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Published: September 18th 2008
Malpais Beach
Named in the ‘Top 10 most breath-taking beaches in the world’ by Forbes Magazine.Just the name conjures up images of a remote, exotic destination - but all too quickly I was to have this image shattered. Costa Rica is exceedingly beautiful, with a winning combination of jungle and beach, but unfortunately it’s no longer quite so remote or exotic. Before we got there, feedback from other backpackers wasn’t all good - we’d heard that it was (comparatively) expensive, very touristy, that there are lots of agents offering every tour option conceivable without much regard for the environment and that there was a great party scene. Sarah and I crossed the border and suddenly there was fast food, gringos in 4WDs and I could buy hair conditioner for the first time in 6 weeks. Just like Australians have taken much of the Bali out of Kuta Beach, our American friends appear to have made Costa Rica their 51st state. So what, it’s not a culture stop, but this didn’t stop me from having an absolutely brilliant time!
Whilst Montezuma’s in Australia is a chain of Mexican restaurants that are just the right side of dodgy, Montezuma in Costa Rica is actually a funky little tourist town on the Pacific Coast. Lots of places to
Malpais Wildlife
Found this little critter outside our apartment in Malpais! do yoga, buy expensive handcrafts made by dreadlocked expats and eat pricy meals in the company of older tourists spending-the-kids-inheritance and rich kids paying with daddy’s credit card! Sarah & I stayed at Luna Llena’s - a cool guesthouse up the hill (not so cool if you get off the bus too late and have to carry your packs up the hill). Luckily we didn’t and find that the main house is gorgeous, with an open living area that has ocean views. We stay in bungalows below, with outdoor showers and monkeys in the trees. After some bargaining (the Costa Rican prices really are a shock!), the German lady who owns it gives us a discount - the first of many expats we meet running Costa Rican businesses.... Actually, apart from the pesky guy at the air-conditioned internet café who kept asking me out, I don’t think I actually met any genuine Costa Rican natives my entire time in Montezuma. The beaches nearby seem to have lots of rubbish, so we decide to traipse out to the waterfall south of Montezuma village. There are three main waterfalls to see, but we scrambled over slippery rocks to just the one. Here
Montezuma cervaza
Sarah & I celebrate our arrival in Montezuma over a local cervaza we break for a swim with some toe-nibbling local fish, quite a refreshing spot away from the oppressive heat and humidity. But a couple of days in Montezuma is enough - I’m ready for some decent beach action!
Malpais and Santa Teresa are adjoining seaside resort towns on the Nicoya Peninsula. Actually, no one seems to know where one starts and the other finishes. But both share the same long, rocky stretch of surf coast and the same 15km long dusty, unsealed road. The local businesses are up-in-arms about the dust from the road - all the outdoor shops and restaurants are completely blanketed in a thick layer of dirt. The dust, heat and prevailing smell of sewage would have been unbearable had Sarah and I not chanced upon a self contained apartment (with air-conditioning no less) to rent for the same price as the hostel next door. Actually, I can’t take any of the credit - Sarah has a real knack for sniffing out accommodation deals that somehow combine posh, with affordable! We visit Tranquilo Backpackers next door and practically trip over Creagh, John, Nollsy and Mortein who have evidently managed to escape the good life on Little
Shit chicken
I tried it and it really is 'the shit'! Corn Island. Of course there’s an outdoor club called D&N on the beach featuring Italian and Argentinean DJs that night and of course we end up there, most of the gang together - dancing up a storm once again! I bump into Luis, another backpacker I haven’t seen since Earth Lodge, Guatemala, but unfortunately, Sarah gets her bag stolen from the club.
There does appear to be a posh side to Malpais. New boutique resorts are opening up amongst the more rustic backpacker offerings - to the extent that Gwyneth Paltrow, Mel Gibson, Matthew McConaughey, Jared Leto and even the Olsen twins own property here - all in search of pura vida - the pure life. I’d like to see them try a no-carb diet here, when all food offerings seem to include rice, beans and fried chicken from places like ‘Chicken Shit’! Though to be fair, we do find a nice Thai place that even has wine, also accommodation and combines relaxation and pain in some sort of yoga/waxing business. Tranquilo backpackers where the boys are staying has a nice setup with tanned surfer dudes chilling in hammocks, outdoor tables, internet with skype,- so when not enjoying the
Thai Dinner with the boys
Sarah, me, Creagh, Mortein, John & Nollsy air-conditioned comfort of the apartment, I make the most of the amenities there! The beach here was named in the ‘Top 10 most breath-taking beaches in the world’ by Forbes Magazine. Sure it’s nice, but I reckon top 10 is a little generous … what with all the rocks on the sand and in the water. However, it was still very, very nice to hit the sizeable surf for a decent swim - it almost felt like being back in Oz. The sunset here is also pretty impressive and best enjoyed with a cold cervaza on the beach.
