The 4 of us (Dan, Wendy from Toronto) finally arrived to San Jose after a 15 hour bus ride.  Fortunately the bus wasn’t very full so we could all have our own 2 seats to try every angle to sleep – some more successful than others AND it wasn’t cold.   This could be since I pleaded with the Espresso Panama bus manager at the ticket counter that spoke abit of English to NOT freeze us out.  We even bought light sleeping bags while at the mall.  Unfortunately, going back to Panama City the bus is full as it is “Semana Santa” – Easter Holy Week.   Costa Rica is slightly smaller than West Virginia and a population of 4 million.  It is very beautiful, diverse from black beaches on Pacific versus white on Caribbean, cool mountains, civilized (clean public toilets with tissue, some English, good economy, minimal theft and doesn’t have a military force.  This says a lot for their philosophy, laid back culture and kindness. Plus we got to eat lots of ice cream…  Its main issues I see is so much forest that continues to be cut for cattle grazing, tourism growth they are loosing their culture and the volcanic black beach Pacific coast is HOT.  There are many non Tico’s from US, Canadian and Europe that have taken residency and built homes on mountain vistas.  Besides tourism, Costa Rica is a large grower of pineapple, fig, banana, sugar cane, palmetto, etc.  Some of photos are from Dan/Wendy’s camera as they both have a powerful digital camera – so thanks to them we have some great shots.

 

Once we arrived in San Jose, we got in their rented small 4WD SUV and drove to San Ramon where we ate pizza and stayed for the night.  Continued enroute to Arenal active Volcano and Lake Region where we stayed for 2 nights at Cabinitos El Castillo.  We could see the volcano from our cabina with LOTS of bird watching.  It was great to hike in cool mountain areas.

 

Then continued on to a beautiful ROUGH country road drive to Monteverde Biological Reserve/Cloud Forest where we stayed for 2 nights at Finca Terra Viva cabinas.  The Monteverde ticos want to keep this area without tarred roads so has great views with minimal cars.  These areas are in the Cordillera de Tilarian mountains.  I even got to participate in milking cows.  This finca is a delightful ecological place 5km or so from Santa Elena.  These areas are pretty popular but where we stayed was very calming.   We had a guided hike at 7:30am at the Reserve looking for various birds/wildlife which we did see both male/female quetzals and then another hike in the afternoon to the continental divide.  Our muscles had to get used to the hiking again as swimming uses different ones.  It was great to be walking around in the clouds!

 

We came down to the Pacific coast where the beaches are HOT with volcanic black sand but beautiful vistas.  We opted to not stay very long on this coast.  Stayed one night at Cabina Veranito in Playa Herradura.

 

During our travels Tom/I needed to figure out how to get back to San Blas.  You would think that with cell phone and car this would be a breeze.  We didn’t realize that it was “Semana Santa” – Holy Week where schools and a lot of businesses are closed.  There was only space on the Espresso Panama bus but we couldn’t make reservation or pay for this over the phone.  So had to find a Banco National to deposit money into their account and then call to make reservation.  Whew – that was handled pretty easy since Edwardo had lived in MN to obtain his agricultural education.  So lots of conversation about what he remembered about MN and currently is applying for employment in NY.  We also had to coordinate this with the only flight via Air Panama back to San Blas.  Well they didn’t take credit card over the phone either but would at least make a reservation after pleading with them that we were no where close to San Jose and we would pay once we got back to Panama City.  But we also needed to call another cruiser anchored in Green Island along with Sojourn to see if they could watch our boat for 2 days. All of this is done over a couple days as you none of them to answer the phone.  As with life, things do work out so off we continued with our journey.

 

We spent a week at the lovely home that Dan/Wendy rented in the hills/mountains near San Isidro de General – Perez Zeledon.  We took lots of side trips to explore and hike. 

 

We decided to take a day trip to see the Reserve Biological Durika. We thought we were going to see the Cabecar Indians near Ujarras.  We were given driving instructions and indicated that we needed a 4WD vehicle. We first drove south an hour to Buenes Aires. The 15km private road to the Reserve continued to deteriorate to the point where our small 4 cycle 4WD just couldn’t handle the ruts, rocks and steep hills.  This is after Tom/I got out to relieve some weight and started puffing up the road.  So now what as we weren’t sure how much we had left but thought it was around 1K.  Finally they answered the only number we had and advised us that they could come down with a tractor to tow us and car up to their Reserve.  Well Dan wasn’t keen about towing a rental car for liability reasons.  So Wendy took control and asked them if we could get a ride in this tractor.  They said sure if we weren’t opposed to getting abit dirty.  So we waited about 15 minutes and down the hill came a young women driving an oversized bobcat with her hippy father making a joke about the situation.  Well we all piled into the dirty bucket, sitting wherever we fit.  Tom became abit nervous as we went backwards up the steep hill and the tires starting hitting a deeper rut.  The young women stopped to readjust the direction and off we went again.     During this journey he shared that Durika is a commune of 30 who live off the land and try to assist the Cabecar Indians around Ujarras.  They have members that are dentists, doctors, massage therapist and engineers so they provide these skills at the commune and bring to Buenes Aires for income.  Well that is abit different than what we expected but all part of the adventure.  He introduced us the host Christina and went back to his chores.  She gave us a tour of the compound and answered our many curious questions about how this commune lives/rules/etc.  It felt like I was experiencing Tomas as I imagined this was what a few of the communes he lived at were like.  Christina shared that initially it was difficult for her as you give away your individual ideas/wants and live as a community. You do most things with the members and have a family that shares meals within each cabin.  We all decided that this was lovely but would miss our solo time and being able to make decisions for self.   They provided a great veggie lunch and if we would of stayed a few days they could of brought us on a hike to visit some indigenous.  They have not been too successful getting the indigenous to continue with teaching them skills to enhance their finca growth –  so they tread more cautiously.   So we went back to our SUV via the back hoe but this time with some cushion mats in the bucket.  Life is good!

 

During one of the hikes Dan/I took we entered the trails/large property into another spiritual teaching center called Mountain Azul.  Apparently, Costa Rica has a variety of these centers.  I guess this all makes sense with their past philosophies.   

 

The last day before departure we decided to go back to the Pacific beach area, Isla Baru to take the ecological tree canopy tour via zip line.   We took the 8am tour to minimize the heat as you hike to the various tree platforms and zip to other trees.  It’s not a huge adrenaline rush but a guide comes with his huge binocular to observe birds, etc.  We saw 2, 2 toed sloths which was interesting as I didn’t realize how large they are and wonder how they ever stay perched sleeping on a tiny branch.  The zipping from tree to tree was fun as we would get caught by the guide before hitting a tree. 

 

Thanks to Dan and Wendy we got to see a lot of Costa Rica and reconnect as friends.  We had a wonderful time till our next journey together as this shows that there are “never goodbyes”.  We now go back the same way to get to Sojourn anchored at Green Island.

 

Live your Dreams Daily!

Rose & Tom