Getting to Peru


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April 11th 2008
Published: April 11th 2008
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Hello, I shall start off again from where I left off last night which was actually still in Costa Rica, so here goes.

The next day was getting ourselves down the west coast to Jaco, which is pronounced aco - silent J, It took us a while to figure that out. Anyway, it was 5 hours in a shuttle, which is really just a small minivan with a crazy Costa Rican Driver, which seems to be mandatory for Interbus which is the company we were using. The Centre of Costa Rica is mountains and to get anywhere you have to go over these really windy roads that are quite narrow at break neck speeds, with 10 wheeler lorries on the inside of you, it is a little bit eye opening and jaw dropping at first but you soon get used to it and nod off.

So 5 hours later we arrive in Jaco, we stayed at the Hostel Kangaroo, which was just off the beach and about a 15 min walk into the main strip area. We arrived and were shown to our room. I had booked one with air con but that had been taken already, it seemed we were lucky to even have a window, we did however have our own shower room. I will skip this as much a possible, but I really didn´t like Jaco, it was too hot and humid and our Hostel was disgusting - I am gonna be gutted if the rest of the Hostels we are staying in are like that. I thought I would be able to cope with dirty hostels, but in truth i really do like my home comforts and as they say cleanliness is next to godliness, I´m not religious but I´ll give it a go if it means clean hostels.
So needless to say I was a bit grumpy, then we had this 15 min hike in the oppresive heat to go draw some cash before we could even buy water ! best to be prepared before you arive somewhere as you dont know what facilities they will have nearby.

So we walked along the beach with the hostels Golden Retreiver in tow, made it into town, and got some moulah. We got accosted in the road by a bloke selling surfing lessons. As I wanted to give it a go and Grae wanted to hire a board we went ahead and booked for the next day with him. To be honest we were dubious as to if he would even turn up - we had given him 20 dollars as a deposit. But as every single person we met in Costa Rica was friendly and helpfull our guard was down and we just trusted him.
Then we had lunch, not that you could really eat in that heat, and walked back to the Hostel. We got changed and went to the beach to watch the sun go down, and that was pretty much the highlight of Jaco for me. Then we went back to our room and led under a fan till the next morning - pretty boring hey.

Next day was the surf lesson but that wasn´t till 1pm so we had breakfat and headed to the beach again, to check out the surf. it was pretty flat, so I was happy as I was getting super nervous by this point. After a dip we went back to the room and got ready for the lesson, well that was if he turned up anyway.
Lown and behold he did and he was even on time ! He said we wern´t going to Jaco beach as it was too flat he was taking us to a special spot. La Formosa I think it was called. When we got there I all but said ok take me back now, the surf board he had brought for me was a long board and about twice the size of me and the waves were massive. Well maybe not massive in the surfing scheme of things but I wouldn´t even go swimming in that normally. He said that by 3 or 4 pm it would have calmed down. So I had a lesson, which was actually really good he seemed to know his stuff, he did however reckon tht Kelly Slater taught him this special techinque for getting up, when he was on the pro tour - I doubt that but it worked for the two other guys who were with us, so you never know, maybe that is my sinical English temprament coming through.
So it is my time to go in the water with this massive board attached to my leg, and I swear I could barely stand up against the waves that were breaking right at the shoreline and he wanted me to go to the next lot of breakers. He was holding the borad for me as the waves were well and truly over my head and the board was too big and boyant to go under the waves in a dog dive - that I could do anyway. So we get out there and two massive waves come and grind my body, boobs first into the floor of the ocean and that is before I have even held the damn board, goodness knows how he managed to hold onto it while I was getting washed on the floor. So I get up out of the wash and another wave is right there coming again and he blows his whistle which meas for me to lie on the board. I do even if only to get up off the floor, the wave comes and picks the board up at the back and takes me into shore on my belly clingling on for dear life, I didn´t even attempt to get on my knee. And the shore is where I defiantly stay, no way hose was I going back into the washing machine - my boobs were too sore !

So now that is snowboarding and surfing I suck at, and that is fine with me.

Grae went out on his board, and did ok, he said the waves were too crumbly - whatever that means and you would have to be really good to stand up before the wave gave out. The only reason I managed to catch a wave was because my board was the size of a tank.

So it was a nice day anyway just being on the beach out of our hostel room. That night we had something to eat and went to bed again.

The next day we had another shuttle booked to take us back to San Jose at 1pm, so we went to the beach for an hour or so, had breakfast and packed up our stuff. The shuttle came to take us to San Jose which was about 2.5 hours and we ckecked back into the hostel we stayed at on the first night In San Jose. Let me tell you it was like luxury compared to the Kangaroo. We had to be at San Jose Airport very early the next day so we were up at 3 am and got a taxi to San Jose, and here the mammot journey to Peru starts -

Hostel to San Jose Airport
San Jose to Miami
Miami airport for 6 hours
Miami to Lima
Lima airport in the check-in area for 7 hours
Lima to Cusco
Cusco airport to Hotel

Sleep !!!!!!

All in all ths took about 29 hours ish, as it is dificult to work out with time differences.

We had a tour of Cusco city booked for that day at 1pm, whic I am proud to say we made it too, if not a bit bleary eyed.

I´ll leave it for now, we start the Inca Trail tomorrow so I will write again in a few days / week.





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15th April 2008

oh to join you guys on your travels ! how wonderful that would be!

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