Category Archives: Costa Rica 2008

Information on my multiple trips to Costa Rica. Specifically about exploring the Nicoya Peninsula and finding places I might like to live.

Tuesday Morning in Montezuma

Posted on August 25, 2008 | Leave a comment

It was raining so hard this morning it woke me up but I think part of that was due to the noisy roof of where I’m at. It’s beautiful outside now and the early rain will help keep all the dust down. I want to go for a ride and it’s so much nicer with the windows down but the dust really ruins the ride.

I just had breakfast in an open air restaurant down by the water. It’s a nice place but they’re really slow on the service at this place but that let me monopolize their table a little more :)

I’m going to head over to Cabano (a central town in the lower part of the peninsula) and run some errands and then over to a restaurant on the beach in Manzanillo for dinner and catch the sunset. Continue reading →

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Great Day in Montezuma, Costa Rica

Posted on August 24, 2008 | 1 comment

Montezuma-Beach-Pict2568The weather was amazing all day. Sunny and warm but very humid. We didn’t get any afternoon rain at all.

But, regardless of the wonderful weather, the first thing I did this morning was find a new hotel, the other one wasn’t that great but I was too tired to look around any more last night (I did check two others that were full). I found one that is nicer and cheaper, $30 a night which includes A/C and hot water. Don’t laugh at the “A/C and hot water comment”, some hotels have 4 prices based on which combination that you would like. As long as I sleep okay here, I think I’ll stay here until I have to go to San Jose on Wednesday.

Picture 14So after I moved I went up to the waterfalls which was a little more exciting than usual, with all the rain the current was really flowing. When I got up there to swim it was pretty quiet (in terms of people) the the falls were raging with all the extra water. I tried swimming but the current was too much for me, I’m not that great of a swimmer and certainly out of practice. Hung out there for a while, for as dead as it was when I got there, I think it got the busiest I’ve even seen it. Not the best picture of me, but it’s the only one I have of me so far.

So since I didn’t wear myself out swimming I decided to hike it up to the upper falls. Another difference because of the rain a few recent downed trees and lots of mud. But I got up there just fine. Unfortunately, right when I got up top I dropped my bottle of gatorade! So that meant I really had to ration my other bottle of water on the way back; I usually take 3 bottles total (of water or gatorade) I was so thirsty on the way down but I made it. It fell pretty far and I’ve climb that part before (to get to the lower fall of the upper falls) but where I usually climb had loads of water running down it.

Here’s the cRaZy spot where you have to climb down to the upper falls. This is while I was halfway down rope looking down and looking up (fuzzy), it’s really not as bad as it looks :)

Park-Ocean-Viewfile0088Stats according to my GPS: I climbed from 97 feet altitude to 572 feet, but I actually ascended over 600 feet and it was a total of 4 miles for the round trip. (But now I need to go double-check since none of that was meters or miles and I thought I had all that switched to metric; I’m certain it was “feet”, maybe it was 4 kilometers?)

All photos should be clickable for a larger version (but not very large, the ‘net is really slow here).

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Time Zones

Posted on August 24, 2008 | Leave a comment

For some reason I was really thinking Costa Rica was only an hour off from Michigan right now. It’s actually two hours off so that might my flight feel much much longer since I had it in my head wrong.

Not the most exciting thing to tell you, but I keep noticing my clock on the computer is off by 2 hours so maybe this will stop me from thinking about it…

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Traveling for 15+ hours…

Posted on August 24, 2008 | Leave a comment

I left for the Airport before 6 am and didn’t get here until 7:15 pm (9:15 my time); that’s factoring car rental time and immigration and a short stop for lunch (no other real stops) so it was a long day. I ended up renting a car because it was cheaper to rent for five days than to take a taxi and it was WAY too hot to try public transportation (taxi then bus then taxi then ferry then another 2 buses or a taxi) and I couldn’t find any kind of shuttles. I rented some little wind up 4×4 which ran really well for me. I really didn’t think the drive would be that long from the airport but it was.

