Quepos to Bocas

Following our Po-Ass adventure, we spent exactly one more morning in San Jose before leaving again for the Pacific coast, this time to Quepos. Quepos' only redeeming feature is that it serves as a great base of operations to explore the Manuel Antonio national park. We arrived there in the evening, and found a lovely little room with a ceiling fan that threatened constantly to chop off any body part incautiously raised above one's head. To keep the room cool at night, we had to keep the thing on its highest setting, which is apparently "Helicopter". The ceiling bulged ominously downward as the tremendous suction from the fans whirring blades attempted to pull the entire roof down on our heads.

In the morning, (somewhat slowly as we were recovering from a cultural excursion to witness Quepos' version of Ladies Night, which has not a patch on the Heredia version previously described), we rallied ourselves and caught the bus down to the national park. Just to keep with the theme from previous posts somewhat, apparently someone on our bus had tried the ceviche made in small ice chests and sold on the side of the road, because whomever it was did not manage to stem the bowel tide for the twenty minute ride to the park, and let loose all sorts of foul demons on a seat in the front, to then dart of the bus at one of the stops in abject embarrassment. As we exited the bus in Manuel Antonio, the bus driver casually pointed at the floor with a bored expression, as if to say "Watch your step, stupid gringo tried the ceviche and stupidly left the safety of their bano." Ok, enough.

So we entered the park, which consists of about 5 seperate beachs dilineated by small rocky headlands and one large peninsula along with several hundred acres of rain forest, and hiked out a few kilometers. Along the way, we saw all sorts of wildlife, including white-faced Capuchin monkeys (think the monkey from Friends, then try not to hate me for the reference), Iguanas, bats, birds, lizards, a slothful Sloth, a ton of Agoutis (rodents about the size of a small dog), and too many birds to count. The park is quite beautiful, and we passed a very pleasant afternoon there.

The next day, we headed down the coast to the town of Uvita, which is a very small place with not much to offer in and of itself. The major reason we went was to visit yet another national park, called Marina Ballena, which was recommended to us by David, the very nice guy who runs the language school we attended. The town and park are certainly off the beaten path, and while I enjoyed the short time there, I don't see as how the path will be beaten there anytime soon. The park is pretty enough, but immediately following Manuel Antonio, it wasn't exactly the highlight of our trip. Oh great, another pretty national park. Whoopdee-shit. The beach there is very long, bordered by jungle (as per standard here), which terminates in a series of rocky headlands and beachs. After walking the length of the beach, we climbed out around the point a ways, then headed back to town to catch our bus back to San Jose.

It took 7 hours to get back to San Jose. 7 hot, sweaty, tiring hours in a crappy bus.

We spent the night in San Jose, then spent the following morning retrieving our plane tickets to Argentina from FedEx, and henceforth headed out to Puerto Viejo for the 30th time. We spent the night there, as its the last major town on the way to the Bocas del Torro that we would want to spend any real time in. We partied the night away listening to Reggae, then woke this morning to begin the journey down here to Panama. Today was a long, tiring travel day. We have been in buses, on foot, taxis, and water taxis to get here, only to find a very cool location completely swamped with rain, with no end to the deluge in sight. As a result, we are currently stationed in an internet cafe, and may be for some time. After this, we'll probably return to our hostel, and spend the evening reading and relaxing, hopefully to wake to sunshine and puppy dogs. If not, we may well have to hate this place.
- posted by Micah @ 9:44 PM