Day-to-Day Life in Costa Rica

Even though we had to come to the US due to COVID, I thought I would add to the blog.  (See March post on that...)

Day to day life was interesting.  One of my favorites was the drive to school.

First, there are the trees. We were there during the dry season. We have seen rain twice for about 10 minutes each in 90 days.  However, some of the trees are still green...amazing....and some are blooming like Spring without water.....The province is called Guanacaste, which is also an iconic tree here.  I particularly like it when the cows are under the tree getting shade.

Second, there are the animals on the road. This is a cattle region, with most of the land used as pasture for cattle. Farmers ride horses to move the cattle between fields.  They look so cool on their horses with boots and hats. But we have seen them use bicycle, mopeds, cars, or walking with a big stick to move cattle.  Each day you never know what you might see on the road.  We have also seen goats, chickens, and sheep.

Third, the roads can be quite varied. The main roads are good, but have limited shoulders. And yet there are people walking, biking everywhere. There are also dogs, bicycles, mopeds, dump trucks that can pop in front of you at any moment!   We drove white knuckled much of time.  The back roads have less worries about hitting something and more worries about hurting the car. The potholes are enormous.  But luckily there is always a grader, bulldozer, and dump truck (in the way) fixing the roads.  You can go around construction at your own leisure. Half of the time there is no one there to guide you.  We have driven on roads and near equipment which we had no business being near.  The video was not on the way to school, but you get the idea.

Decision To Come Home

Sixteen days ago (a Thursday), we had to cancel a ‘bucket list’ hiking trip in Torres del Paine National Park, Patagonia in Chile.  We were scheduled to go from Costa Rica to the park through Argentina and my niece and my son Daniel were supposed to join us from the US.  On the previous day St. Lawrence University where Daniel goes had announced they were moving to on-line classes after Spring Break.  But that day Argentina said that folks coming from the US would be quarantined for 14 days.  Hastily we tried to arrange a way to the park only through Chile but with no luck luckily.  A week ago while we would have been hiking, Costa Rica closed its borders to non-citizens.  Had we gone we would have likely been unable to return to Costa Rica.

In Costa Rica (CR), tourists like us can stay for 90 days without a visa but if you want to stay longer you have to leave the country and come back.  Our Patagonia trip was to be our leave and come back.  Since that was cancelled we had to find another way, so we walked into Nicaragua.  This is a regular thing and many many people do it every 90 days.  Here is the article that we followed. https://mytanfeet.com/travel-tips/crossing-the-border-between-costa-rica-and-nicaragua/.  We didn’t walk all the way to Nicaragua, we first drove to the border, then walked into Nicaragua, paid some money, got our passports stamped, paid some more money a few more times, and walked back out.  Oh, and we saw some people we know while we were there.  As we are walking out, Gab says ‘Hey there’s my friend from school!’  So we saw someone we know in Nicaragua; that has still not sunk in. 

Meanwhile in CR, our kids’ school went online and there were a growing number of cases there.  At the time it was 12 or 15.  Here is the graph of how cases of COVID-19 have gone in CR.  https://ticotimes.net/2020/03/26/costa-rica-posts-largest-increase-in-known-covid-19-cases-up-to-231(Isn’t it crazy how the trend is so similar to that in other places, almost like these things can be predicted using some kind of abstract notation or symbols… but I digress.)  

 

So then last week our kids did their Costa Rican school from home or tried since it was in Spanish.  Our condo was 100m from Playa Grande, a large beach known for its surfable waves in Marino Las Baulas National Park.  It is amazing there.  While the kids worked with some success, Steph and I fretted and fretted and fretted.  The previous week we had thought about cancelling the Patagonia trip over and over.  Now we plotted another trip in Costa Rica to Corcovado National Park to raise our spirits.  And worried about whether we should go back to the US.  The weather continued to be sunny and warm; it is the dry season right now in Guanacaste Province so every day was sunny with temps in the mid 90’s.  And when I say everyday I mean we had had 30 minutes of rain in the last 90 days.  But elsewhere the world was coming apart.  And by apart I mean that y’all couldn’t get together or couldn’t get it together or something like that.

Then the end of last week Costa Rica closed the National Parks, so no Corcovado.  And no more Playa Grande (or any of the nearby beaches in Las Baulas).  It was a tough mental blow for kids cooped up in a condo and who had enthusiastically wanted to see some sights and had embraced surfing.  So we found a tree house hotel, long on Gabriella’s list of things to do, in a jungle to visit for the weekend.  It was also going to be a mental break for Steph and me.  Somewhere around this time, alcohol sales stopped in our region to discourage people from congregating.  For about two weeks the unspoken question in our household was-are we going to go home.  With a goal of taking a mental break from worry, we made reservations for Saturday and Sunday night, packed up and started our drive.  With advice from Costa Rica neighbors --- who happen to live in Ardmore, PA --- we also bought plane tickets home so that we had them in case knowing they would be easy to cancel. Flights to the US were being cancelled; in a week there would be no regularly scheduled flights to the US until who knows when.  Saturday, we stopped along the drive for a bathroom break and to grab a drink about halfway along our 6 hour drive to the treehouse.  Steph checked her email via wifi at a Subway.  The tree house place had cancelled all reservations.  The effect on all of us was palpable to everybody.  Turned around and drove home.  But the die was cast.  We were still gonna wait until Monday to make a final decision but I think we were all effectively done.

