Bama or Bust: Costa Rica Week of Adventure

Getting mocked by Stewart

After a water taxi and short bus trip, Stewart and I had officially left Panama and were on our way towards Costa Rica. We were going to meet Stewart's friend Craig in San Jose. He was going to take a week off from work and travel with us while we hit up some of Costa Rica's hot spots.

Costa Rica is perhaps one of central america's richest countries, while still poorer than the US, they do have a life expectancy, a literacy rate, and an infant mortaility rate that is comperable to the States. There are several things that seperate Costa Rica from other Central American countries and make it decidedly unique: After a massive civil war in 1948 between a leftist leader, and conservative right wing aristocracy, the next president Feraria(sp?) aboilished the entire military calling it "a threat to democracy." This would set the tone for a peace loving nation for the next 50 years. Costa Rica's president Arias actually was instrumental in coordinating the peace treaty ending the nicaraguan civil war in 1980 and as a result won a Nobel peace prize. He was reelected last year after 20 years out of office. The US on the other hand entirely funded the loosing side, thereby prolonging the war for years and killing hundreds of thousands in the process.

Costa Rica realized somewhere in the 1970s and 1980s after several decimating Banana blights that they should start diversifying their economy. With the help of many, many extrañeros, they started setting aside land for conservation and preservation, eventually totaling over 30 percent of the country. Within 20 years, Costa Rica had revolutionized their economy and now their number one export was tourism far surpassing all other products. The numbers are evident, with something like 50,000 Americans living in Costa Rica, and over one million tourists in 1999 alone. In contrast Panama only got 80,000 tourists that year. And while this tourism makes the country less of what it used to be 100 years ago, there is not a culture in the world that does not change. Culture is inherently fluid . In the same way that there is a little bit of truth in every stereotype, the tourism is here for a reason. The country's forests, volcanos, and beaches are some of the best that I have seen to date.

Another side effect of such massive influx of foreignors wass their foreign money. While great for the country as a whole, it makes the life of a budget backpacker a difficult one. In other countries we are used to being able to get by on the same sort of pay scale that the locals do, but here since tourism is such a ubiqitous buisness, every price in a restaurant or hotel is quoted for a gringo. The locals simply eat and live at home. The tourists that spend these kinds of prices are here for a week maybe two, and so to them it is really nothing.

Stewart and I met Craig at the airport in San Jose last week, and although his plane arrived at 8:30, he didn't get out of customs until 10:20. Lesson to be learned: when the plane deboards at a foreign airport, do not stop to go use the restroom and let the entire plane get in front of you in line, instead hold it until you get to the other side if you can.

That night we went out and partied with the locals, trying to pick out the "real girls" from the prostitutes or men dressed as women, throwing Craig a welcome to Costa Rica party. It was kind of fun to introduce him to the things so foreign to American culture and now mundane and ordinary to Stewart and I. I lived vicariously through him, watching his reaction and remembering what it was like the first time I came to latin america. We called it a night at 3:30 a.m. after some Hamburgeusas con Jamon y Huevos (hamburgers with ham and eggs, actually really incredibly good) from a street vendor. The next morning at 7:30 am, or 4 hours later, we were up and adam for an 8 oclock bus that would last the next 5 hours and take us up to La Fortuna where we were going to see the Volcano Arenal.

The rickety old 1970s charter bus rambled through the hills north of San Jose along a bumpy dirt road headed for La Fortuna. As the exhaust wafted in through our window and the bumps without shocks threw us off our seats, we all couldn't help but feel a little bit quezy and think that maybe a night of fun wasn't the best precursor to an 8 o'clock 5 hour bus ride through rural Costa Rica.

Finally arriving in La Fortuna, that afternoon, we checked into our hostel "Gringo Petes" and grabed some grub, a set meal down here is called a cansado and we ate the most expensive cansado that we have ever eaten at 6 dollars (in Ecuador they are 1.50). A little nap, some blogging, and we were scheduled to take a night tour up the side of the active volcano looming over La Fortuna.

Volcano Arenal first erupted from its dormant state in 1960, and has been spitting out lava and hot rocks ever sense. The last person it killed was in 2000, a man who was trying to get too close to the volcano and got killed by the heat. Total the volcano has killed under 50 in the last fifty years, with the majority of those being during the initial explosion in the 1960's.

Our guide, Juan Carlos, has been giving tours up the side of the volcano for over 15 years, and as the day slowly faded into purple, we bounced down the road in a van with several other tourists headed for the volcano. The van came to a stop a hour later at the very base of the volcano. From there it was an hour hike in the dark through the jungle, while battling mosquitos, up to a viewing point. The viewing point was actually a clearing of lava rocks from the last major eruption, and for the next hour we sat there in the silence and darkness and watched and listened as this force of nature spit glowing lava rocks hundreds of feet into the air and then let them slide down the mountain, bursting into thousands of tiny pieces in spectacular displays of fire. I felt one with the powers of the earth, and got a sense for how truly massive our planet is. We were watching lava that had just recently flowed up from the center of the earth and now spewing out into the air.

After the Volcano we went back down the mountain in our van and got to swim in thermal springs feeding off of the heat from the volcano, ambiance provided by flashlights mounted in the trees by our guide, Juan Carlos.

Nixing plans to go out that evening, Stewart, Craig, and I caught a jeep out of La Fortuna to lake Arenal 2 hours away, where we boarded boats to take us down the lake. From the end of the lake we caught another jeep to the cloud forest town of Monteverde.