The view was beautiful for the start of the ride. But while it was great out I knew from the clouds the afternoon showers would be starting. After a while it started to rain so I thought it’d be a good time to stop for lunch since it might be a while before the next town (especially since I was starving). But then after I got back on the road it poured for a really really long time. I wasn’t concerned about the rain affecting my driving, I was worried about the road farther up ahead. I was afraid the road might get washed out on the stretch that kind of separates the lower and upper sections of the Nicoya Peninsula (between Narango and Paquera) they’re actually in different providences (or something like that). The roads weren’t too bad when I got up there, but remember my expectations were it would be “washed out” so it was still pretty bad, didn’t have to drive through any actual rivers this time (yet!).

The sun set around 6 PM (5:54 at this location according to my trusty GPS) so I drove the last 75 minutes in the dark but it was mostly paved so the night driving wasn’t so bad but the last 4 miles were awful (as always). The rain really slowed down my total drive but I think that way isn’t optimum even if it was sunny, the other airport (San Jose) is better for Montezuma.

I did get to see some really great scenery earlier in the day :)

Town was really hopping, the bar they always say is the hot spot (Chico’s) was packed. But I was so pooped from my long day I went to be early…

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Garmin eTrex Vista HCx GPS handheld unit

Posted on August 23, 2008 | 2 comments

So my Mom got me an early birthday present, it’s a portable Garmin eTrex Vista HCx GPS. This has been on my Costa Rica to do list so she asked me what I wanted at just the right time. Obviously, it’s a specific model I picked out for her and it’s been great the little bit of time I’ve played with it this past week. It’s got the color display, the compass (this is an extra) and the memory chip expansion. It’s a whole lot easier to us than I expected it was almost Apple-ish in it’s use, but there are too many buttons (it’d need a touch screen to make it a little more intuitive).

As of right now it’s telling me we’re at 7,284 feet and traveling at 527 miles per hour (we’re somewhere south of Cuba). That’s seems a little low to me (I thought they didn’t let us use electronics until 10,000 or 15,000 feet) but maybe it’s having a hard time tracking out the window of the plane (but that’s not really my area either). I’ll be sure to upload some of the tracking info later superimposed on a map. I’ve always been into maps so it’s a fun gadget for me.

I wanted it for Costa Rica for a few reasons:

  • the signage for the roads are awful and since some of the roads are so bad you don’t want to backtrack unless you have to.
  • When I’m hiking I’d really like to know how far I’ve wandered away from civilization and have a better idea if I’m walking in circles.
  • Maps here aren’t the greatest so maybe one of the Points Of Interest (POI) will help me find something I’ve been missing. Continue reading →

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    Posted in Costa Rica 2008, The Costa Rica Plan

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    The Atlanta Airport

    Posted on August 23, 2008 | 1 comment

    This was the easiest layover I think I’ve ever had. I needed to go to gate E29 and when I got off the plane I was at E31, right next door! Usually I have to traipse all over the place but I still figured I’d have a long ways to go to get food and convienently there was a great food court around E25-ish. So there was no rushing no running it’s was great. I managed to get McBreakfast, pick up a cold sandwich for the flight and there was free WiFi to do a quick check of my mail.

    And the flight? I have a whole row to myself. Actually, if everyone spread out I think every one could have their own row (out of the back 9 rows there are only 5 of us). The pilot thought it was a little bumpy for a while because of the tropical storm so it was a while before they passed out snacks but I thought it was fine.

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    Security and the Detroit Airport

    Posted on August 23, 2008 | Leave a comment

    I’m always trying to loosen up my shoes when I travel so I decided to wear sandals for this trip. Then I got to security it and remembered why I never where sandals, because you have to take your shoes off (yuk!). Plus, I kept forgetting stuff in my pockets (and then my belt) so I had to go in and out through the scanner a few times stretching the experience out. At least there wasn’t anyone behind me so I wasn’t holding people up.

    The flight to Atlanta wasn’t very full, it looked really full on-line when reserving seats and the staff seemed to think it was going to be full so maybe a connecting flight didn’t make it. I moved seats and I’ve had more than enough space. My connecting flight looks really really empty so I’m hoping for 3 empty seats for a nap, I did not get near enough sleep last night.

    Curbside check-in: They were really pushing for you to just check in at the curb when I confirmed my flight. But they were so slow and it was really humid out so I decided to go inside. As I was heading in I saw a sign that said it was $3 a bag, I thought that was pretty lame to charge us if it’s helping decongest their floor traffic inside, but I guess if the line inside was long and you were running late it’d be worth it.

    Everything has been really smooth so far…

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