Check out this beetle...
Hola Campos… I am reading Fire From the Mountain right now, and even though the Sandinista party turned out to be a brutal regime, what the Frente went through to obtain power was pretty crazy. It makes our little adventures here look pretty tame.
Speaking of Adventures, yesterday we decided to take the bus to Nicoya to finally get our cell phones working. Last week we contacted our lawyer in San Jose and had him send out our corporate papers which are needed to get anything done if you aren’t a citizen, or resident. The first bus was supposed to arrive at 5:30, but came at six. Now, let me try to explain what a bus ride in Costa is like. The buses are probably from 1970 at the newest. And they are popular! Very popular. Yesterday, our bus to Nicoya had 14 rows of 5 seats and there were at least 12 folks standing. It made for a full ride. Couple the crowd with the excellent shape the roads are in right now, and you have the makings of a mechanical bull ride. The ride to Nicoya is only 2 hours by bus, half on dirt road, half on paved road. Our first bus had some transmission problems, i.e. that it had no clutch, so at each of our 25 stops, we spastically jolted ahead. The real excitement happened at the last bridge, well, you have a bridge and then the last steep hill on the dirt road. The driver didn’t quite have the gusto he needed to make the hill, after clearing the bridge. He was in second gear, and tried to downshift, but with no clutch it wasn’t really feasible. We were a solid 200 meters up the hill, past the bridge, and all of a sudden we are rolling down the hill in the 1971 blue bird bus, approaching a bridge were at best you hang 2 inches of tire over both sides. I think the bridge was made for quads. We made it over backwards, then we proceeded to climb a 1k hill in first gear at 3kph.. but we made it.
After all of that, we were told at ICE, the government controlled phone company that there were no cell numbers available. The government only lets out a few thousand at a time, and last week the paper said they had just released more… well, they have, but they aren’t available until December.
We made the best of it by shopping for fruit and veggies, and bread. We scored on that front, 2 pinas, a bunch of chiles, fresh bread, bacon, spices… for a total of 4 huge bags and only dropped 18 bucks. Another 2 hours on the bus and we were back in Nosara by 12.
On another note, the town is starting to wake up again. The water is getting crowded, restaurants are opening, and our friends are slowly making it back. Nick got in a few days ago, Marco and Joy made it in yesterday, and Adu gets back today. I have mixed emotions going into the high season… I am excited not to be living in a ghost town, and have a choice for food, but it was pretty nice having paradise to yourself, surfing with all of the locals.
Chow, E.
Hola Campos… I am reading Fire From the Mountain right now, and even though the Sandinista party turned out to be a brutal regime, what the Frente went through to obtain power was pretty crazy. It makes our little adventures here look pretty tame.
Speaking of Adventures, yesterday we decided to take the bus to Nicoya to finally get our cell phones working. Last week we contacted our lawyer in San Jose and had him send out our corporate papers which are needed to get anything done if you aren’t a citizen, or resident. The first bus was supposed to arrive at 5:30, but came at six. Now, let me try to explain what a bus ride in Costa is like. The buses are probably from 1970 at the newest. And they are popular! Very popular. Yesterday, our bus to Nicoya had 14 rows of 5 seats and there were at least 12 folks standing. It made for a full ride. Couple the crowd with the excellent shape the roads are in right now, and you have the makings of a mechanical bull ride. The ride to Nicoya is only 2 hours by bus, half on dirt road, half on paved road. Our first bus had some transmission problems, i.e. that it had no clutch, so at each of our 25 stops, we spastically jolted ahead. The real excitement happened at the last bridge, well, you have a bridge and then the last steep hill on the dirt road. The driver didn’t quite have the gusto he needed to make the hill, after clearing the bridge. He was in second gear, and tried to downshift, but with no clutch it wasn’t really feasible. We were a solid 200 meters up the hill, past the bridge, and all of a sudden we are rolling down the hill in the 1971 blue bird bus, approaching a bridge were at best you hang 2 inches of tire over both sides. I think the bridge was made for quads. We made it over backwards, then we proceeded to climb a 1k hill in first gear at 3kph.. but we made it.
After all of that, we were told at ICE, the government controlled phone company that there were no cell numbers available. The government only lets out a few thousand at a time, and last week the paper said they had just released more… well, they have, but they aren’t available until December.
We made the best of it by shopping for fruit and veggies, and bread. We scored on that front, 2 pinas, a bunch of chiles, fresh bread, bacon, spices… for a total of 4 huge bags and only dropped 18 bucks. Another 2 hours on the bus and we were back in Nosara by 12.
On another note, the town is starting to wake up again. The water is getting crowded, restaurants are opening, and our friends are slowly making it back. Nick got in a few days ago, Marco and Joy made it in yesterday, and Adu gets back today. I have mixed emotions going into the high season… I am excited not to be living in a ghost town, and have a choice for food, but it was pretty nice having paradise to yourself, surfing with all of the locals.
Chow, E.
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