On the way home we stopped at a beach and took a long walk.  CR would announce the closing of all beaches shortly thereafter.   The US State Department and the Embassy in San Jose, the capital of CR, sent notices that US citizens who want to go home should very soon or they might not be able to get out. Monday we woke up and had a family meeting with many many tears.

 

Rincon de la Vieja

The next place that we visited was Rincón De La Vieja (literally Nook of the Old Woman) which is an active volcano. Vieja is about 90 minutes to our Northeast. The drive took us past Liberia which is just an hour away.  There are some trails around the base of the volcano as well as some waterfalls and hot springs. We walked around the trails and saw white-faced monkeys, paca, squirrels and a series of bubbling mud pots.

After some lunch, we then went down the mountain and did a short hike to a waterfall, Las Chorreras waterfall, near the Hacienda Guachipelin. We swam around in the pool at the bottom of that waterfall. Gab and Christopher jumped from the ledges behind the waterfall into the pool below. Given that the temp that day was about 92, it was surprising that the water was freezing.

We ended our day by heading to the Rio Negro hot springs which has 9 hot springs pools along side the river, Rio Negro.   Each pool was a slightly different temperature which contrasted with the very cool river water.  There was also some "volcanic mud" there which is supposed to be very good for the skin.  We all got some on our faces and bodies.  Of course, it dries quite hard so it can clean your pores or something. 

Finished the day with a nice dinner at the Hacienda Guachipelin itself.  Pics below.
The image below labelled bird, just might be a Baltimore Oriole though it is hard to identify from the shadows on the image. But I'm going with it.

A Ride to Playa Penca

We took a timelapse of our drive to a nearby beach , Playa Penca.

Here is a rough map of the ride.

Here is the video but since it is a compilation of photos, pausing anytime yields a clear pic.

Arenal Volcan

So catching up some more from January and the visit of Pam and Paul Caswell.

After Alamo came and got the car started we drove to the town of La Fortuna in north central mountains of Costa Rica.  We were able to catch up with the tour bus that Pam and Paul and Gab were riding.  They had stopped for lunch so we met them at the restaurant and were able to follow them.  And we took a road, Route 4, that was just finished and  which was not on the map.

We checked in and were able to hit the pool and hot tubs before dinner.  Had a good dinner at the hotel restaurant.  The next morning after a really good breakfast at our hotel, we drove to the Fortuna waterfall but we could not swim there to do the recent amount of rainfall.  Only something like 550 steps down and then back up.  But there was lots of inspiration from the Guru Sloth (see pics) on the way.  After that we drove over to Arenal Volcano National Park where we ate a packed lunch.  We did a nice hike there and got a little rain on us.  Shout out to Christopher for using the emergency poncho that Steph has been carrying in her purse for like 10 years.  Only a great mom does that.

Before we had headed on this trip, someone we met said that we had to do the rope swing at La Fortuna.  If you go on Trip Advisor or any similar site, you will find that the 'rope swing' is one of the top things to do in the area.  So you might expect that this would be some commercial thing where you pay for your turn and maybe there's a lifeguard.  Nope, just a rope over a river by the side of the road.  In Tico fashion there is a guy who will watch your car for $4 but he seemed busy so we did not get charged.  And this rope swing was awesome and by awesome I mean terrifying for an old man.  When you let go, your head is probably 15 feet above the water.  And it was fun.  All of the Schuckers went.  Grandma took pictures and video while Grandpa kept an eye on the car.  (I probably owe him $4.)  That night we went out and had a seafood dinner.

The skies on the trip so far had gone back and forth between downpour and streaming sunlight and La Fortuna was no different.  Volcan Arenal (Arenal Volcano) is high enough it seems to create its own weather, basically making its own clouds.  So lots of the pictures below have the top of Arenal in clouds.  We got a bit lucky the next day.  In the morning we went over to The Hanging Bridges in Mistico Park.  The hanging bridges is a series of, you might have guessed, bridges through the jungle.  We went with a tour that included a nature guide (some of the pictures below are through his telescopre.  Without the guide we would have missed a good deal including the pit vipers.  The tour was supposed to be 2.5 hours but our guide was chatty so it was nearly 4 hours.  All good though and we learned and saw so much.  As we finished the tour, Arenal got clearer and clear and so almost all of the pictures where you can see most of Arenal is from the restaurant at Mistico Park.

On the way back, we stopped at a hot springs river.  As Grandpa said, it is amazing that this place is not commercialized.  We parked on the side of the road and walked about 50 yards to a river that was fluctuated between 80 and 100 degrees.  Somewhere upstream it was much warmer.  We just found a place in the river which has spots of between 8 inches and 2.5 feet in depth and we just hung out for a bit.  There was at least 30 other people there; one family had camped on the side of the river and was having a large picnic.  A coati came and visited their meal.    Rest of that day was spent hanging by the pool at the hotel and Grandpa took us out for a pizza dinner. 

