself to waste precious vacation time and sit at the slow hostel computers and ensure all my readers of my well-being. Of course, I apologize for this, but you wouldn’t want to blog either. Rather than back track and provide y’all with a post each day, it’s all going to happen right here in a post that might take me a while, I’m bound to miss a few things. Enjoy.

Day 1 – Pizza (6/28/07)

Began the day getting haggled to join the baby trees people in the field to hold measuring tapes and stuff. Decided that the time would be best spent finishing the LEP data table and sending an update to Dr. Chazdon. Worked on all that up until noon then had a fine lunch. Packed up my weekend stuff in record time.

Around 1:20pm Amanda, Debra, Tinny, & I all hiked out the scorching kilometer out to the bus stop. Very efficient trip into the capital, straight 90 minutes. At the bus stop, stocked up on some colones and grabbed a taxi.

Exciting story #1. So, I have the directions down to this hostel as far as streets, nearby locations, and Tico directions. Hop in the taxi and schpeel some directions and the driver nods and then continues to ask me the name of the place for the next five minutes. Told him the hostel was 250m north of this park in San Jose and he seemed to be all set now.

A few more minutes of navigating San Jose’s genius one-way street system and the car stops. Driver says something to the effect, “It’s around here, no?” I respond with a “Well, what street are we on?” “7th” “But, señor, there’s a sign right there that says 5th street” “Oh” “I’m gonna hop out here”

Only a 100m or so to the hostel called Tranquilo Backpackers (my kind of place of course). Also happens to be right next to Bakea, the fancy restaurant we dined at my last time in the capital. Backing up, I only picked this hostel because they have free pancakes (over the one that charges a dollar for breakfast).

Grabbed a dorm room bed for $9/night in the basement, dropped my back and hopped on the horse up to 7th street books for a rendezvous. Only a 6-7 minute walk south in the part of San Jose I know pretty well (where to get a La Nacion, coffee, etc.). Met back up with the three girls and eventually Melqui.

Snap, I never introduced Melqui. Melqui has the coolest name if you hadn’t noticed (also “Melky” Cabrera). Amanda knows Melqui from the bat course she took here in February. Originally from Colombia, now San Jose, and moving to Monte Verde, Melqui has a job as a biologist in Monte Verde.

Thinking like a true sports fan, Melqui suggested we find a place for dinner where the Copa America was on. Good call, Paraguay/Colombia. Taxied from the center out to San Pedro to a restaurant called Il Pomodoro, which supposedly has the best pizza in San Pedro, if not the Metro area. Definitely lived up to the reputation.

The five of us got through a large veggie, a large cheese and a few brews. Some really good tomato sauce definitely made the pizza. Paraguay embarrassed Colombia. Afterwards, Tinny & Debra took a bus to the Wellesley apartment on the other side of town. I split a taxi with Amanda and Melqui to the center were Amanda was grabbing a bus to the airport.

Wished Amanda a good trip and decided to walk on back to the hostel. Interesting walk through the most interesting parts of town. McDonald’s on Avenida Central couldn’t have been busier. By the way, the most amazing weather ever in town. Constant breeze, mid seventies, mountain vistas.

At the hostel I watched the Argentina/USA game in the Copa America with a few people on the chill TV set up they have. Got a little sleepy after the long day, but decided to do some reading outside. Shot out to some hammocks on the front porch. Read for a little bit before dozing off. A little later the light on the porch went out.

Around 11:30pm, I decided it was a good time to hit the hay. Got up to the door to discover it locked. Ay! So at this point I’m trapped between a 10 foot wall and the hostel. Before seriously considering just climbing over the wall out to the street and then reentering the hostel, I did some knocking on the door to no avail.

As I’m about to just forget and climb over, a guy walks up and he offered to go inside to the desk and get somebody to save me from sure peril. So that was a little ten minute ordeal that worked out all right. This hostel was especially fond of playing loud music in the lobby until midnight or later, so it was tough to get to sleep right away.