San Jose, Costa Rica’s capital city is not renowned for its charm or any particular sites. The trusty ‘dangers and annoyances’ section of the LP warned against a whole range of things as long as your arm, so I shut the book and carried on. I bused it there with John - keen to sort out some tedious flight changes with my RTW ticket and other boring administration. We stayed at San Jose’s Tranquilo backpackers who had free pancakes for brekkie and some proper supermarkets nearby, so for the first time in ages, I was able to cook some decent meals.
Jonathon and I enroute to Tortuguero
Two Canadians girls Abeiene and Tuyen, Jonathon a young American missionary and I ended up on the back of a truck in banana country enroute to meet a dugout boat by the river. I’d decided to go to Columbia, instead of Venezuala - which meant I could spend my birthday in April on the Caribbean Coast diving and once again meet up with the gang. The local American Airlines office spent hours making the necessary alterations to my RTW ticket, whilst I played spanglish charades with the trainee making the changes with increasing desperation. The end result was, I decided to skip Panama and fly direct from San Jose to Bogota, Columbia. At this point, I must give a shout out to my incredibly patient travel agent in Australia, Kirsty Eccles from
Meridian Travels for her assistance throughout. I didn’t do an awful lot in San Jose, except for one memorable night when I ran into some fellow gringos I’d met in Cuba, Belize and Guatemala. The boys and I ended up at a local bar in San Jose city singing ‘Hotel California’ (in Spanish) at a bizarre Spanish karaoke night!
My journey to Tortuguero somewhat restored my hope in discovering the real Costa Rica. Another bus re-direction/strike - a very common occurrence in this part of the world - more than doubled the two and a half hour journey to Cariari, the
The offending Fish
A fish actually jumped out of the water and into the boat, slapping Abeiene in the face. I laughed til I cried! She didn’t think it was so funny! starting point for boats out to Tortuguero - the ‘mini Amazon’. Two Canadians girls - Abeiene and Tuyen, Jonathon a young American missionary and I ended up on the back of a truck in banana country enroute to meet a dugout boat by the river. We sat, hungry and not so patiently on a lonely riverbank in a backwater banana plantation for over 2 hours in the middle of nowhere waiting for the boat. That’s when it began to get dark. Frogs kept jumping around startling us and food rations were dwindling. Jonathon went on a manly mission for assistance and came back shaken after witnessing a snake being killed on the nearby banana plantation. Good news - the boat was on its way. The ensuing 3 hour long night-time jungle journey Irwin-style in a dugout canoe through the backwaters of the mini Amazon was sensational!! It was pitch dark - no moon, only light from lanterns and our torches and lots of rain. Aside from seeing (and hearing) lots of animals including monkeys, racoons, caimans and prolific birdlife; two incidents stand out. A fish actually jumped out of the water and into the boat, slapping Abeiene in the face.
Punto Cocles, Puerto Viejo
Walking south there’s palm trees and forest to water, rock pools, coconuts bobbing in the surf, yellow sand, a stretch of beach and surf un-littered, few people bonus! I laughed til I cried! She didn’t think it was so funny! Next we kept getting stuck in shallows and this local kid kept getting out and pushing us through.... he’d just got back in the boat when a massive 3 metre crocodile slid into the water and under the boat .... crikey!!!
Tortuguero literally means ‘region of turtles’. It’s a famous village between the Tortuguero River and Caribbean where turtles come to the beach to nest and lay their eggs. Off the canoe, we were hoping to see some turtles on the beach that night, but Ricardo the tour tout who met us at the village pier, quashed all hopes for a sighting of endangered green sea turtles. Apparently they only nest between July and October and it’s April. Boo! To add insult to injury, the village restaurants are closed up and the woman serving food at the local disco is rude and uncooperative. The following morning, I decide to head to Puerto Viejo via a boat to have a few days on the Costa Rican Caribbean before I fly to Columbia. I join the others on a boat to Puerto Limon - where I hope to catch
sight of a sloth in the jungle either side of us - but no such luck! We farewell Jonathan and catch a minivan to Puerto Viejo - with just one stop for a puncture on the way!
Puerto Viejo is the first Caribbean coastline I’ve seen with surf and surfers. Dreadlocked Costa Rican ones, that LOVE the ladies! Walking south there’s palm trees and forest to water, rock pools, coconuts bobbing in the surf, yellow sand, a stretch of beach and surf un-littered, few people - bonus! The best beach is Punto Cocles where I spent a couple of days swimming in rock pools, sleeping on my sarong and reading in the shade of palm trees. In the evenings I meet the girls and a gang from Manchester for cold cervaza and my first steak for months at an Argentinean steak and wine joint. Then, all too soon, it’s back to San Jose to catch my flight to Columbia. Yep, Columbia.
‘But it’s dangerous?!’.
‘Oh, really?!’
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