Blogs from Liberia, Guanacaste, Costa Rica, Central America Caribbean - page 3

I settled down for two nights at a very nice camping spot called El Sol Verde. The facilities suited my needs perfectly and the Dutch couple that owns and runs this show were extremely helpful. The maps they gave me showed me precisely where to find everthing worth seeing in the immediate area so I made a day out of that and had a great time. I hiked a 2.5 mile loop trail in Rincon de la Vieja national park that featured a couple of waterfalls and about a dozen thermal features. It was no Yellowstone but neither is there a jungle in Wyoming. I bathed in the Rio Negro hot springs afterwards to soak away any pain their might have been from the hike. I spent a couple of hours there and had the whole ... read more

From Trujillo, because of possible trouble with banditos, we were advised to backtrack to Tela and only drive the main roads south to Honduras’s capital city of Tehgucigalpa, from which it was as easy drive into Nicaragua. Much of CA-5 was excellent. The rest was under construction. Along about KM 21.5 shadows were getting long and we had began to worry about where we would spend the night when Ray noticed a sign a saying Campamento on the left side of the road. We turned around, came back and stopped at the gate. A young lady walking along the road with her babies led Ray up the road to the home of Julio and Irma. Julio invited Ray to stay for the night so he walked back down the road and we drove up the narrow ... read more

Bienvenidos a Costa Rica! I'm already back in Edmonton, Alberta, freezing my butt off, after spending an action-packed, fun-filled week of R & R, at the Allegro Papagayo resort, Guanacaste province, Costa Rica. Mother Nature provided a record-breaking welcome back to Canada, of the cruellest kind, on the night of Saturday, December 12, 2009. The second leg of our journey home from Liberia, was interrupted over Winnipeg, Manitoba, when the Captain informed passengers that we were turning back to Toronto, due to the extreme cold conditions in Edmonton that exceeded the aircrafts minimum operating temperatures of -41 degrees C! It actually got as low as -46.1 degrees C and -59 degrees C with the wind-chill at Edmonton International Airport, the second coldest location on the planet that day, after an obscure weather station in Siberia! What ... read more

Sunday morning finally brought a respectable wake up time. A delicate and fresh breakfast awaited us in the villa restaurant. Noel, the local tour guide, picked us up for our ten hour excursion to Buena Vista (tourist trap) in the heart of Guanacaste. The first stretch of the tour consisted of a vigorous trot on horseback with an eighteen year old cowboy professional, Oscar. As we headed to the rainforest, I quickly learned that my horse had a mind of it's own and preferred leadership rather than following Oscar's instructions. This led to shrills of "Ay Senor" as I tried to get Oscar's attention to redirect my horse. Instead, I found myself "Ay Senor-ing" all the way through a bush. As the ride progressed, I won the horse over with my charm and he responded with ... read more

I dont even know where I last left off with the blogs...I think in Granada? Anyways, from Granada we headed to San Juan del Sur which is on the pacific coast of Nicaragua. It was fairly nice there, a real surfer town with looots of tourists. We stayed in a nice enough place overlooking to beach and met some aussies and canadians on the beach who we later met up with at the local sports bar to watch the Super Bowl. Wooooo! Before leaving San Juan, we went to Playa Maderas which is about a 45min drive from there. It was beauuutiful. Very secluded and only a few spots to choose from to stay at. We ended up camping at a place called the Hideout...what an experience. The owner was a 50yr old guy from California ... read more