Costa Life - A Trip in Review (Jan '20)
Ever since I've been in and out of San Jose for work, I've been waiting for a sign to call me back to be an explorer. That sign came in the form of a cheap A$$ Spirit flight for $270. (sounds better than it was in all honesty - add in baggage and then a FIVE hour layover each way and the price sounds less appealing) BUT it got us to Costa Rica. How I would sum Costa Rica up in 3 words - vibrant, alive, amigos. It's the true essence of their life motto - pura vida meaning "life's good" or some variation of that. [me in Costa in 2017]
There were so many places we wanted to explore in Costa - all corners of the country have something great to offer - WHERE TO START - but a goal for this trip for us was to spend time in both the Tico forest and get a dose of #beachLife. Of course, Costa is very well known for both, so this was not a hard goal to achieve.
Summary of our trip:
It was extremely lovely and a place I would be very happy spending extended time in. Unlike SE Asia, it’s a place of comfort and simple for Americans to travel.
Speaking Espanol again was really fun and with a couple dedicated months, I think you could get pretty fluent. Many Ticos know some English as well, so it’s a great place to learn. “Como se dice “Jungle”?”
The jungle is a mysterious and cool place with whack weather. We preferred the jungle to the beach towns, but beach towns with surf boards are gaining traction with us. :p
We did not participate or see any dancing which would have been fun. We were also in bed by 9PM most nights and the dance parties I heard about started at 11PM or later…AYYYY! But I know and you know that Ticos know how to make their hips swing!
Vacations post-Holiday vacation = yes, please!
Route overview is below - we made a good chunk of the country, but also not because it takes FOREVER to move around CR. Especially when on dirt roads on winding switch’ies.
Day 1 - 2: Our first day started with a red eye flight that got into Fort Lauderdale at 5AM. So we picked up Starbucks and went to the beach to watch the sunrise and did some handstands in the sand. #playtime with my Beebs!
5 hours later…we flew into San Jose (spent little time there which I also would pass on as advice for the next peoples) and stayed in the mountains of Alejuela in the cutest BnB with a great host. We got up early the next day to some amazing balcony-serviced coffee and gallo pinto (aka breakfast rice & beans, THEE BEST) before hitting up the one and only Starbucks-owned coffee farm. Very cool to see all of the work Starbucks is doing for coffee supply sustainability! All of the coffee served there has never left the farm - from growing to processing to roasting to the table. Talk about a farm to table operation!
We then trekked on down to Los Quetzales National Park, thru the park to a remote lodge. This was the main reason we stopped there as the lodge looked like the most peaceful oasis. & it was SO worth it! The roads to get there were quite treacherous (4x4 required), but we stayed in a cloud forest overlooking amazing mountain valleys all from the porch of a canvas tent. It was a sweet, sweet escape.
Day 3 - 5: We had to head out the next day already to get to San Gerardo to check in for our Chirripo hike - WHOOP. #AMPED I was so looking forward to this although we were also a bit nervy as we had never done a hike so long or with so much incline. You have to check in at the office in town the day before you actually head into the park, so we did that and pre-ordered our lunch at Base Camp for the next day. We stopped in town to #CARBup and met some local folks from the states who suggested we ADD another summit to our Chirripo summit. Crazy - but what's really another 5k and 1,200ft up/down when you are already doing a 40K? Aside from the carbo load, we were in bed by 6PM to try to get some decent zzz's as we planned to roll tide by 1AM. Our granny selves were able to do it! See my post here that describes the amazing Chirripo experience we ventured on! Definitely a highlight of the trip and life accomplishments.
We left San Gerardo the day after Chirripo and were destined for some #beachvibes in Dominical - YAY for paved roads again! :D There is a really cool waterfall on the way as well, but we had to hike 6k or so and were honestly not feeling it after a 17hr day prior of hiking (check it out - Nauyaca Waterfalls). We got to the beach and were immediately slapped in the face by a humid AF 95degree sauna (AKA the ocean). Jake was suffering from sunburn, but I ventured out and had a little relax sesh by the beach & watching surfers ride the swells. Trying to pick up some pointers for the next day :)
Day 6 - 8: as Dominical is very known for its BUENO surfing, we bit the bullet and bought a surf for beginners sesh with our man, Marco (both of us were first-timers). I mean, once in a lifetime exp, amIright? It was super fun and of course we both got up and were rocking the mini rollers in the whole 2ft of shore :p Form on point and exactly what the professionals look like, we know. See BONUS section HERE for Jen’s Surf Tips for Beginners.
