2018 COSTA RICA DAY 3

It is our third day in Costa Rica and today we received our motorcycles.  We were supposed to receive two 250 CC bikes but we didn't.  What we got was one 250 CC and one 200 CC Honda.  We were promised to get the other 250 on Wednesday night so we'll just hang out in San Jose one more night no big deal.  I installed the GPS mount and wired it in.

Please sinor don't worry I'm going to tear that stuff apart to wire in my GPS anyway.

They delivered the bikes on a small pickp and had a narrow plank to get it down.  I help Carlos AKA Charlie unload the two bikes.  We soon figured out that a plank on a pickup truck wasnt to tough a glide path as we were soon to find out.  So we headed out of town about 2:00 PM

After about an hour of traffic that rivled the Puget Sound Region o n steroids we arrived at Cartago which is on the edge of town.....sort of.  It was about 14:00 so we were hungry (ravinous) and went looking for a restaurant.  We didn't find but a small caffee at which we stopped, if for no other reason then to get a break from the traffic.  The drivers here are truely almost as bad as I am.  Thank God that they don't move too fast (about 40 MPH or so) because they split lanes and weave in an out like an accident waiting to happen.  We saw one accident between a semi an small passenger car wheich showed just how crazy it gets around here.

We didn't find a restaurant that was open so we stopped at this coffee shop with a very helpful and kind owner who was more than happy to educate us about coffee in Costa Rica.  We had him pick out what to serve us since we had no idea and the guy seemed trustworthy enough.  He was very enthusiastic about it all for sure..   When we did get our coffee it was quite amazing.  I usually use sugar and cream in my coffee.but with this stuff neither was a good choice since it stood on it's own.

Some of the best coffee I ever had for sure!

Check this guy out.

Well we did a little route planning based on the input of one of the hotel employees who rides a Honda 500 last night.

  He did not steer us wrong.  When we busted out of town we started to experience the true landscape of  Cost Rica which is lush, green, wet, and comes with lots of landslides.  I started to feel more like we were on the open roads that we so much enjoy, curves good, sharp curves better, land slides and dogs not so good

Below is the route we took this afternoon, it's about 55 miles. 

At this point I need to give Wendy a bunch of credit.  She has been riding about 5 years on a cruiser bike and has never really been off road.  Today was the beginning of her motocross experience and she showed her guts and determination as we road over over a couple of very gnarly landslides which  crossed the road .  These things were about six foot tall mud speed bumps and she weathered them in great fashion.  She's a pretty amazing girl. 

Before we left I read on the internet that the most important thing was not to drive in the dark in Costa Rica.  Well on this our first ride we got caught in the dark and the rain. We didn't get back to the hotel in San Juan until 19:30 at night.

We did stop at a grocery store to pick up a few things for dinner and food for tomorrow.  A good hot shower back at the hotel made every thing good.

Pura Vida (more on that later).

2018 COSTA RICA DAY 2

Here we are on the morning of our second day in San Jose, Costa Rica.  I washed my socks last night but they weren't quite dry so Wendy, being the resourceful squirrel that she is, finished drying the for me using the hair dryer.

We also decided the each day we would post one photo of each of us that the other liked best on that day.  So here are the two for the day.  Wendy like me at lunch in the cafe of the National Theater of Costa Rica and I like the photo of her in the lobby of the same.

I suppose what impressed us the most on our first day here in San Jose was the art work that was everywhere, from the graffiti, to the sculpture, to the National Theater take a look at the following to what I'm talking about.

I can't let this post go without saying something about the food here.  From what I read and what people said Costa Rican food was sort of hum drum.  I have to say we have had four meals here and the have all been good and last nights dinner was great.  Lots of vegetables we don't have at home and wonderful sea food.  Wendy has had fish twice and she isn't so crazy about seafood.  

We had a nice conversation about motorcycles with the young man at the Hotel Desk.  He rides a Honda 500, which is fairly large for around here.  He turned us on to some areas to go riding in.  All the folks we have met here so far have been very welcoming and kind.  We've been using the Google Translate App  and I've been totally amazed by it.  It has one feature which allows you to use the camera to do the translation.   So if the menu is in Spanish you simply hold the camera over it and you can read it in English.  It's quite amazing.  You can also speak into it and what you say is immediately translated into Spanish.  The person you're talking with hears it in Spanish and then they can speak Spanish and you hear it in English.  The whole thing blows my mind it's soooo helpful.

Tomorrow morning at 9:00 AM we get the motorcycles.  We are both excited about that.  It even makes me forget about the giant blister I got today from walking in my sandals without socks.  We must have walked a good five or six miles.  Oh well I'll heal up.  We are also looking forward to having breakfast again tomorrow.  I'll close with a video at today's breakfast of a squirrel.  

2018 COSTA RICA DAY 1

 Maria was kind enough to take us to the airport after working all day.  She battled traffic south for 2.5 hours to pick us up and leave by about 5:30 PM and head for SeaTac Airport.  So we will be on this trip for 51 days.  We have ticket to return on March 1.  During the last week of our trip we plan on going to Panama to check out the canal and other sites TBD.  We will visit with one of my former colleges, Clara Davidson, who lives there with her husband.  We think we will have enough time here to to see at least all the major areas of this county.  

We will be renting two motorcycles to use for the duration of our trip except Panama since we can't take the out of the country.  We rented two Chinese 250 CC adventure bike which we will get on January 13.  More about motorcycles and gear when we get the bikes.  Needless to say we've spent quite some time preparing for the ride.  Inquiring warm weather gear was the biggest deal since we are all set up to ride in the lovely Northwest and not the tropics.  So lighter (cooler) gear was in order. 

We had one stop on our flight in Mexico City.  My advice is avoid that airport at all cost  We spent three hours standing in line just to go through customs then transfer our bags and check back in through security.  I was a real "Mosh Pit" of an operations.  People were trying to form lines and organize themselves because the airport offered none.  Paper work completed and rubber stamps applied we did eventually get through the place and on our plane to San Jose, Costa Rica .  As you can see from the photo the countryside is lush as advertised.

We were happy to get into the cab to take us to the Hotel Arajuez where we plan to stay for five nights.  The traffic and drivers didn't seem all that crazy as it had been described.  The motorcycles do some crazy stuff like  splitting lanes and cutting across traffic.  Pedestrians do tend to stand in the middle of the road at times while trying to cross.  Kind of like in that old computer game "Frogger". 

Tomorrow we plan to explore San Jose on foot for the day.  It's been raining but tomorrow is expected to be one the better days of the week.  Once we get the bikes on the thirteenth we will start exploring the central valley around San Jose.

We already had two meals here, lunch and dinner.  Lunch was the traditional rice, beans, salad, with some fried fish.  For dinner we went a bit fancier.  We shared a squid as an appetizer which was wonderfully prepared.  When I say shared what I mean is I ate it and Wendy watched.  She did have some of the garlic potatoes that came with it.  As  main courses Wendy had some fresh salmon and I had tuna, both were really well prepared and tasty.  

Oh yes Wendy did make a new friend as she usually does.