Costa Rica (via Fort Lauderdale)

A quick stop in Florida

After the hostels we had stayed in in Mexico, we were met with quite a treat when we flew into Florida for an overnight stop on the way to Costa Rica. We stayed in a gigantic King Size suite at the airport Hyatt hotel with a functioning bathroom! It turns out the hotel was only 2 months new and so everything was spick and span. Our little package included dinner, drinks and a full breakfast and our suite was fully equiped with a kitchen and lounge area. All of this for a grand total of $40 - Bargain! I think both of us would have been quite happy to spend a week holidaying at this spiffy airport hotel as we felt like real people again.

But alas, we left the very next day for a flight to San Jose. Not much to report on this city, the capital of Costa Rica, as it did not ooze warmth or charisma. It was more of a dirty dumpy kind of city, and we were keen to high tail it out of there speedily after a night.  The hostel itself was really cool, with heaps of internet kiosks, a nice cheap restaurnt, cinema room and bar overlooking the city.

Samara Beach - on the Pacific Coast of Costa Rica 

In San Jose we jumped on a hot and sweaty public bus that took us to the beach. Wes had done excellent research (as usual) and lined us up with a fabulous apartment in this tiny beach town that we used as our base for 7 days. The apartment was fully equiped so we made the most of the little kitchen and cooked ourselves brekky, lunch and dinner which was rather a nice change.

The town itself was really cool, consisting of only 3 streets really, which were mostly unpaved. There were lots of paddocks spread out across the town, interspersed with hotels and shop and there were perhaps a dozen horses that would continously wander through the streets, unattended from one paddock to another.  

We are currently in the Wet Season in Costa Rica and so the rain tended to hit our little place every afternoon. And it wasn't a slight drizzle either - the storms we witnessed were torrential and quite spectactular. One evening we waded out to dinner in water up to our knees as the flash flooding hit our street. 

We had a thoroughly enjoyable week here. We swam, read books, went for the odd run on the beach, had some great dinners, mooched around, and generally soaked up the fact we weren't on the move somewhere else. We just wanted to sit still for a while after a month of constant travelling.   

Wes had no luck trying to buy some free range eggs from the neigbors with chickens. We were later told that the word for eggs is simlar to the word for testicles which might have explained why the old man wasnt willing to part with his "eggs". 

Tamarindo Beach - a couple of hours north

Wes' sister Elle had told us that Tamarindo Beach was a "must must must go" to destination. This was in direct contrast to people in Samara beach, who told urged us not to go. Elle had done us pretty well so for so we jumped on 3 public buses and made our way there. 

What was an unknown tiny surf beach 15 years ago, is now a lot bigger thanks to the hit surfing movie "Endless Summer II" which featured this "secret" surf spot.

The lonely planet indicated we were to expect a Gold Coast kind of place with high rise buildings and wall to wall tourists. It really wasn't like this at all. After the isolation of Samara Beach, we found this place to be a bit more built up, but still a small relaxed surfer's town. There were more people than Samara, so we felt like this place had more life to it, and we enjoyed that.  It was perfect for what we were after.

We again found ourselves a little apartment in a complex with a pool, and we spent 5 days here doing much the same as the week before.

 

Wes turned 27 while we were here so to celebrate we went out for a massive Breakfast Burrito and a scrumtious 3 course dinner at the restaurant of his choice. I bought him a little cheese cake just to ensure we were both thoroughly sick on all the food we ate.

We also ran into a friend from Fernie which was absolutely amazing as it is not really on the beaten track. This is the second time we've ran into Fernie people on this trip and proves just how small the world is. 

Cahuita - on the other side of the country

Public buses are the mode of transport for us, so again, we used these vehicles and made our way to the Caribbean coast on the other side of the country all in a day.

We arrived in this TINY little town with dirt roads, and instantly were met with a real Caribbean flavour. Think dreadlocks, reggae music and people lying in hammocks. It was very laid back and distinctly different to the other side of the country. Costa Rica is a small place, only 300km wide, yet there is a different feel on either side which is interesting. 

In Cahuita we got up early to do an 8km walk through the National Park Jungle. The walk follows the white sandy beach coast line and so the scenery is quite spectactular. We saw numerous monkeys and lizzards, and I'm sure we unknowingly stepped on other colonies of species as we plodded on the trail. All in all, it was beautiful. 

I loved this town - it was so relaxed. The local food was fish in coconut milk which was delish. 

We met an annoying guy from Australia on the bus to Cahuita and he wouldn't leave us alone which was a bit of a pain. He was about 55 and claimed his wife was joining him on the weekend.. At first I thought he was lonely when he plonked himself down at our dinner table, but really, he just liked talking about himself and his apparent success which was tiresome, so Wes and I pretended we were tired and left hastily.  Needless to say, we spent the next day hiding from him in town. When we spotted him in a cafe or on the street, we'd quickly turn the other way and walk briskly elsewhere. Pretty funny.

