Final week

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Alright final week....
So I did decide to head to Playa Gigante I almost convinced Lauren to come for a day or 2 but she didn't want to have to deal with all the buses and walking in. I wound up missing my 12:30 bus from SJDS to Rivas because it left early then the 1pm bus left super late so I was worried I was going to miss the last bus out towards the beaches but luckily I just made that one. I got off at the intersection and started hoofing the 5/6 km to the beach. I got a couple Kms in and a construction truck filled with sand and cement bags slowed down enough for me to hop on the back with some local school kids and a couple workers. The kids and I hopped off just off the beach as the truck was turning off more north to their site. I thanked them and continued on walking to the beach. It's a beautiful tiny little fishing cove with only a handful of restaurants and places to stay. Mikes local friend told me about a place so I headed down there, where I met joe a Oregon guy driving with with his gf down to South America but were stopped in this town working for a few months. Anyway he showed me the tiny, hot looking dorm room and asked if I could just use one of the lockers and sleep in a hammock for a couple bucks, which I did. The place is really cool, surfer rustic and its mostly made from wood. The guy who owns it apparently owns 5 or 6 houses in a row, pretty wild. The next morning I had planed to walk to Colorados to go for a surf with Patrick a guy I met last night but I had also met 2 other guys staying in the dorms that were headed to the beginner wave along the way so I walked with them. Cleal and Martin. Cleal was a very tall and interesting nice Canadian guy and Martin was an awesome Austrian dude who was living in Nica with his Austrian wife. I had about a 45 min walk along the beach and out around a rocky point to get to Colorados which was a small fast beach break with tons of dudes out there. So I headed down to Panga drops another 15 min walk down. It was much bigger but pretty fat however there was barely anyone out so I opted for here. After my sesh I walked back to Colorados found my bottle of Gatorade I buried and my peanut butter sandwich sat under my board and had my snack. Patrick would up getting out of the water a little while later. He ate his snack and we hung out for a bit to decide if it was worth going out again but the tide had dropped and so did the size. So we headed back together. That afternoon I hung out with Cleal and Martin and the 2 girls, one Australian Sherry and one Canadian Kendra, they had found. They were super cool girls they both worked in the middle of now where Canada at a Catt ski lodge. Sherry was a massage therapist and Karen was a bartender. Apparently the clients fly to some airport somewhat near by then get helicoptered into the lodge. The crew and staff have to get there by driving and taking snowmobiles for a few hours. Sounds pretty legit. Oh except it costs $1000 a day and a 3 day minimum and I think 5 max. Wild Anyway later that avo Martin Cleal and I played some frisbee on the beach until the sun set. It's a truly beautiful beach it was a great way to spend the late afternoon. Oh the hostel also has a slack line out front on the beach we messed around with for a bit. That night we went to burger happy hour at one of the surf camps next door it was honestly one of the best burgers I have had in ages. The next morning Sherry (who she and I have already planed our Terry and Sherry surf adventure camp could be a children's book title too. Haha) Martin and i woke up around 5 to walk down to Colorados again Patrick was again suppose to come but was a bit slower. We went out for a bit at Colorados got some alright ones but it was a bit smaller than we thought. Sherry and I saw Martin on the beach so we went in to check on him. Turns out he stepped on a sting ray and had a nice hole in his heel and it was all swollen so be headed back to gigante. Sherry and I decided to try panga drops break. Well there was heaps of guys out and it looked promising but again it was pretty fat and shifty we got a couple ones and headed back. That afternoon was similar, Cleal made some sick salsa/guac we ate and hung out in hammocks and played frisbee till sunset. Martin and I were a little late getting to our sunset diner with everyone up at the beautiful restaurant on the hill because he and I were really into frisbee he apparently played ultimate frisbee for ages and now frisbee golf. We also took the long way up and had to hike through some backyard jungle. Haha. Dinner was amazing though I had 5 small lobster tails for 10 bucks. It was delicious. We went back to the main hostel and hung at the bar for a bit but all crashed pretty early. MondaySherry and I wanted to hit a break called monzanillo a place Patrick had told me about and he was super keen To go as well but got offered last minute to do on a sweet fishing trip so he bailed on us. We alsmost didn't got to monzanillo because the Irish boat driver didn't think it would be working but we said F it. Lets try. So we hoped in their tiny boat with tinier engine and headed off. Well we lucked out. It was working I'm sure it wasn't at its best potential but it was super fun and we had it to outselves for a while until the people on the beach saw how good it looked and a few other boats showed up. Haha we wound up surfing for about 3/4 hours until Robbie and joe were waving at us to head back to the boat and back to gigante. Haha Martin and i had planed on heading out that afternoon he had to get back north to his wife and I I had planed on trying to get to kitesurfing bobs place down in costa that afternoon but we had surfed a bit longer than planed and sherry and I were having a good time together. Side note We had found out sherry had a