The next morning we headed back to Playa Grande and Pam and Paul headed to Monte Verde for some sightseeing on their own.   Shortly the kids would start school and Pam and Paul would come back to visit us for a weekend in Playa Grande.

Tortuguero Part 2

So the second day at Turtle Beach Lodge (TBL), we got up early for a morning tour which was in an open top boat.  Our guide Marvin was amazingly knowledgeable about the flora and fauna of the region.  Why does Canada have a research station on the tropics; the world may never know.  We then had a breakfast which included the typical Tico (Costa Rican) beans and rice (arroz con frijoles).  Apparently, Costa Rica has bees without stingers.  This took awhile to get used to and they seemed to always be around our table at breakfast.  Might have something to do with my kids getting pancakes every morning with fake maple syrup.  Adirondack maple syrup snobs they are.  Also Michael discovered guava jam/jelly and it is a thing.

In midmorning we went on a jungle walk again led by Marvin.  The highlight for my kids was the red poison dart frog.  But we also saw fleetingly a wild turkey and a good deal of other wildlife.  That evening we went for a night tour.  One of the highlights was seeing a boa up close.  Those of us who wanted to were able to get up and be about 8 feet from it.  It was not a boa constrictor but a regular Caribbean Annulated Tree boa (Sorry no good pictures).  As a note on pictures, I'm combining pictures here from the whole troop. 

 On our third day we got a new guide and also took at late morning tour.  Saw more birds.  When we were not touring around, we were trying to stay dry --- there were downpours regularly.  When not trying to stay dry we were swimming in the pool, playing volleyball with some folks from France, napping or playing pool.  There were spider monkeys on the grounds of the TBL and they were fun to watch.  In the afternoon that day we all got in canoes and paddled over to Laguna Cuatro; kids in one canoe, parents and grandparents in the other.  

Fourth day was up early; ate breakfast and had took the boat back to La Pavona.  Our next stop was Volcan Arenal.  Pam and Paul had a ride pick them up at La Pavona.  And the rest of us, well some idiot, me, forgot to turn the lights off and so we had a dead, dead battery.  (Our second in a week, no less.) Gab hitched a ride with the grandparents --- these tourist buses have wifi --- and the rest of us waited for Alamo to arrive to jump the battery.  We talked a nice group of French kids into trying to give us a jump but after 15 minutes it was not turning, so they au revoir-ed and we waited.  Only took an hour so we hung out at La Pavona.  From there we started our journey to the town of La Fortuna, near the Arenal Volcano. 

Tortuguero: Part 1

So we are catching up a bit but at the beginning of January, Pam and Paul Caswell - Steph's parents - came to Costa Rica.  We toured around with them for a week or so.

We met Pam and Paul in San Jose and spent a night there walking around downtown San Jose and going out to dinner.  Daniel was with us having come a couple of days beforehand.  When we went to park our car at the hotel, we were met with a guy who guided us to our parking spot and we negotiated something for $10.  All Spanish with a good deal of hand gestures.  We thought the deal was $10 for the night.  So as we leaving the parking area, an attendant summons us over and tells us we have to pay for the parking.  As we pay for parking, we look back and the first guy is starting to wash our car by hand.  Pura vida  (the national motto).

The very next morning we got up early since Pam and Paul were part of a tour.  Heading east northeast out of San Jose, we followed the tour bus to a breakfast place, Restaurante Selva Tropical, in Guapiles which also had a butterfly garden.  And, of course, there was rice and beans for breakfast. There is a pic with a butterfly on Gab's face.  Because there were extra seats on the tourist bus that Pam and Paul were taking, Gab rode with her grandma and grandpa while Daniel and Christo stayed with the Schuckers.  Almost immediately after we left the restaurant, the tour bus pulls over and everybody gets out.  Well the Schuckers did too and we were rewarded with a view of a sloth.

We then drove a while and went through banana groves.   The Caribbean side of Costa Rica is very different from where we live.  The east (Caribbean) side is very very green and lush.  And as we found out, very rainy.  The west side is less lush but it is pretty green at elevations a good bit above sea level.  For us, living right by the beach, we have had no rain since we arrived on December 17th.  It is very dry here.  As we drove through the lushness of the area to the northeast of Guapiles, there was plenty of evidence for plantations and signs for Dole and Chiquita.

To get to the Turtle Beach Lodge (TBL) in Tortuguero National Park, we had to take a boat since the park is accessible only by boat. We parked near the 'port' and had a snack and used the bathroom.  On the way to the men's room there was a 'generator' room which had a generator and probably 30 car batteries. The ride to the lodge was via canals and rivers some of which were made by the locals hundreds of years ago as a method of travelling north and south without venturing into the ocean.  Our boat was a long and skinny one with a center aisle and two seats on either side.  We stopped on the way in the village of Tortuguero where we had some snacks.  Lunch was planned at the lodge when we got there.  Below are links to some of the pictures from the first day which is primarily from the ride to TBL.  There was a night guided tour for that night but it was cancelled due to rain.  More to come in a second post on Tortuguero.