And to think, that’s just one day!

Day 2 – Compras (6/29/07)

Had plans to meet Debra downtown for some goofing around at 11:00am, so I had some time to kill after waking up. Kicked it off by making myself a couple pancakes, super yum. Checked the old email quickly and set out into the city.

Grabbed a La Nacion (the big newspaper) and had a couple coffees at a nearby coffee shop. Took my time walking over to 1st & 6th since it was still early. This short Mexican dude walked up to me a little before 11:00am and gave me this great story (in English) about how he got in trouble trying to buy some pot the night before and he was here visiting his Dad.

Mildly entertained, I gave him a thousand colones and continued on to meet Debra. We took a quick walk through the Mercado Central and then on to the cool department store with the really good toy department. Here I found a Little Tikes wiffle ball set (with two balls!) and crayons (check and check).

From there Debra and I decided to walk to San Pedro. Turned out to be a long-ish walk, but we took pit stops at a small market (bought Imperial playing cards) and Bagelmen’s to read guidebooks and enjoy a big coffee. The check card was back to its usually moodiness and I’ve learned it ends up working if you ask people to try every credit card machine they have.

Our next stop was Mall San Pedro, where we did all the floors (4) and stopped in a few places. Interestingly enough, this mall as a food court on not just one floor, but three of them. Every fast food place imaginable, including the Quiznasty. Checked out their prices, not that much better than the states.

After the hour or so in the mall, we made the call to go see the campus of UCR (Universidad de Costa Rica). Since their academic year runs March-December, the campus was pretty lively. All the buildings look like they were built in the mid-80’s, which is probably true. Reading through the Lonely Planet, Debra suggested we visit the insect museum on campus.

Asked a few people for directions and then found a guy who was going near there. In the basement of the music building (where Debra didn’t think the people playing music should be going to college for music) we found a crazy grad student type who let us in. The Lonely Planet distinguishes this museum as the largest collection of insects in Central America.

Turned out to be about an 800 square foot room jam-packed with bugs. We saw butterflies and beetles and ants and wasps and lots of other cool insects. They were mostly organized into “bigger pictures.” Like a bunch a little bugs were organized so that the display case looked like a bigger bug. After touring the entire museum and seeing a picture of elephantiasis we booked it out of the museum.

Tried to use the ATM, but it didn’t feel like cooperating. Debra and I grabbed a bus back to the center were we used healthier ATMs, bought phone cards (once we sorted them out from lottery tickets) and went fly-shirt-shopping. Found a solid Hollister rip-off for 14 bucks. Dropped off my new belongings and changed quickly at the hostel.

Raced on back to 7th street books to meet Tinny and Katie (fellow Wellesley intern in San Jose) for dinner. We waited for about 30 minutes, then Debra went to call while I kept a lookout. Ten minutes later a cab pulled up with Tinny & Katie and we went to find Debra. Once reunited we decided to eat at Nuestra Tierra, Lonely Planet’s budget choice for the city.

Used my exceptional sense of direction (and map) to guide us to the restaurant. (I really didn’t think blogging this vacation would take so long) Looking over the menu, I found an option I couldn’t say no to. How the pizza the night before filled my American cravings, this meal filled my Tico cravings.

Quarter chicken (done to perfection), generous helpings of rice & beans, fried platanos, steamed veggies, salad, and an egg (yay!). All for seven bucks. Needless to say, I went to town on this casado campesino (country meal). Following dinner we scrapped plans to go to Moravia to see live music and decided to walk to Centro Comercial El Pueblo, more like Centro pub crawling.

Kicked around for a little while, went into a couple places. In this one, Café Arte Boruca, there was a guy on guitar who really liked playing the Rolling Stones. Soon after, called it an early night (12:00am) so that Debra could grab an early bus to the coast, and we were pretty tired. A quick walk back to the hostel were I went straight to bed.

Oh, and Tinny got her visa, so we’re good to go for the home stretch.