Honestly, we wish we had another day in Dominical because it would have been fun to take the boards out the next day to mess around and see how far we could get by ourselves, but we were off to Manuel Antonio which was recommended by everyone. My favorite part of Manuel was the shipping container we stayed in with a wicked view of the ocean and sunsets from our bed. It was beautiful.
We headed into the National Park ($16 entry fee pp) the next day which happened to be a Sunday and we didn't get there until ~9AM. ADVICE: Avoid Sundays and avoid popular times like 9AM. It was SO SO busy and almost impossible to move. I really think it affected our review of the park sadly. We walked/hiked every trail in the park I believe within ~3 hours. Many people obvi go spend the day at the beaches there, but we were not up to lay on the beach that day. The monkeys and sloths and iguanas were pretty neat though!
We bummed around the beach in town the rest of the night sampling chili guaro and watching people take off and biff their running start to parasailing. #puravida Another goal of the trip was to zipline in the jungle and what's a better place to do this but Costa? Definite trip highlight as well - flying through the jungle with the monkeys.
Day 9: we had a long drive from Manuel to Alejuela outskirts which started in the afternoon. Our goal was to see Poas Volcano the next morning prior to our 2pm flight. Unfortunately, it was extremely cloudy from the minute we pulled into our night cottage to when we left the next day. If you do a small amount of reading, it's quite easy to gather going to Poas when it's really cloudy will only be disappointing, so we saved the $30 and went towards San Jose. Attempted to check out the market in town, but it was mostly raw meats and quite disappointing compared to SE Asia markets. We also got a parking ticket and were only there for 30MINUTES!!! GRRR. All things went pretty smooth after day aside from it being a really long day of travel. Some classic Spirit flight delays made our 5hr layover only 3 :D #glasshalffull We were home and cozy in our Minneap bed by 2AM <3
Takeaways / lessons learned / advice :
Book some things ahead of time…we waited to book Manuel Antonio until a few days before we stayed there and a lot of options were gone. Esp if you want high rate, budget places.
Save heading into Manuel Antonio Nat'l Park for NOT a weekend.
No need to book excursions ahead of time, but when you do book them, you get pretty big discounts if you use cash over card.
San Jose - meh. Don't have much to say about it; maybe I just haven't discovered what it has to offer, but I really haven't seen much of anything about it that I enjoy.
If you want to see a volcano, be flexible in your schedule as you can't predict when there will be clouds!! We were pretty close to Poas on Day 2 and it was a clear day and we wish we just hit it up then instead of trying to wait for the last day.
Rent a car - highly suggest it if you are on any sort of time constraint.
Eat all of the gallo pinto (breakfast rice & beans) you can. It's delicious and who knows when you'll get it again!
Sweet plantains and cheese plantains - plantains in any way are DELICIOSO!!
Drink all of the coffee!
Pura vida,
Juana (my Spanish name granted in 8th grade)
BONUS SECTION - POINTERS to Beginner Surfers (& for myself the next time I rent a board):
Start in the white waves…and going towards shore instead of sideways in the real SWELLS. Bad idea, brother.
Once you lay on your board, HOLD your board tight when going over waves to get out in the real waves or you will get face-slapped by the board. You won’t always have a Marco holding your board!!
Take your time getting up. Best advice from Marco - feel the wave and move wit it. Surfer-bro, I know, but you really have a lot of time to get up, don’t force it once he says “POP up!!”
Figure 4 pop move is magic. Essentially yoga figure 4 face down on a board, but you use the front leg to push off the board to pop your body up. #popthatbody3-6
One up….
Keep your legs bent & athletic
Point both arms forward - use them as your steering wheel. This was the craziest thing I learned surfing. But forward doesn’t mean up, then you are just dabbing (thanks Marco for helping me correct natural instinct)
When possible, fall backwards off the board, not forwards and especially not forwards and in front of the board or again, face-slap is in your future.