thing for mustaches so Martin used a market and drew one on me this morning before we went for that surf. Ha it was a joke all day. Anyway Martin wound up leaving shortly after we got back from our surf I was sad to see him go. He and I really connected so many times your meet travelers and its just "oh hey;yeah" we hang out a bit were travelers but sometimes you laugh and joke a lot more and become better friends really fast. He was a cool dude. F B HSo that afternoon sherry and I hung out all day we had an awesome brunch at this little cafe/restaurant then chilled and chatted in hammocks all avo. That night we went back up to the restaurant on the cliff after we watched the sun set on the beach. It was a very nice day/night. It was hard to say good bye to Sherry too. She almost convinced me to do a dawn surf then head to costa after that but there is only one school bus out of town at 6 am and I wanted to be on it so is have plenty of time to catch my buses and deal with the boarder. So we said our goodbyes at night and shared contact info. She said she is allowed to bring a guest up to the lodge for a couple days each employee is allowed one guest a season and she has never brought anyone in the 4 years she has been there. So I said I could be the first. Haha Tuesday Woke up around 5 finished organizing and headed to catch the school bus out of town. It's funy most of the local busses down here are old Canadian and USA school busses but this was a dump truck or similar that was the towns school bus, most of the passengers were kids going to school and a few other people going to work or town to get things. It really is just for the students because it leaves at 6am when then need to head to Tola and it comes back around 12 when the kids get out of school but your allowed to hop on and pay for a a ride. Anyway I get off in Tola and find a colectivo (shared taxi) to Rivas then in Rivas I found the bus to the boarder. I paid my fare with my last cordobas I had on me luckily at the boarder there's tons of guys exchanging money I had some Quetzals from Guatemala left over and oddly enough he changed for me normally they only take USA money or euros maybe and the 2 bordering countries. But he made the exchange for me and I head to to border office. I had to pay a couple bucks to get my Nica exit stamp then I had to walk about 1 km to the Costa Rican side and get my entry stamp there. I was pretty lucky though there was practically no one on the Nica side so I flew through that border. The costa side had a bit of line but nothing terrible. The thing that slowed us down was people didn't realize you need an exit itinerary to enter costa. I had my flight info on my phone. After the boarder I grabbed some food and found my next bus to La Cruz. When I got to La Cruz i went to the grocery store to pick up a couple things for meals since there's nothing out at bobs. It was nice I had been in that town before because that is the closest town to bobs place. Anyway in the grocery store I happened to see a gringo(white tourist) and I asked him if by chance he was headed out to Bahia salinas and if he was could he give me a lift. Sure enough he was he was staying at one of the outer kite places here but was a chill dude from Hawaii. When I arrived Franciso was at the house so he and I chatted a while and I met Frank one of bobs local instructor. After resting for a bit I headed to the beach and went out for a shesh. I brought the surfboard and was just cruising back and forth. It gets kind of boring because there are no waves and no straps on the board to do jumps or anything. But at times you kind of zone out and just cruise which is pretty cool. That night bob got back from his surf trip to witches rock one of the reasons I was really going to try toget to his place last night but.... He and I caught up and hung out with frank and Michelle (French Canadian guy who works at one of the other kite places) Man I write a lot more when it's fresh in my mind. Wednesday Was a pretty lazy slow day. Bob and the guys were packing pretty much all day but I headed to the beach for one session. I was going to bring the surfboard with straps but bob said I should work on chop hops without straps and quick turns so I can wave ride better. Man turning directions on the surfboard is really hard you have to shimmy your feet all over the place. Thursday Bob had his final lesson today so we headed up around 10 or so and put a couple hours in. It was much more fun today I was making a few of the turns and doing some chop hops. I did however crash and loose my $1 visor I picked up in one of the markets in guate. Haha. After lunch we went out for another sesh basically a sun set sesh. It was solid. The wind was wicked though, super light patchy spots then crazy hard gusty spots. I wound up coming in right before sunset and bob went out for a bit. Man he really kills it. Makes it look so easy an much more fun. Guess I have some work cut out for me. Haha I can't wait to do a big down winder on the island this summer and actually hit waves though. When we got back I was in charge of packing up a couple of boards and kites. I don't think he ever removed the fins from his kite board they were basically salted in there it was super hard getting them out. We all hung out at Ulfs place and had dinner and nicked off pretty early. Bobs flight was around 7:30 so we had to leave at 4:30 I was think about sleeping a big longer and taking the busses but I would have had to leave by 6 and it would have taken me probably 3 hours and 3 different busses to get here. So I just decided to go with bob I and currently set up chillin in my hammock out front of the airport. So far there is a nice breeze so I'm good. I did get nailed by some serious ants setting it up though. But se la vi. Next stop jerz.

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