Surf's Up

Since the rest of us really needed to work on Monday and Tuesday, and get ready for our trip to Nicaragua, we booked David's surfing lessons for Monday at noon.

Gustavo Castillo, a surfing champion from the Costa Rican team set up and supervised the lessons, giving David a unique opportunity for one on one with one of the best surfers in the world. This shot is of David's fourth or fifth attempt to ride a wave, and you can see the professional instruction paying off already.

The lessons start off with 20-30 minutes of beachside talk. Safety procedures, (don't go near anyone else, stay in white water...) are taught, and careful demonstrations of how to get up on the board from a lying down position.

Once they are sure that you understand and can duplicate all the steps on land, they take you out in the water, and coach you through it all over again, because by that time you are so overwhelmed that you have forgotten much of what they told you.

From that point, it is just practice. Gustavo loaned David a board, and he was surfing Monday afternoon, and Tuesday morning. When we went back Tuesday afternoon, David had graduated to a smaller board.

I have been very pleased with the way they have monitored the process. Always while David is surfing now, Gustavo or one of his instructors are watching. When he comes in, they give him some pointers for next time, and the same as he is heading out to the water.

We have a lot of work to do from now until we head back to Canada. At least we won't have to worry about David enjoying his trip!

Seafood...eventually

On Sunday we went to the beach at Punta Leone. There is a good road in to it, at the end of which is a private resort/secure community and some security guys who charge you $US 20.00 per person to go down to the beach.

But there are no private beaches in Costa Rica, you say? You are right; the private owners cannot block access to the beach. But nothing says they have to make it easy.

There is another road to the beach, this one long and carefully paved in ruts and potholes, and whimsically decorated with the occasional roadside washout, frame-wrenching creases, deep puddles and streaks of clay gruel. At the resort end, a security guy radios ahead so the next security guy knows we're coming and haven't stopped to park in any driveway to one of the expensive houses that we pass before we get to him. These guys are just trying to do their job and scowl fiercely at us for being dastardly interlopers - and then wave back when wave and smile at them.

There is one last security guy at the skinny lane at which the road terminates; his job is to make sure that no one parks anywhere but in this twisty cul de sac barely two vehicles wide and capable of holding less than twenty cars. If it is full, shame about your luck, but you will have drive the car back to the other side of the resort and leave it at the side of the Back Road in. And walk back.

But we didn't have to cough up $US 80.00. We got one of the last two spots in the twisty lane, and tottered down a rough slope, over a deep gully bridged by long cement planks, clambered oversome massive exposed tree roots... and were there.

The beach itself is spectacular, and when the tide is in the right spot, you can leave it for another beach even better (see Jane's old entries about the battering effects of tides that sneak in when your back is turned). Perhaps I will get to see this beach yet, as just about the time the tide was out enough to let us cross to it- some two hours or so after we got there - someone switched on the rain, and we decided to leave. Rain here fails straight down, and the word 'heavy' doesn't even come close to descibing how much water there is splashing around.

While the tide was still going out, and I was puddling around in the surf picking up bits of coral and shells, I realized that the rock on which I was standing was laced with with big fossilized shell thingys, whose age, name and classification are not known, at least by me. I also don't know how far the fossil bed extends down under the water and back up under the sand, but maybe forty or fifty feet would be a good guess. In the picture, you can see that the waves have worn away some of the fossils to expose the chambers, but one of the most intact is front and center.

On the way out , David and I had to get out of the car and walk so that it would not get stuck as it scraped bottom in a particular steep and concave, mud-slick bit of uneveness - and the car didn't even slow at all, in spite of the graunching noise it made. Not bad for a little Hyundai Nothingmobile. Thereafter we drove to the Fiesta del Mariscos.

The boats in the pictures - shot from the table at which we ate - were used to go out and catch that day the same food on which we stuffed ourselves... and when the gods themselves die, they hope they're going to Better Place, where food like this is served. I had the filet especiale, which is an understatement.