   

Puerto Viejo - 30 mins away

We joined all the other tourists from Cahuita and came to this place yesterday on an old rickety bus. When we got off the bus, an old man, who clearly gets commission from a few of the hotels in this town, kept hassling us to stay at his establishments... until we told him quite firmly to get lost.  It was boiling hot, so trying to find a place to stay sapped our energy. But we finally found a cool little sanctuary with 4 beds in our room, so I'm playing musical beds to ensure I get the best night's sleep possible. 

From here we are off to Panama....so stay tuned. 

On the road again ...to Mexico

At the end of April it was time to say ciao to Canada and begin the next 6 months of our adventure backpacking. We gathered up our backpacks and took off.  

Our first stop was the Seattle Airport Hotel. Okay, not the most adventurous way to begin our trip, so we moved on quickly.

So our next proper stop was Mexico.  

We flew to Mexico City and were warned explicitly about safety in this city from our lovely Mexican friend back home, Lorena. I believe her words were, “Wes, this is serious. Don’t skimp on getting an authorised taxi. It’s a matter of life and death”.  With those words ringing in our ears, we made sure we did everything properly once we arrived. We had a night in a business hotel which was very functional but had zero atmosphere;  and then spent the second night in Hostel Amigo – a fun hostel that provided a fantastic brekky and massive dinner each night, both free. We did a tour of the Mayan pyramids with the hostel, and managed to fall asleep going both to and from the pyramids. It seems 5 months of doing nothing really takes its toll.  Climbing the pyramids was a real highlight.

Our verdict of Mexico City was that it was a very interesting place. It was a massive, sprawling city, and the old district where we stayed had a fun feeling about it. Not at all as scary as we feared.

The Mexican Pipeline - Puerto Escondido

We were eager to hit the beach and get some sun, so after 2 days, so we went to Puerto Escondido on the Southern Pacific Coast of Mexico. We had the choice of either taking a 45 minute flight, or a 24 hour bus ride. Not surprisingly we voted for the flight.

Puerto Escondido is world renowned for its surf. The main beach has huge barrel waves that never relent, and that swimmers don’t muck around with. We stayed in a massive room in the Mayflower Hostel which had a fan to give us some reprieve from the sweltering heat.  We spent 4 nights here, swimming at the swimming beach around the corner, drinking cervezas, reading books, eating fish, Wes attempting surfing on the non-existent waves at the beginner beach, and sleeping lots. It was very relaxing. Wes discovered “Heuves a la Mexicana” for breakfast, which are essentially scrambled eggs with diced tomato, chilli and onion – delish!

It was here that we had our first experience of the Mexican “Collectivo”.  Which is basically collective transport, (like a bus, but smaller). Our collectivo was a ute with canopy and bench seats lengthways and an open tailgate. We got some funny looks from the 8 locals already in the back, but we piled in with them anyway and after a while got “chatting” in spanglish.  40 cents later we were at our destination .

Living on a nude beach - Zippolite

4 days later we took off. We jumped on a local bus and a collectivo cab to get to our next destination called Zippolite. Unfortunately the cab driver thoroughly ripped us off and so our arrival in Zippolite was slightly tainted.

Nevertheless, this town was unique. It is a sleepy little town right on the beachfront. We found ourselves a Cabana literally right on the (nude) beach called... “A Nice Place on the Beach”. The Cabana was a tree house built out of trees. We scored the best room in the house which had only a bed and mosquito net, and was idyllic. We spent 3 nights here chilling out, swimming, drinking, eating, sleeping and practising our Spanish on each other. 

We mostly ate Mexican food (amazing chicken soup and guacamole), but as had been theme so far, all the waitresses thought we were American and consequently did not treat us very well. Once we made it known that we were Australian we were treated much better, but we weren’t always able to tell people so it was tricky.  Also, on the one night where we ate western food, it didn’t agree with poor Wesley!

So far the heat (35c) in Mexico had been quite a shock to the system, by this stage though, we had the solution down pat: 3-5 showers a day plus beach chairs under a tree while drinking a beer.

A colonial city in the mountains - San Cristobel de las Casas

This was our next stop. We met a delightful Canadian couple at the bus stop near Zippolite who had fluent Spanish, so chatting to them helped pass the time while we waited for the 12 hour overnight bus to San Cristobel.

The bus trip was actually fine. We slept most of the time, and we have our routine down pat now – eye patches, ear plugs and jumpers to keep us warm as the air con gets cranked up on these vessels.  Despite the sleep, it is hard not to get off the bus feeling like you have jet lag!