Day 3 – Viajar (6/30/07)

I doubt this could get any shorter, but I sure do enjoy writing all this down. Slept in as much as I could bring myself to and washed up quick. Grabbed a quick breakfast and coffee at a little café on my way over to the El Caribe bus stop. Aiming to catch the 10am to the southern Caribbean, I was told it was full and settled for a ticket on the 12.

With about 3 hours to kill, I decided to fudge it and take a taxi back to Avenida Central. Found a sweet department store where I bought jeans (yippideedooda), an Imperial t-shirt, and, of course, a $6 Green Bay Packers towel (gotta support my boy Brett Favre). With jeans checked off the list I was feeling pretty confident.

Also found some flip flops at a beachy, surfy shop for cheap and grabbed another taxi back to the bus stop (how lazy, but the backpack was getting heavy by now). Seating was assigned on the bus to Puerto Viejo de Talamanca (reputed as the hoppingest town on the shore). I actually got the best possible seat, the one right at the front with mad leg room.

Met Elena from Mt. Holyoke who was sitting next to me. She’s in the country for an education volunteery thing but is visiting PV de T for the week. Also found out we were planning to stay at the same place in town (Rocking J’s). Probably a 4.5 hour bus ride down to Puerto Viejo, but well worth the $6 and constant ocean views for the last 90 minutes.

Like after any long bus trip, felt all dirty and icky and tired. Walking the 800m to Rocking J’s with Elena, Karen came running towards us. Made some meeting up for dinner plans and continued on. I actually chose Rocking J’s for a less superfluous reason than the last one. Hammocks on the beach for $5/night.

Sequestered most of my belongings in the locker and had an amazing shower with newly purchased Garnier Fructis shampoo & conditioner (oops, that was a part of the jeans/flops/coffee adventure) (got pretty overcharged to, but my hair deserves it). Brushed the grillz and threw on my new jeans.

Now all this with the ocean smells and sound coupled with perfect (slightly warmer than San Jose) weather. Had a few to chill, so it was naptime (hmm…one word) in the hammock. Realized I really need to invest in a hammock, discover how to set it up in South C without getting busted, and enjoy the good life more often.

After a little confusion and searching, Elena & I found Karen on the main drag and we shot over to Stanford’s (motto=Si Conoces Stanford’s, Conoces el Caribe). Paid a little to much for a mediocre red snapper, but the atmosphere was chill and overlooked the ocean. Karen decided to retire early to her accommodations and Elena & I headed back to the hostel.

The moon was really bright this weekend so it was especially nice chilling on the beach and watching waves for a couple hours with Elena. Got pretty creeped out by loose dogs sneaking up behind me, even though I love dogs (ha). Now here comes the best sleep of my summer. 10:00pm quiet hours which everyone in the “hammock hotel” was cooperating with, sounds of the ocean, breeze, and of course, the hammock.

Never even caught myself trying to go to sleep, it was instant.

Day 4 – Uva (7/1/07)

People started getting there day on around 6:00am, but I stuck it out until 8:00am or so. Showered up and got ready for a full day of enjoyment. I had originally planned to travel on back to La Selva today and actually told Tinny that we would work Monday (oops). I just couldn’t bring myself to travel all that distance two days in a row, especially because I now found myself on a coast at 10 degrees latitude.

Got together my stuff and rendezvoused with Karen at 9:00am in the center of town. Grabbed an apple for breakfast from a street vendor and looked around for open internet places (no luck). Rented bikes (the super chill beach town kind with pedaling backwards as the brakes) from the first place we came to for $2 for 6 hours. Mine was big and yellow and Karen got a pink one, needless to say we were super styling.

Started our biking south down the coast. Later realized that we were only about 20km from Panama in Puerto Viejo and could have easily biked there, oh well. Other Panama news includes an old Survivor set on Bocas del Toro (an archipelago maybe 40-50km from Puerto Viejo). We ended up biking 7km to Punta Uva, supposedly the best swimming on the coast.

