Exploring The Ends of the Osa w Costa Rica Craig

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Geo: 8.44348, -83.462

To the end of the world with Costa Rica Craig

Got up early and invited Craig over for coffee. Cabinas Jimenez has a coffee pot in each of the rooms so it is nice to get up and have that first cup of coffee in bed.

Craig came ove and we all sat outside and watched the sunrise, ate pastries and mango slices, and watched the parrots moving to and fro.

Got ourselves packed up and Craig ferried us over to Cabinas Tropicales. Our room is actually two rooms and Mark let us have it for the same price as the one we had orginally booked.

Tom Kayak has suggested we go check out Dos Brazos for its old buildings and mining history.

Dos Brazos is an old mining town in the vicinity of Puerto Jimenez on the Rio Tigre where you can sometimes still see people panning for gold along the river.

Do not know how much luck they have though.

There are several guesthouses etc. here with places for hiking, swimming and so on to do. There was at least one soda open in the town,

We drove around the village until we got to a point where it looked like we would have to go through another low water crossing and then did the road go on or not?

The locals have made a great swimming hole right there and we stopped and just enjoyed the scenery. Saw a wood creeper and jesus lizard!

It was bumpy road but doable in a two wheel drive in the dry season.

We had been told that there though there was a sign that pointed toward the Osa Corcovado National Park there that it was illegal to enter the park from Dos Brazos. Who knows?

This may be where the poachers to in who are apparently killing jaguars and poaching game at an alarming rate. Who knows?


On the way back we saw a barred forest falcon just sitting in a tree.

While we were looking at this falcon, an older gentleman came down his drive and seemed to say in very rapid Spanish that he wanted us to come sit on his porch and enjoy all the wonderful birds that came his way.

We declined and continued on.

Gold Panners

We pulled down a side road when we saw two guys that were carrying what looked like gold panning equipment on their bicycles. We talked to them in our broken Spanish and they said they found very little and seemed nervous when Robert took their picture. They picked up their bikes in one hand and gold panning equip in the other and continued wading across the shallow river crossing.

We also waatched some people upstream crossing a swinging bridge to the other side.

As we drove along on back to Puerto Jimenez with Craig we all decided to head on back and then drive to check out Matapalo.

We had had heard was
very beautiful but we had not had a car to check it out on previous
trips and Craig was interested in checking it out as well.

The drive back from Dos Brazos to Puerto Jimenez of course did not seem to take as long and we drove through Puerto Jimenez, decided not to stop and get something to eat but press on to Matapolo.

Trip to Matapalo, or The End of The Earth

As we were heading there, we stopped at a waterhole where Robert had spotted some bird life, one of the whistling ducks and jacana.

The road got progressively rougher and travel was slow. Also in part because we were not sure exactly where we were going even though we had picked up a photo copy hand drawn map at Cabinas Jimenez before we left.

We had to shift into 4 wheel drive as we went through several low water crossings. There were a couple of places where you could see cavitation at work.

We saw one or two places where you could get something to eat but were did not have an ocean view so we continued on.

The road got narrower and we were passing many private residences or places to rent we imagined.

Almost missed the road to Matapalo because the road did not look like it was the main one.

Probably was not and the road we almost took the turn that continued on toward Carate where one can enter and leave the Osa Corcovado National Park by walking on the beach.

Magnifico !

Drove til we were sure we were at the end of the earth!

But, it was magnificant scenery!

Crashing waves , giant rocks and macaws in the trees really special.

Had ourselves a tailgate snack lunch of Marie's, peanut butter, bananas, oranges and a power bar and Craig drank a beer.

Not the best of meals but it did the trick and we were already planning to fix dinner at the Cabinas Tropicales. The setting , however, could not have been better. Great breeze made it very tolerable.

Surfing Matapalo

We didn't surf, but did see others surfing in the spectacular setting. There are no low budget places to stay, but surfers and others who want the seclusion of an 'end of the earth' beautiful locale and who don't mind paying mid and upper range can find numerous options.

We decided that this is a place you have to work to get to, the road is a little rough, so one should bring enough supplies for several days.

We watched a caracara and brown pelicans fishing among the rocks, as well as a couple of men fishing. We also watched a man surfing at the end of the point.


We passed the entrance to a number of beautiful places to stay but they were all outside our budget as far as we had been able to research.

Decided it was time to go and headed back with time the go shopping for the evening meal.trip to Dos Brazos and Matapalo-end of the world

Craig and Laura made a wonderful dinner back at Cabinas Tropicales and we visited with a guy who had been traveling around by himself for some weeks.

See our reveiw of Captain Mark Corn's Cabinas Tropicales, a new place to stay in Puerto Jimenez.

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Photos

Matapalo
heading down the road to the end

Craig at the stove
cooking the fish and pasta, with stir fry vegetables by Laura

Matapalo
heading down the road to the end