We left Monteverde with a great feeling about Costa Rica and their efforts to conserve their beautiful natural resources and landscapes. We hired a van to take us out to Playa Coco on the Nicoya Peninsula. The drive was a great opportunity to work on our Spanish and our driver was very interested in also learning English. The driver and I traded car-related vocabulary. We made a lunch stop at a crossroads where once we opened the doors of the air-conditioned van it was like getting blasted with a hair dryer. The feeling was an extreme change from the misty mountains around the cloud forests. The stop had a number of macaws, toucans, and peacocks all hanging out together, seeming personally offended that the other birds existed.
Playa Coco
Now down in a hot, arid climate, we must have passed 25 sandina (watermelon) stands before finally reaching Playa Coco. We didn’t really know at to expect, but the condo turned out to be lovely; we were really living it up and capitalizing on the buying power of four people. We had a nice pool surrounded by 9 other units populated mainly by Canadians and Americans. It worked out that the whole town was more or less for sale with many deals available on every block. We got to know our neighbours and it led to many interesting conversations on the pool deck over the course of our stay. I even had a chance to put the ole lifeguarding skills to the test rescuing a small crab from the chlorinated pool. I am still not sure how it got from the ocean all the way into a pool 2 blocks away. Crossing traffic, avoiding dogs, birds and other animals that would have enjoyed a crab for lunch, only to attempt a suicide in a swimming pool.
Without too much to do in Coco we spent a lot of time on the beach, beside the pool, and wandering around the small town. It was really nice to again be in a place where you could go out at night without feeling unsafe. Well…we were told by some of the new neighbours that no one should go down to the beach at night because of the drunks and druggies. So on the way home from having a drink Catherine and I walked the beach and met some folks having a bonfire on the beach. Playing guitar, swimming, and hanging out were a bunch of Utah Mormons in the country doing missionary work. We had to laugh at the overly cautious folks that probably have never gone to the beach at night. I guess points of view are always relative to experiences. I may be afraid of missionaries as well if I was coming from Louisiana.
A nature highlight was a family of Howler monkeys that were often found in the trees across from the condo. We would watch them run down the power lines each evening to a mango tree where they found dinner. They were great and I have really started to perfect my Howler call, sometimes even getting them to respond. By a serious fluke (I decided to go for a run) I also got to see a mama turtle on the beach beginning to lay eggs, but the downside was that there was 30 people there with cameras and talking, kids that were too excited and did not understand their impact, and even people with dogs off leash that were getting too close. It was a bad scene and it was a shame with the turtle turned and headed back out into the surf without completing the Nature of Things moment. The police and biologist types were present but were either overwhelmed with the situation or did not have a protocol for dealing with the situation. It was hard to see it happen.
Coco was the last part of our adventure with Doug and Sheila and it was tough to see them go after such a great month. We parted ways, us on a public bus heading to Tamarindo and them on a 1st class bus to San Jose. The ride was pretty good and I had the opportunity to have a great conversation with a guy from Nicaragua. It is amazing how many people from Nicaragua are working in Costa Rica keeping the economy going and really how negatively a lot of Costa Ricans feel about the situation. I really started finding a deeper respect for Nicaragua after meeting more and more people working in Costa Rica.
Coco was also a very different picture of the classic Costa Rica marketing. It was relatively dirty, there was no recycling, multi story condominium building were going up on every vacant lot while many of the houses that appeared to be owned by locals were up for sale. The majority of people that we encountered in Coco were either ex-pats or immigrant workers from Nicaragua. We got some information from a group that were selling fractional shares in the new properties and they explained to us that the strategy is to keep the housing market growing artificially by 15% a year to increase prospective values and to force locals out of the market. It is clearly not sustainable, and is going to create a market bubble. It is pretty obvious that Costa Rica has some major issues to deal with as it balances out conservation with the rapidly growing and important tourism industry. Not to mention the imbalance between well-off foreigners and exploited Nicaraguans, with Costa Ricans in the middle.
Playa Tamarindo
Tamarindo was a classic surf town but with big city prices. We found a great hostel, inexplicably called La Botella de Leche (The Bottle of Milk), and immediately found out about surfing prices. “Super cheap” was the answer, and at least that part of the hype was true. It was three days of me vs. the waves and getting my ass kicked. It is truly becoming an abusive relationship. Catherine did some surfing and also enjoyed the hot sand on the beach that was almost like velvet. The beaches were long, wide, and picturesque and Tamarindo had an interesting charm, although it is one of the most touristic places we have stopped during our trip. We left the town thinking about the incredible sunsets, fun travelers that we met at the hostel, and a major hangover from a last great night out.
Quepos and Manual Antonio
Other then Vancouver quality sushi, Quepos was really just a place we stayed in order to access the Manual Antonio National Park. Now, everything is relative and we have been very fortunate to visit a number of amazing nature reserves. Manual Antonio was like walking along a crowded street for most of the day. There were packs of tourists with cameras snapping pics of everything, which is fair. It was just harder for us to get excited about ants and trees after Monteverde. We tried to get to a couple of different less travelled trails but it was tough. It actually closely resembles of the layout of Stanley Park in Vancouver: a forest surrounded by exceptional beaches.
The beaches were definitely worth it, especially because in the late afternoon we had an incredible encounter with multiple families of squirrel monkeys. They are the smallest of the four types of monkeys found in Costa Rica and were the last on our list to see. We were less than 10 feet away from at least four sets of these tiny monkey mamas with babies on their backs, accompanied by the rest of the tribe. It was incredible. The next day we also got a close encounter with a troop of white face monkeys that were trying to get food from the tourists and were as close to us as we had gotten to monkeys so far on the trip. A plethora of monkeys and ice-cold coconut water drinks. It was all worth it.
The Pacific coast beach towns of Costa Rica are extraordinary beautiful and the costal drive is a life experience all in itself. Lushes trees boarding the highway with a wide variety of beautiful flowers woven with spectacular views of waves breaking on the shoreline. We can understand why so many travelers fall in love with the coast and really hope that the country can find equilibrium between the prospect of tourism dollars and ensuring that the natural beauty continues to exist.
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