Home again

As I said previously, we’re not beach people so the one day in Quepos was enough for our “Taste of Costa Rica” tour. We went back to the city park and took a few more pictures (see previous post) and were on our way to San Jose by 11am. Since our flight left San Jose at 7:40am Saturday morning, we planned to turn our rental car in and spend our last night in an airport hotel. The Holiday Inn Express in this case. (Ken had made reservations on our previous ill-fated pass through San Jose.)

Our trip in was pretty uneventful – good paved roads, signage, and a non-obscure destination (the airport). Until the very end. We were heading east on CN-27 (the orange line at the lower left below) and needed to go north to link up with CA-1 (the magenta line below) which goes past the airport. Unless we wished to go into San Jose and come back out on CA-1. Not on your life.

So we dutifully followed the GPS to it’s first wrong connection to CA-1 – the first green spur below. We sorta figured it was wrong since all the traffic was staying on the main road, but what the hey. Sure enough, after some very bumpy dirt road we got to a place where there had once been access to CA-1. But now there was a big pile of dirt blocking it. If we were desperate and nuts enough, we could have gotten around it, but why bother, we had all afternoon and it was only 12:30. So we turned around and rejoined the main road.

As we drove along, we saw signs to the “aeropuerto” and were reassured even though the GPS was squawking at us to turn back and go the way we had just tried. That is, we were going fine until we missed a turn – saw the sign too late. We could have turned around but were in an exploring mood so just decided to follow the GPS again (it had a new route by this time). So we crossed over CA-1 heading north and followed another spur to a dead end. Then we turned around and followed another one we were sure wouldn’t connect (obstinacy is wonderful) and it dead ended, too.

By this time we were tired of the game and just decided to go toward Alajuela and take another main road out. So that’s what we did. The green line below shows our track from CN-27 to the hotel.

We arrived at the hotel a bit before 1pm – too early to check in – so we went over to the nearby Denny’s for a late lunch. An expensive late lunch. But what do you expect for a restaurant in an enclave of airport hotels?

The final chores of the day were to gas up the car and return it. Done. And with no notice paid to the dent in the passenger side door!!! Then shower and repack our bags to airline mode and take advantage of the hotel service to pay our exit taxes there. They charged $6 each for the service but it meant one less airport line tomorrow morning. Finally some pizza and beer for supper and an early night.

The following morning we were up at 5am and arrived at the airport by 5:40 – the recommended 2 hours ahead of time. And, as it turns out, far earlier than we needed to be there. The exit tax line was long – but we didn’t need to go through it. And the lines to check the bag and go through security were short. So lots of waiting time. Ken said he’s going to have to teach me about getting to the airport “just in time”. Hah!!

The flight back to Phoenix was uneventful but, since the car keys were in Ken’s stolen computer bag, we needed to take a taxi back to his house. Then pick up the spare keys and drive the truck back to the airport to pick up his car. Finally, the trip was over.

We had some bad times, but all-in-all, I would rate our Costa Rican trip as very good and I would be willing to do it again. But there is also so much more of the world to see that I don’t know when that would be.

Have fun and go see for yourselves.

Quepos–on the Pacific coast

We spent our last day in Costa Rica in Quepos on the Pacific coast. I wanted to experience a different milieu than the mountains we had been in. We figured a single day was enough since neither of us were beach people. We did plan on dipping our toes in the Pacific, however. That plan was dashed when we walked over to the city ocean front park. As far as we could see, the bank was lined with these huge boulders as a break wall. When I was younger I would have clambered over them down to the water, but now I wouldn’t. Neither would Ken. Here is the beach within 15 min of low tide (I checked later). The surfer waded through the waist deep channel and is climbing the rocks in the right picture.

The following morning we went out again for more pictures. This is 1 hr 44 min after high tide.

This is the street seen standing on the park embankment. The Hotel Sirena (our hotel) is the blue “S” near the center.

The original reason I had chosen Quepos was that it was near Manuel Antonio National Park. There are also some famous beaches there. But we chose not to drive over and instead walked around town a bit and generally relaxed. Good enough for me.

Selvatura Again

Once again it’s off to Selvatura at the crack of mid-morning on the 10:30 bus. We have tickets for the hanging bridge walk and the butterfly garden. Once we get up there, it’s not nearly as nice a day as yesterday – cool & drizzly. But we came prepared with jackets and a hat for me and off we went.

This excursion wasn’t as much fun as yesterday’s zip lining. First, it wasn’t a guided walk so all we could say was “Yep, there’s some greenery.” Pretty, but kind of the same after a while. Second, there were quite a few people on the walk and many of them delighted in making the hanging bridges bounce and swing. Annoying when you were trying to take pictures and insecure feeling in the best of cases. Finally, we had the paths between the bridges. These are paved in a type of open cinder block. Necessary to preserve the path and help with footing, but very uncomfortable to walk on. No danger of catching your foot – openings were only ~4” – but uncomfortable none the less.

 

Here I am trying to use my hand as a measure for these giant leaves. Looks like a philodendron to me!

 

 

A pretty view.

 

An amazing shot Ken took. This is a zip liner going by on the 1 km line we were on yesterday. You can see the bridge we are on in the movie in yesterday’s post.

After the walk (~1.5 hrs), we had lunch in the restaurant figuring we would do the butterfly garden afterwards. However, we had not counted on the huge tour buses that were there that day – we didn’t finish lunch until nearly 2pm. Since we wanted to catch the 3 pm shuttle back to the hotel, we decided to blow off the butterfly garden. The tickets were freebies anyway. So that’s what we did.

Hmm. This post has a whiney tone. I don’t mean for it to be that way. This was a good day, it just wasn’t as good as yesterday. And my body is sore.

Back at the hotel, we had some beer (free), checked our email, and relaxed a bit. Lonely Planet said Trio’s is owned by the same people as Sophia’s so we drove around to find it and to get some gas in preparation for tomorrow’s journey.

Trio’s was fabulous. That’s three for three good restaurants in Santa Elena.