Ollie's Folly

As you near Manuel Antonio National Park, you pass a curious structure as the road winds up over the hills: there is a large airplane – a Fairchild C 123 cargo plane - resting in a parking lot under a metal roof that covers its wings and fuselage. It’s faded, dented, and has been made into a combined bar, restaurant and coffee shop, a use about a hundred light years from its clandestine past.
About a century ago, in 1984, when the USSR was still in one monolithic piece, the Democratic-led US Congress passed a piece of legislation designed to stop any more American government money being spent to overthrow the communists in Nicaragua. Administration officials decided that this didn’t mean ALL money from every source, and started a strange three-cornered deal where they sold overpriced weapons to a country (Iran) they had sworn not to deal with, and re-invested the profits in aircraft to carry weapons to the anti-Sandinistas, and flew them in to a secret airfield on a privately owned ranch in Costa Rica… and flew out drugs, ‘cause that’s what their pilots did for their day jobs.
No one is saying exactly where the profits from the dope went.
There were two Fairchild ‘El Avion’ cargo planes doing this shuffle. In 1986, one of them was shot down by the Nicaraguans, and a CIA agent on-board captured. With the proverbial waste hitting the air circulation device, the other future restaurant was flown to the San Jose Airport and immediately abandoned thereafter, as everyone onboard went back to being whatever name was on their most current sincere passport, and left the country.
Lt.Col. Oliver North took one for the Gipper, and became the public face of this scandal. This was easy enough as he had been involved in it up to his eyebrows, and he refused to pass the buck up the line to those in the Regan Administration who had okayed this operation. The fuss received world-wide attention. (Google Fawn Hall and her shredding of documents, appearance in Playboy, etc.). North eventually did three years… except he didn’t, as his sentence was suspended. There were fines, probation and community service, also set aside in the 90’s.
In 2000, the remnants of Air Ollie were purchased, taken apart and hauled to their current location, reassembled and restauranted, if that is a word, and the computer doesn’t think so. You can sit down in a piece of recent history, and raise one in commiseration to Ollie. Unlike you, he is persona non grata for life in Costa Rica, which is the last country from which I’d ever want to be banned.

Manuel Antonio State National Park

I finally made it! I had heard about the park from, well, everyone I know that has been in Costa Rica, and had wanted to visit, but each time I have been here fate has intervened and made it impossible.

Friday was a work day - we closed negotiations for a canje (trade) with surf lessons for David and a board for the time we're here for a 1/3 page ad in the phone book. Sales wise it was a good day, but not a fun one for David, so yesterday we took a day off and went to the park.

This is an amazing place, not unlike our national and provincial parks with wildlife running er...wild and small animals easily seen. Because we're here, there are monkeys, sloths, odd little deer things, rabbit sized rat-like creatures (rodents of unusual size) and mapaches. The animals here have no reason to fear people, and basically ignored us. An annoyed monkey may throw something at you, and mapaches will steal your food right out of your hand, but other than that, you are at most an obstacle that has to be walked around on the search for food. The beach is wonderful, and the weather was fantastic, considering we are supposed to be experiencing the worst weather of the year. We are planning to go back one more time before we leave, due to time considerations we couldn't take the trail to the waterfall, and missed the best lookout point.

On the way there we saw the non-existant Ollie North drug plane, now a restaurant, and visited the town of Quepos, which is a great little place I would like to spend more time in.

We managed to grab some sunset pictures at Jaco beach, which is unusual for this time of year, since it usually clouds over at around 4:30. As usual we were 10 minutes late for the best shots.

We ended the day laughing at music videos from the 60s 70s and 80s.

Unfortunately Geoff wasn't able to come with us to the park, as he and Mauricio had a trade show to go to , so sadly we have to go to the beach today, in order that he can have a day off. It is my favourite beach on the other side of the rocks. I wonder if I will get any new bruises...

We've arrived! And to prove it, we're here!

Although there were times today that I wondered if it would ever happen. I don't want to make a long-winded and boring post, but I can say that David has enough material for his school project journal just from today, and we've only just arrived!

I shall hit upon the main events:

1. We were nearly an hour late getting to the airport, actually arriving with less than an hour to go before take off. This was a combination of Rob remembering me telling him we were leaving at 6:30(it was 6:00), me forgetting to leave time for the long term parking shuttle driver to meander through the airport and get us to the terminal, and me telling the hotel staff to wake us up at 4:00, when we absolutely had to be at the check-in desk at 4:30.

2. In Houston, they lost the plane. Yep. A Boeing 737. "It came in last night" they said, "but now we don't know where it is". Eventually someone found it and brought it to the gate. We were 40 minutes late leaving.

3. We had a medical emergency on the flight. The poor girl (between 20&25) was standing in the lineup waiting for the washroom, when she fell over like a cut tree. She took some time to come around, and while that was happening we kind of hovered over Texas, waiting to figure out what we should do, then the oxygen seemed to help and they decided to keep going. Then while we were over El Salvador, she started seizing. What the poor girl really needed was air pressure, but she had to wait for Costa Rica for that, so she just kept seizing periodically. Fortunately there were a couple of nurses on board that helped her out, and by the time we landed and the medics arrived she was stablized and had an IV started. Another long delay while they got her safely off the plane.

4. Visit to Ruth's went without incident, and we stopped in Atenas for bocas at Los Mangos Dos. Mmmmmm. Ceviche.....

5. There was a landslide between Atenas and San Martin and the road was closed, so we had to detour down some very windy, poorly paved mountainous back roads. It was (of course) dark, and rainy, and we really couldn't see anything.

