Santa Teresa, Costa Rica

This penninsula beach town is incredibly dusty. But finally, it was sunny and I spent the day on the beach with a newfound friend. He spent a lot of time picking at coconut shells and digging frantic holes in the sand. If he wasn't doing that, he was chasing waves in the water with me. Crazy black dog with yellow yes and a braided cotton collar. When I went to leave at the end of the day, he was all too content to follow me however, he was too distracted by some kid playing with a ball. I'm gonna miss that fellow. The do-it-all guy, Mark, at the hostel / restaurant, made grilled tuna for dinner. Best meal I'd had in months.

That evening, a few of us went to the local watering hole. This turned out to be THE place that eveyone went to. Think spring-breakers from the USA. I left after a beer.

More on San Jose

Interesting city, like any other big city. I went to the National Museum. Pre-Colombian artifacts and pottery. Big carved circular stone spheres. Big, like, around 4 feet in diameter. Another section showed the cultural progression of Costa Rica. I kinda glazed over the exhibit. Basically Spaniards killed the locals, stole the gold, made the survivors into slaves, imported more slaves from Africa and now they have a mixed cultures. Another part of the museum was a gold museum. Unimpressive after Colombia. Interesting part was that the figurines were of animals in the area instead of just decorative designs. Animals like turtles, scorpions, deer, alligators, monkeys, etc. There was also a butterfly garden.

I then went to the Gold Museum, which was about the same price, $6 USD, and had the same things as the National Museum but you couldn’t take pictures at the Gold Museum.

I also bought a 256 memory card so I can take 700+ pictures. Crazy.

San Jose, Costa Rica

Yesterday was spent travelling over mountains to get here. (It is sunny!) And yesterday was spent verbally rejecting this guy I met on the bus who was going to the same place. We ended up in the same dorm room in the basement corner of this hostel and he's my only roomate. When the lights went out, he had the audacity to ask me for a goodnight kiss. Hm.... me shooting him down the whole didn't give him a clue that I wasn't interested? I said no and then I said prayers, hoping that he won't disturb me at night. He didn't. He didn't speak to me much today either. Not a loss.

Today, I meandered around to two museums. They both had pretty much the same exhibit so I'm a bit miffed at the money I paid to get into them. There was a description of the cultural history of Costa Rica and there was some gold. Not as impressive as Colombia's museum but interesting in that the figurines in gold are of the animals that are in this area. Whereas in Colombia, the figurines are more of highland animals and were usually narrowed down to 3 categories of land, sea and air. This was the most interesting thing I've done in Costa Rica so far.

Tomorrow, I'm heading to Santa Teresa, another beach town but on the Pacific. People are saying that the good weather is on that side. I hope so. I have a very uneven tan. heheh

Puerto Viejo, Costa Rica

I am on a Caribbean beach town being rained in. I'm sharing my room with an older Californian lady who wakes up at 8am and gets beer. I am being devoured by sand flies. I am leaving tomorrow for San Jose, Costa Rica where it will hopefully be sunny.

There were a couple of things in the area that looked interesting to do if it didn't pour down. A few miles North is a national park with an easy trail. Bright coloured frogs, iguanas, butterflies and even monkeys. And leaf cutter ants. Lots of them.

They have similar things in Nicaragua but, for cheaper and less tourists. I'll have a look then.

Crossing into Costa Rica

This was interesting. I needed a ticket to show that I was leaving the country so I wrote my info from my Colombia-Panama flight on a slip of paper and gave it to him (the custom’s guy), with updated false info for the departure date. He looked dubious but stamped my passport.