When we arrived, we were met by a guy wanting to lure us to his hostel. Always suspicious, we double checked it was a legit operation before we accepted his invitation. It was, so we stayed at Planet Hostel, and it was noisy. The staff loved to yell at each other at all times of the day.  San Cristobel on the other hand, was delightful. A lovely city with a huge Spanish feel, colourful buildings, cute little shops, and lots of local markets.

On one of our days we did a boat tour of the nearby Canyon, and it was truly amazing. The Canyon was absolutely enormous, and contained a few crocodiles and other birds, but the tour was in Spanish so we don’t actually know anything about it.

Mayan Ruins in the Jungle! - Palenque

Our next stop was a 7 hour bus ride away. Palenque has Mayan ruins tucked away in the jungle, and so we were told it was a must see. We found ourselves a Cabana in the jungle and spent the night listening to the monkeys going nuts. The heat was sweltering!!! But the nice thing was, there were lots of people also staying in the jungle and there was live music at dinner, so the atmosphere was really fun.

The next morning we took off to explore these ruins. The guide book said you could see them in 3 hours, but we managed to whip around them in about half an hour. They were really impressive, but the heat was so overpowering that we couldn’t spend any longer looking at a pile of rocks. So instead we set off to find the waterfall in the jungle that we were told you could swim at. We stripped down to our swimmers and refreshed ourselves under the cool water.

That evening we took another overnight bus to Tulum – but this time we decided to splurge on the “Executive Bus”. The Mexican Bus system has a variety of classes of bus, and the executive class is second best, better than first class, but without the flat bed seats, and a huge improvement from the ones we had taken so far. We got a cold soft drink on arrival, and the leg room was the best! Definitely worth the extra $9. Even so, it didn’t stop us from holding our breath when the army boarded the bus at a checkpoint in the middle of the night. Not sure who or what they were looking for, but the big flashlight was intimidating.

The Island of Women (Tulum...Isle de Mujeres)

12 hours later we arrived in Tulum, a town on the Caribbean coast of Mexico. Everyone we had spoken to raved about it – the white sandy beaches, the ruins on the beach, and the general beauty. So we were excited.

Well, it was indeed beautiful, but we decided not to stay. We had found a sand floor cabana right on the beach, but it was expensive, the toilet situation was dire, and the place felt empty and isolated. We thought we could get more for our money, so after a quick squizz at the white sandy beach, we went straight back to the bus station and onto a bus headed for Cancun.

Quite randomly on the bus we ran into some friends we had       met in Fernie – so it is a small world after all.

Once we got to Cancun, we jumped on a ferry to Isle de Mujeres, a resortie kind of island half an hour off the coast of Cancun. The water was crystal clear, and very Caribbeanesk. We found the Poc Na Hostel which is the place to stay on this island, and were shown to our room. Our room was no more than a prison cell – white walls, cement floor and a bed. Oh, and bars on the windows of course. It wasn’t exactly welcoming, but it was perfectly functional. The Hostel itself was great – full of lots of travellers and full of life, right on the beach. However, it was surrounded by a barbed wire fence, so just when you thought it was a resort, you need only look outside and be reminded it was definitely NOT a resort.

We spent 4 nights chilling out here and felt much more content and less lonely than we had in some of the other places.  We met another couple who were also travelling for 6 months, and I think we were all desperately craving some people contact that we spent a couple of nights hanging out with them for drinks and dinner which was fun.

The beach was stunning, white sand and beautiful aqua water. We had to wade out about 250metres in knee deep water to get to any sort of depth. We spent our mornings lounging on the beach, swimming every 20 minutes to cool off, and reading. For lunch we had the most delicious Fish Tacos, and for dinners we ate either at the hostel or at a local fish restaurant.  It was utterly relaxing, and easy to imagine doing this forever.

So there ends our 2.5 weeks in Mexico.  It was a great trip, though my overall feeling was that the Mexicans were not as friendly as I had hoped.  If I go back, I’d personally like to go back with a much bigger budget so I can stay at some of those all inclusive resorts!

 Next stop Fort Lauderdale in Florida for a night....

Until then.

Leaving Fernie

At 3am on 19 April we walked out of our wonderful little house and lugged all our belongings to the bus stop. It was rather eerie leaving our little home in the middle of the night and jumping on our bus, knowing we wouldn’t be coming back for a long while. It was really rather sad to say goodbye to the place we had called home for the last 5 months, and the place where we had the best time of our lives. 

After 17 hours on the Greyhound bus (Canada haven’t really grasped the best way to do public transport), we arrived in Vancouver and met our friends Georgia and Marty who had moved there from Fernie only 2 weeks prior.  We had 3 fun nights at their little abode in Vancouver while trying to sort out our plans. Remember, we had only sold our car the day before, so we had made ZERO plans on what to do next as all was contingent on selling the car. On one night out with our Vancouver friends we went to the Mongolian Grill that Wes had raved about for months. Well, it was excellent and lived up to Wes hype! After completely stuffing ourselves we decided to hit the Vancouver nightlife, and ended up at the busiest club in town, which turned out to be a Gay Bar. We all danced the night away and had a ball until the wee hours of the morning.

