TheMoncurs: Pura Vida!* Costa Rica: Saturday, Day 2

Click any of the pictures to enlarge. Continuing from my notes...

We awoke this morning to the sounds of tropical birds. Not a bad way to start the day! As it turns out, Hotel Robledal is quite beautiful.

Looking toward our room

Looking down our patio toward the main house and dining gazebo

It was dark when we got to the hotel last night, so we couldn't really see much, but Hotel Robledal is actually quite nice. It's owned and run by a family, and the whole place kind of feels like an indoor/outdoor home. The main house/lobby area has a large verandah with big comfy chairs and there's a dining..gazebo kind of thing right by a indoor/outdoor kitchen where they made us breakfast this morning. Scrambled eggs, sausage, and gallo pinto. This is why I never served a mission. I farmed my sausage over to Aaron, my gallo pinto over to Jeremy, and sucked it up and ate my eggs. Fortunately, they also had a bunch of fresh fruit and bread with this wonderful guava jelly. Man may not be able to live by bread alone, but this woman sure can (and just might, if beans continue to be on the menu for every meal).

Aaron at the breakfast table.

The Dollar shuttle came and got us around 9 and took us to exchange our currency at the airport before taking us to pick up our rental car.

Lingual faux pas of the day: I waited with the driver while Aaron and Jeremy exchanged money. While practicing my Spanish with the him I accidentally told him that I was Aaron's wife and Jeremy was his boyfriend. He looked at me real funny. So awkward.

When we got to the rental office my seatbelt wouldn't come unbuckled. Aaron and Jeremy got out and started unloading our luggage while I continued fumbling with my belt. "Hey guys? Um..I think I'm stuck." They ignored me. "Ok, but like, seriously though..I'm stuck!" Finally the driver came around and tried to help me. He couldn't get it undone either. Finally we just loosened the seatbelt as much as we could and he helped me climb out and then caught me as I almost took a nosedive out of the van. Again, awkward.

Our Dollar Shuttle/My Seatbelt Prison

We died laughing when we saw this fruit truck barelling down the highway, bananas swinging in the wind.

We got our 4WD Suzuki Grand Vitara and started on our way. As it turns out, Costa Ricans don't believe in street signs. Our directions didn't include street names so much as landmarks like the big Nissan dealership and the hospital. We spent about 45 minutes getting lost in San Jose before finally getting on to the highway and on our way to Dominical.

Our trusty Suzuki Grand Vitara. Comfy. Gutless.

Trying to capture the chaos of driving in San Jose

We learned pretty quickly the rules for driving in Costa Rica are as follows: if it gets you to your destination, it's ok. People mostly stop at red lights, but that's pretty much the only driving rule they really obey. There was a truck stopped sideways in traffic. No one really minded, they just went around. Pedestrians here are dang brave too. When we got a green light and didn't jump forward immediately, they'd start crossing in front of us. Total chaos.

Chaotic, but what a beautiful city!

The drive to Dominical from San Jose was filled with semis and FOG

Once we finally hit the highway the driving got a little easiser, but no less scary. The highway between San Jose and the Pacific coast is 2 lanes over a mountain range. There are lots of semis and, once you get up high enough, you're in the clouds for a while which leads to really low visibility. These Ticos in their dinky little cars will pass the trucks on blind corners in heavy fog. The entire country has a collective death wish.

Finally out of the clouds!

All along the way we kept seeing signs for "Soda." What's with these people and soda? Is it standard practice to pull over and have a soda? We didn't.

We drove through the clouds for several hours. It was cool at first, but at the end, it started to wear. We were really glad to get back into the light of day and start heading down the mountain.

The muddy streets of Dominical

We finally pulled into Dominical sometime in the late afternoon. It's kind of cool I guess. Ok fine it's muddy and super hot and humid. And the waves when we got here were pretty crappy, which makes me feel bad for Aaron and Jeremy. For me, this is a beach vacation (and Dominical has a pretty nice beach) but for them, it's a surf vacation. When the surf sucks, the vacation sucks. When we got to our hotel...oh my ghetto.

Piramys "Hotel"

It is...interesting. The people who stay here..also interesting. We had some trouble figuring out our sleeping arrangements with the owner lady. She only spoke Spanish and my ability to form sentences in Spanish is sorely lacking. I explained that Aaron and I were married and wanted a private room, but Jeremy would be fine with hostel arrangements and sharing a room with whoever. She showed Aaron and I to a room downstairs with a pair of bunkbeds, all single beds. She then showed Jeremy to a room with 1 bunkbed with a double bed on bottom. We told her we'd take Jeremy's room and he could have ours. Why would Jeremy need a double bed and why would a married couple want to sleep on single bunk beds??

The town itself is full of surfers. It's pretty much a beach bum type of town.

We were at the top of the stairs back in a dark corner. Jeremy was on the bottom floor (over where Danielle is standing)

Mosquito netting always looks kind of romantic in the movies. It's not.

Aaron and our "windows" made of wooden latticework that kept nothing out

Our bathroom and super fan

At least we had hot water!

I'm not sure why they painted the trees, but they sure looked neat.

Aaron's body board calls.

Crappy waves. Warm water though!

My new crabby friend! These little guys were everywhere. The beach was alive with hermit crabs and sand crabs scuttling all over. Click to enlarge this one, the detail is awesome.