Parked the bikes and set out to work on my killer sunburn. At one point along our beach walk, Karen & I had about a whole kilometer of beach that we didn’t see a soul on. That was awesome, especially since the beach was completely postcard (picture on the way later this week).

Came to a chill spot and took a solid swim in the ocean. Absolutely perfect temperature and fun waves. Never really thought sunscreen was a genius idea at any point, but the sunburn has a sort of refreshing feeling to it. Also realized how cool it is on the shore, that you can so easily place yourself on a globe, right where the green meets the blue.

After our swim, we started walking back to the bikes. About halfway back we stopped for a juice break at one of the resort/hotel thingies scattered along the coast. Following our little break we were back to the bikes and feeling a little hungry. Biked back into town at a leisurely pace and hit up the supermarket for some serious hydration.

Ended up replacing lunch with two liters of mango juice (nutrition-wise, I don’t know where that falls). Returned the bikes around 1:30pm and went to find a shady spot on the beach in town. Did a little people-watching, a lot of beach-napping. Karen left to go for a run, I needed to get some sand off of me and we set dinner plans.

Had yet another amazing shower and continued my nap in the hammock until 6:20pm or so. Met back up with Karen and we found a 700 colones slice of pizza place. Few things about the pizza place. Must have been the best place in town since it always had people coming in and out. It was called Pizzeria Boruca and had an interior advertisement for Café Arte Boruca in El Pueblo (some kind of crazy connection there).

Took our pizza outside and got to bum the neighboring bar’s projection screen and watch Costa Rica play Nigeria in the U-20 World Cup. The U-20 World Cup was oddly enough being held in Victoria, British Columbia. Costa Rica got pretty embarrassed on the offensive side of the ball, but had a really good goalie that kept them in it. Lost it 1-0, not sure how the thousands of Canadian fans felt about that one.

It was probably a bit after 8:00pm now and we decided to walk through town and eventually just sat on the beach for three or four hours talking and watching awesome lightning off at sea. Also got a papaya ice cream cone. Made a four-legged friend who actually followed me through a walk through down and most of the way back to the hostel later on (dogs must like me).

Sometime after midnight I hit the hammock and had more amazing sleep. Quite a successful day without a doubt. Passed up the best weed in town, twice. Fell asleep dreading the next day.

Day 5 – Exploradores (7/2/07)

Travel day, boo. Think I got up around 6:30am and got to packing up my belongings, which grew substantially from the beginning of my trip. Checked out of the hostel (four nights of lodging= $28), and walked back up to the bus stop and waited for the ticket office to open. Found out the next bus wasn’t until 9:00am.

Went to get some coffee and pass the time. A little later on ran into Kelsey and a couple of her friends who were on their way from Puerto Viejo to Bocas in Panama. Kind of feeling a trip to Panama these days. After impatiently waiting for the bus, finally hopped on the departure for Limón, the major port on the Caribbean.

In Limón, had to walk across town (a city I would describe as completely devoid of gringos, or foreigners for that matter) to the other bus terminal. The city gets a terrible treatment from all of the guidebooks, even though it has the first baseball stadium I’ve seen in the whole country. Grabbed a nice little fried chicken combo for lunch and hopped on the 12:00pm express to Guapiles.

About a 2 hour ride to Guapiles where I had to wait almost another two hours for the bus to Puerto Viejo (de Sarapiqui). Luckily, I got to meet Costa Rican Boy Scouts on their way back from a weekend trip in the bus stop. That was cool, it’s nice being a part of an international organization.

Nice crammed bus to PV, it was place to go this day and this was the second bus for the time. Got off in front of La Selva and jumped right back into rain forest living. Showered and cleaned up the junk mail. Watched the Rocket pitch a gem on ESPN and was happy to be back to La Selva’s food.

Found Debra in the office, she had just gotten back. Called it an early night and hit the aloe gel and bed. Sleep did not compare to the hammock. And that was that, probably my longest getaway of my summer unless I convince myself to do something crazy in August, who knows…

BP