Day 5: San Jose to Monteverde

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I landed in San Jose, the capital of Costa Rica. I had kept a few days just to recover from my long flight, see the city a bit which I did (it has some great museums, but since am into that much, I didn't do any).

I explored San Jose like a local (well as much as I could), ate at Sodas (these are small local joints, tasty and cheap food, you will find mostly locals eating there). The dish that is most well known in Costa Rica is Gallo Pinto (pronounced as Gajo Pinto), which is made from rice, black beans, served with an egg (scrambled/poached) and can have add on of ham or other stuff you want and sweet plantain (tastes like banana, it's not banana though). Overall San Jose was a good stopover for me, I did go to Irazu Volcano Park in Cartago (lot of locals on a weekend go for a picnic there).

My next destination was Monteverde. It's about 130KM from San Jose airport, about 2.5 hour drive if you take a car. I took the public bus, which took me 4.5 hours. The trick in public buses is to be safe, just keep your valuables with you when you sit (not in overhead storage). I found the bus safe, the people friendly. The driver (rightly so) was a stickler for Covid protocols, he made one passenger get off at a stop because he was just not wearing mask despite being told to. While it's a public bus and they have no obligation to be a tour guide, the driver did take a rest stop when it was about sunset, ensured that we saw the sunset before he started again. Thoughtful gesture.

I reached Selina Monteverde, the hostel I was staying at in the evening. It's a really cool, funky place. Started by two Israeli backpackers, it is now a great chain of hostels across Central and South America. Reminded me why Israelis like Indians are great entrepreneurs. The night I reached, was Karaoke night, so people singing away and the restaurant had a great vibe.

Also, they had morning Yoga classes. Yoga is very popular in Costa Rica, I met two people (one from California and one from London) who are Yoga teachers, in fact one of them had read the Vedas and was learning Ayurveda. It was great to see how popular the ancient sciences from India are in a place so far away.

I crashed early because next day was going to be hiking day.

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