World Costa Rica San José San José

Cancun to Cape Horn 2009

Costa Rica Jul 13, 2009

COSTA RICA

San Jose (John)

In Simon Bekkers words: “We crawled into San Jose like dishevelled, sewer rats.” We have been embracing our back packer status and are not shy to use the same pair of clothes two days in row. When in Rome! Simon and Phil (short for Philippa, PB doesn’t have an estranged gay brother hiding in Costa Rica) were incredibly kind to us and we absolutely loved having some home cooked food again, a HOT SHOWER and a toilet which flushes paper! They put us up in their beautiful home for 3 nights and showed us the awesome sights of San Jose! As Simon and Phil are busy doing renovations, T and I slept in a tent on the balcony of the house! It was flippin great though! The house has an awesome view over San Jose and borders a reserve area. We thus had an incredible view and were woken up daily by the birds calling in the reserve.

Simon had been investigating the “Routa de Conquistadors”! This is a very basic path/road which was used by the Spanish conquistadors to transport gold from the Pacific to Caribbean Ocean. Simon had been told it was a 90 km odd mountain bike track which would take us from San Jose to Playa Hermosa on the Pacific coast. We knew it’d be tough but ****, we didn’t expect it to be THAT TOUGH! WOW! I must firstly say that the girls did insanely well to finish the journey and not once did they complain! (despite them both falling numerously!) Secondly, Simon was a great and patient guide who led us impeccably! But **** it was hard! Our pre-cycle preparation was not ideal. I, in fact, lacked even the bare essentials of under pants! None of us had cycle pants, none of us had bikes, none of us had ridden for a year or two and neither Pete nor I have calves! Simon called around and soon enough we had bikes, the girls had cycling pants and I had under pants – XXL! : )

And so Sunday morning dawned and at 6 am we were off! The initial part was easy but alas it was short lived. We climbed one particular hill for over two and a hours! I mean this hill must be a distant relation of Mount Everest’s! It was so steep and rocky that the tyres couldn’t get grip on the steep incline and thus we were forced to push our bikes! After 1 hour of climbing we thought we’d be close to the top, an hour later our “panties were drenched” and we still couldn’t see the top! It was a spiritual moment when we summitted! AND THEN THE HEAVENS OPENED! It started bucketing down, thunder, lightening! The paths became submerged in water and soon turned to mud. We slid our way down the other side of the mountain and through new rivers! It was like a chapter out of a Tolkien book! The last part of the trip was beautiful and easy riding as we wound our way along the river toward the coast. 9 hours later we arrived at our destination! To top things off, on arriving at our restaurant, I ducked away to hose myself off and was bitten by blo*dy dog! Not serious but still not what u feel like after 9 hours in the saddle!!!! 9 hours in the saddle!!! As I sit writing this, 8 days later, “my no man’s land area”, still feels slightly tender! It’s no wonder that Lance Armstrong lost a testicle! Ultimately we were all over the moon to be taken to the arse end of Costa Rica, to see stunning cloud forests, amazing mountain streams and waterfalls, magnificent rolling hills and to experience the true Costa Rica! Given the choice we would all do it again! Simon thanks for an unforgettable day out!

Arenal (John)

We rented a car on the Monday, bade farewell to Bekker’s and made our way out to Arenal. Arenal is a beautiful Volcano set amongst classic Costa Rican cloud forests! I was in my element again! We found an awesome cabin called “Cabana Catarata” which was at the base of the volcano and we eased our way back into reverse mode! The little wooden cabin was set on a stream, in the forests and within walking distance of the Cerro Chato, a dormant volcano. Fantastic! On the second day we climbed the 6 kms in the reserve, up to Cerro Chato Volcano. The top, which is now filled with crystal clear water was unbelievable. Although a tough climb it was worth ever second. We had the whole volcano to ourselves and celebrated with a cool skinny dip at the top! We explored the forests daily, stumbling across howler monkeys, toucans, woodpeckers, Iguana’s and many other beautiful creatures. We really enjoyed our few days in our mountain cabin. We were able to relax, enjoy home-cooking (as we had our own kitchen) and not feel like sewer rats we were when we arrived in Costa Rica!

Santa Elena and Monteverde (Teneale)

Up to this point, Cath and I have normally been in charge of deciding where we go in each town and country, not necessarily out of choice but because the boys tasked us with doing the “research”. Tired of always making the decisions, Cath and I handed over the reins to John to decide on what we did next in Costa Rica. After being told that we could not reach Monteverde Cloud Rain Forest without a 4x4 (which our Nissan rental definitely wasn’t!), John “nature boy” was not perturbed, based on the fact that he had read that there were over 400 bird species and thus decided that we were heading up to the town, dirt roads and all! After scouting out various routes, we found a route up that only had a 1 hour of dirt roads, so armed with Pete’s impeccable driving skills and the knowledge that our car was a rental, we manoeuvred the 4500 feet up to the Santa Elena (town near the reserve). We spent the whole of the next day at the Monteverde Cloud Rain Forest Reserve, which is absolutely astounding. John was so excited to get into the reserve that while waiting for Cath (making a happy birthday phone call home to her mum) at the entrance, he anxiously told a group of Americans to make sure that they were quiet and didn’t scare any of the birds away!!! John was in his elements as we walked through thick forests with hundreds of different trees, epiphytes, birds and wildlife. We thought of Charles Holley often as the trees were phenomenal, some really old, tall and spectacular! We did a couple of routes through the forest and were amazed at some of the view points and suspension bridges from which you can see rolling hills in the distance and Lake Arenal. It was also magnificent to sit at the view point in the midst of the clouds, catching glimpses of the vast reserve that surrounded us. We were all lucky enough to see a nine-banded armadillo, a two-toed sloths and a coati (racoon like mammal) whilst John “Ranger Zack” also saw a weasel and an aguti! We were also treated to a special hummingbird, the purple throated mountain gem, which posed for us less than half a meter from the path way! This was not the only hummingbird we saw, as at the entrance of the reserve is a Hummingbird “gallery” where there are feeders that attract hundreds of humming birds and you are able to sit and watch them. We spent a lot of time at the gallery and were even treated to a few violet sabre-winged hummingbirds.

Our second day in Santa Elena was just as busy as after a run around the very hilly town (1.3km straight uphill!!!), John took us on a hike to “Cerro las amigos” which was a 2000 feet climb up a slippery clay road! It was an awesome hike besides Rouxie and I nearly slipping several times, much to John and Pete’s amusement! We then headed out to the Orchid Farm, where John and I were taken on a tour of lots of different orchids. The tour was brilliant and we saw the 2 smallest orchards in the world (looking through a magnifying glass)! To top off a nature filled 2 days we went to the butterfly garden, where we walked through different gardens and got to see lots of butterflies and arachnids. Our favourite was the Blue Morph butterfly which we have seen all over Costa Rica and will always remind us of the awesome 10 days we had in the land of coffee beans and mountain bikes!