Some other interesting snippets of our Vancouver encounter were:

-          Claire collecting her new travel pack that she purchased off Craigs List

-          Observing the annual  4-20 demonstration – (April 20, public protests to legalise marijuana, lots of people smoking and selling BC Bud, including the biggest joint ever.

-          A spending spree at MEC on travelling clothes (including some more travel undies for me and some travel pants and shorts)

Camping in April!!!

During our last week in Fernie, we decided to have a real Canadian camping experience with a bunch of our Fernie mates.  Although most of our mates thought we were utterly crazy to go camping in APRIL, we decided to brave it.

We loaded up our van with all the best fire wood from our house, and took off in a 3 car convoy to Lune Lake, near the US-Canadian border.  One of our friends Zane had a fully equipped campervan that looked like a Mr Whippy truck, so we were completely kitted out.

The weather was balmy and so we set ourselves up with a roaring bonfire, deck chairs, hot dogs and plenty of alcohol to keep us warm. We had a fantastic time, and the alcohol allowed us to forget that the grizzly bears were out of hibernation. Our blow up bed deflated during the night so we kept each other nice and warm.

We also got to taste the traditional Canadian camping treat called Smorgs. For the uninitiated, Smorgs are chocolate and mashmellow between two biscuits wrapped in foil and melted in the fire.

Gearing up to leave town

Time to catch up on some overdue updates.....

(Based on actual events from April 2010)

Our final days in Fernie began with me getting laid off from my job at the hotel due to lack of guests meaning management had to cut staffing costs. Funny time to ask for a payrise, but I did, and got one (still waiting to receive my final paycheck though). The hotel gave me one week’s notice, 3 weeks before we were planning to leave town. This was frustrating as we had based our departure date on the fact work had told me a week earlier that I could work right up until the end.

Having been fired for the first time in my life, it was a strange feeling.

By this stage, both Claire and I were of the feeling that we had done a lot of awesome skiing and snowboarding this season, on excellent snow, so we didn’t feel the need to do a lot more on terrible snow / grass. This left me with a lot of time on my hands, enough to get my entrepreneurial juices flowing...

Within a week, "WesHound" was up and running as an unlicensed shuttle bus service between Fernie and Calgary Airport – an 8 hour round trip. Over the next 3 weeks, I ferried 11 people to the airport for a total of $495, which was a nice profit of about $300 after fuel costs. This was much more fun than taking reservations and check-ins at Lizard Creek, and allowed me to introduce Hamish and Andy to my mostly Scandanavian passengers (via podcast). The downside was that I got lost 3 times, which was highly embarrassing. Fortunately no one was ever in a rush, especially the group who were hoping to depart the day the volcano erupted in Iceland. 
We had a friend move in with us for a week after she broke up with her fiancé, that was nice to have a new face in the house.

(picture: an overturned beer truck I saw on one of my airport runs)
Our other main activity for the final weeks was selling the car. We started advertising about 3 weeks out, with a clever marketing strategy which had the final buyer pay $2500. This was $900 less than our initial asking price – what a bargain, but still $150 more than our purchase price of $2350. The best part was that we sold it the day before we left town, which meant we have full use of it right till the end.
Did you know in North America, to “luck out” is to catch a lucky break? We were confused by that one more than once, but we can now say that we “lucked out” with the weather in our final days, getting a glimpse of what summer would be like ie. Beautiful. 20 degrees, green grass, and sunshine. It was definitely perfect weather for mountain biking, hiking, golf, Frisbee golf, camping and going down the river in a tube.
Signing off until next time,

Wes

Hot Dog Day!

The one day that marks the end of the ski season is HOT DOG DAY! On this day in April, everyone in Fernie dresses up in crazy 1980s ski gear and hits the slopes for a massive day of partying. Think, tight ski pants, one pieces, fluro headgear and general lack of fashion sense. I got the feeling most people raided their parents closets.
We got all kitted up and went up the hill for a day of skiing and beers with people looking as ridiculous as us. The ski hill doesn’t actually condone Hot Dog Day, so it is all a bit covert, which makes it pretty funny. They screen people for alcohol as they load the chairlifts, and confiscate any findings.
Up on one of the ski runs there was an impromptu party with everyone getting loose and doing crazy ski jumps, some completely naked. After the hill closed, everyone went back into the resort for a MASSIVE party in the plaza. It was packed full of 1980s ski bums and everyone was in the best form, partying to the best of 1908s music. One of the best parties of the season, without a doubt!