We finally made it here to Jaco at about 8:00pm (10 our time). We had expected to be here by about 2:30 or 3:00. So we're tired and kind of grimy, but in some strange sort of a way it is really good to be back.

Heading Back, for now.....

So tomorrow we get up and head for the airport - another trip done. Yesterday we spent the day doing paperwork things and not much of anything else.

Today we had planned an early start and had a big list of things to do. We only finished a few of them, due to waking up late, spending nearly two hours at the bank, and taking a long drive south to make some sales calls.

Take a look at this sand! You will note the complete lack of footprints? It looks exactly the same in the other direction too. This is only about 25km from Jaco, and is the most spectacularly deserted beach I have ever seen. Beautiful! It is also an indication of how the economic downturn in the US is seriously affecting Costa Rica. The business owners here are understandably nervous as they begin looking ahead to the upcoming high season. Many of them experienced a bad season last year, and a second one will put them out of business altogether. From a personal perspective, this is the Costa Rica I prefer, it is just a matter of whether we will be amongst the survivors as everything falls apart.

The jury is still out on whether this trip was worth it. I figure we won't really know for a few days until we start to see the results, or lack of them. I will be back here on the 23rd of October - this time with Rob and David, and we will be staying for neary three weeks. Poor David who has to take nearly three weeks off school in order to come. We have vacationy things to do when I return as well; surfing lessons, a crocodile tour, maybe a zip line canopy tour, and a weekend in Nicaragua are all in the works for next time - depending, of course on how the $$ situation is as always.

I am off now to the bank machine, and to finish some last minute paperwork. So buenas noches, and hasta luego.

Busy Day

I started off today with a cup of cafe con leche, and an unbelievable drive. I hesitate to try and count the number of times I have actually done this trip, but I can say with absolute certainty that this was the best of them. It seemed that I had my side of the road completely to myself for the most part, only having to pass one car on a double yellow line going around a bend in the mountains. I did the drive to Orotina in a record 48 minutes!

At this point, I ran into the Costa Rican cycling team, or maybe some other group of 30 or so cyclists. All in helmets and spandex with a number of support vehicles behind them. And taking up the entire road in to Jaco. So I figured that this was a good time to stop for breakfast. I was just coming up to the "crocodile bridge" which is basically a bridge over a river that is home to many crocodiles, and from which you can see them sun themselves and act like logs. There are more surfers attacked by crocodiles here than there are by sharks - mostly when inexperienced surfers are trying to surf by the mouth of a river. I am hoping next time I'm here to go on a crocodile tour, where you can get much closer to them! The red spot by the face of the second guy here is actually a butterfly. It kept landing on the tip of his nose.

We decided, soon after I got back to Jaco, to head back to the beach at Punta Leone again, this time with a friend from Coco who dropped in for a visit. We timed it a lot better this time, and were actually able to walk on sand on the way there - although we did miss the ideal exit time by 10 or 15 minutes and did have to do some crazy rock stuff to get back. Of course, I had to add to my many bruises, or it just wouldn't be right. I ventured out into the surf to cool off, and as I was pushing my way through the waves, stepped into a big dip created by a pile of rocks under the water, lost my balance, got smashed by a huge wave then dragged across the rocks by the undertow. One more fairly big wave and I was back on my feet, with a new crop of scrapes and black and blue bits.

Then soaking wet and covered in sand we drove to La Fiesta de Maricosas - arguably the best seafood restaurant in the world. Certainly the best I have ever been to. The picture at the top was taken there. They take those boats and go and get the seafood. You don't get much fresher than that!

Finally we headed back home to watch a silly movie and relax. I have forgotten the name of the movie, but it is a Ben Stiller comedy/drama. The whole plot is cute, but the greatest bit involves a conversation about "permanent vacationers". The premise is that most people spend all kinds of money to go and visit a tropical paradise for a couple of weeks a year. And then there are some crazy people that move there permanently, set up small businesses and basically live their vacation all year round.

Hmmm.

Low Season

Also known as Rainy Season, it refers to the six months of the year that very few turistas come to Costa Rica. At the moment, its immediate meaning to me is that I am the only guest at Colinas del Sol, up here at the top of the hill in my suite overlooking the mountains north of Atenas.

The owner and staff members who run the place have either left for the night or gone to bed in the “main house” across the little glen, and all the lights are out in the common areas. The pool is closed, the TV is off, (there is only one, in the rancho where they serve breakfast) and even Blackie (the hotel cat and boa constrictor chaser) is in for the night. I am very, very alone.

I can hear some a couple of dogs in the distance, the occasional moo from the cows in the field at the bottom of the hill, lots of crickets, and the light rain falling on the tin roof of my room and patio.

Today I drove into San Jose to meet with Ruth, our business partner down here. This is a beautiful trip, involving crossing over the western bit of the continental divide, which in this case means winding up to the top of the mountains, then back down again into Atenas, down further into the river valley and up into La Garrita, then onto the main highway into San Jose.

There is nothing like a drive through San Jose to boost your metabolism and get you running to the nearest pharmacy to refill your Xanax. (Ah, I have just been joined by a gecko). Our neat little car has one teensy, tiny little flaw. You can't see out of it, except in optimal conditions. The windows are so darkly tinted that I have to roll them down to see in the side mirrors, and the defogger is actually a fogger. No matter what setting you have it on, in the slightest bit of coolness, warmth, humidity or dryness it fogs up, and nothing you can do will clear it.

So today, after the excellent drive in, the rather intense navigation through San Jose to Ruth's house, (the best bet is to allow yourself to go into a zen state of no mind, and allow your subconscious to drive, otherwise it is just too dangerous for the uninitiated) the even more intense rush hour exit as the sun was setting, then the dark, the rain, (can't roll up the windows or I won't be able to see), the foggy windshield, the major accident on the highway that resulted in a 25 minute delay and the crazy windy mountain roads, I got as far as Atenas – and decided enough was enough. I just didn't have it in me to do the hour/3 hour depending on circumstances trip back across the mountains to and all the way down to the coast in the dark and rain.

Colinas del Sol is a lovely place, (just as well because it is also the only place in Atenas) and maybe a quiet night is just what I need to clear my head.

Hasta manana.

Another Day in Paradise

...or so read the real estate ads anyway. Jaco Bay must have been an extraordinary place 30 years ago, though. Imagine living in a place where the sun sets at (almost) the same time every day, and in (almost) the same spot. I would like to set up a permanant camera on the beach, or on a balcony overlooking the beach, anyway, and take one picture at exactly the same time every day all the way through the year, then edit it together to make a short movie. It is rainy season now, so very often you don't actually see the sun on the horizon as clouds tend to move in and settle over the water.

The quality of light tonight was magical, and all of the surfers trying to get in one more wave before it was too dark were lit up with gold and orange highlights. Spectacular!

I went down to the beach tonight to try and clear my head. Far too many things are balancing on a cusp between total success and abject failure. We only need one or two of these things to be successful, but at the moment there is no certainty, so, North American style, I stress and worry and lose sleep.

I paced up and down on the beach for a while, not really taking anything in, but as the sun started to set, and the warm/cool breeze picked up, I actually started to look around. I watched the surfers for a while. (Mostly) young people having fun and enjoying the idea of being alive; I spotted a young couple on a bench, arms wrapped around each other as their children, about 4 and 2, played in the sand in front of them; I saw an older woman and what was probably her daughter, and granddaughter walk along the edge of the water arm in arm.

And then the sun was all the way down and it was time to go. I watched from the bench beside my car as the Dad of the young couple produced a stroller. "Papa's Taxi!" he said to the youngest boy, and he picked him up and gave him a hug before seating him in his stroller, then the Mom put her arm around the four year old and they headed off.

Pura Vida, I thought back to them. And thank you.

The last couple of days have been, or at least seemed, a bit more profitable, and I am starting to feel like we may not have turned the corner, but we are approaching it cautiously and have an idea of what is around the bend.

We have one signed contract, and lots more artwork in the works. Athena's ad went over very well with Cap'n Josh and we will be finalizing that soon, and many of Jaco's inhabitants (denizens?) are getting to know Geoff by sight and reputation.

In other words, his hard work is starting to pay off.

I'm hoping that some of our other issues have been cleared up over the course of the last two days. It looks like we are all in agreement with how we need things to work at least.

Last night a couple of friends of Geoff's from Atenas dropped by. They had been in town celebrating Rosh Hoshana and one of their birthdays, and decided to come and take us to their hostel for a continuation of the Jewish New Year and Festiva de compleanos.

The hostel is really cute, with some private rooms, some dorms, high speed internet access, barbecues and a kitchen area for the use of the "guests" and a pool, not too far from the beach. And it runs between $12 and $25 per night, depending on the level of sleeping privacy you need.

We also learned a new word..."amigable". It means friendly.

Today we spent a few hours at the bank. For those of you who have never been here, I won't even bother to try and describe banking in Costa Rica. You would never believe me. Those of you who have been here will now be nodding their heads in agreement and sympathy.

I have met a number of great people here, both gringo and tica, but I am not as happy here in Jaco as I have been in other places in Costa Rica. In Atenas, or Coco you can walk outdoors alone late at night and would never feel threatened. Here I always feel like I have to be hanging tightly to my purse.

I figure eventually we will move our center of operations back to Atenas, and that Geoff will drive in for a couple of days a week to take care of business in Jaco.