Extremo!

Before we got settled 1600m high in the misty green mountains of Monteverde, Costa Rica we made sure our zip line tour would be coming to get us in a few hours. I had spent more time than Elise approved of trying to narrow down which tour was going to send us soaring highest & farthest- I'm slightly afraid of heights & if I was going to torture myself, I really wanted to scare the fear out of me. At 2pm we reached the end of a long unpaved road & the headquarters of Extremo. We strapped up & got ready to fly.

monkey see - monkey do

After a how-to introduction we were led by four beyond cheeky local guides to the first of what would be fifteen zip line wires. We hiked upward between them through a lush rainforest full of moss covered trees dripping with vines. Each line was a surprise. I squealed out loud on the first decent sized stretch as I flew over misty green hills, cow-filled pastures, rural neighborhoods, & an isolated waterfall. They let Elise & I ride together for one line & another suddenly dead-ended at a rope where we rappelled 90 feet to the ground. We also jumped from a platform that shot us awkwardly downwards towards death before back & forth- in & out of the depths of the forest- on a "Tarzan swing." I felt like Jane.. or a monkey- "monita" as the guides chirped every time I set foot on the next platform grinning ear to ear.

The guides couldn't have been more entertaining & just as I started to get jealous of their freedom, leaping onto the lines horsing around mid-air, I got an offer I could not refuse. One guide clipped me backwards onto the equipment of another & pushed us out on the fastest, longest, highest line in the park. I forced my stubbornly practical arms into the air above my head & leaned back until I was upside down, the guide holding the backs of my knees. I cruised like this, looking back & forth 400 feet in the air for a full kilometer laughing hysterically. We haven't been able to stop reminiscing about our adventure since & have been plugging Extremo's service to every tourist we meet, or choose to meet, just to put them in the loop.

Hi, Elissa & Elise, the states, Rhode Island... so have you zip lined in Monteverde yet???

I can't even post Elise's video without laughing to tears alone in an internet cafe :)

South Pacific Coasting

beware of cocodrilos

Playa Puerto Escondido










From the Mirador








Playa Espadilla Sur

We started cruising down the muddy paths of Parque Nacional Manuel Antonio before the Pacific Coast heat up for the day. The park was absolutely teeming with wildllife. We paused alongside guided groups everytime their hired professional spotted a deer, monkey, etc. then sped on forward to conquer every last trail. As we trooped along a coastal path bright red crabs froze & lizards scurried out of our way with paranoia. Some trails led us down steep rope-assisted routes to rainforest backed beaches, others to viewpoints above the bright green tree line. After getting sufficiently sweaty & exhausted we finished our hike at the quieter of the two most popular stretches of sand. It seemed every time we returned to our spot from a swim a new population of lizards had made themselves at home along the forest edge. It was here that we met three Californians with a rental car & intentions of getting to Dominical before sunset. In my scouring to nail down our itinerary I'd given up hope on anywhere South of Manuel Antonio, & had a particularly hard time letting Domincal go. The road between the two is a dusty stretch of gravel, truly massive potholes, & rickety bridges that prevents the town from losing itself to the tourism that has inhaled the rest of Costa Rica's Pacific Coast. The bus would take nearly 5 hours. The car- less than 1. So we jumped at the opportunity, hopped in another obviously Gringo rental car (this time a Hyundai Elantra), & bounced past charming tiny villages set around square fields & wide expanses of rolling green hills to Dominical.

Dominical is known as a laid back surfers town whose charm lies partly in how little they've got going on- outside of white sand beaches & killer surf that is. We happened to arrive on Sunday, the last day of a 10 day local carnival that transformed the muddy stretch of land between the businesses & the beach with impossible games, jewelry stands, a giant stage of a bar, makeshift restaurants, & food right down to the cotton candy. We frolicked through the fun, played in the chaos under disco balls at the "new people in the beach" bar (we found this typo endearing), made food runs, & stopped by the patio of our room at Tortilla Flats for much needed breaks.

The next day as the town transformed back into its usual self we got in a few solid hours of hot sun & surfers before packing it up & getting back on the road- this time en route to San Jose via San Isidro where we'd spend another night at the now oddly familiar Hostel Pangea to book an early morning transport to the mountain town of Monteverde.

Elissa y Elise? Muy Similar!

As I made my way 16+ hours overnight on a border crossing bus between Panama City & San Jose, Elise was flying overhead to meet me. We started our two week adventure at the fortress front gate to Pangea Hostel where we hugged, dropped off our things, & head straight downtown for a stroll through the city & some curbside eats on bustling Central Ave. before the sun went down & San Jose turned into its lawless self. I 'd been to Pangea about a month earlier en route to Panama from Nicaragua & chose to spend my first night of transition with Elise there because I remembered it as an oddly modern, unnecessarily large, multi-lingual haven. We spent a couple hours flipping through the pages of three travel guides trying to narrow down just the start of an itinerary. After finally figuring out how to get a couple places in before meeting the girls in Tamarindo on Thursday (not an easy task considering how few paved roads run through the Pacific), we head to our room. It was here that Elise encountered her very first travel nightmare as one of our roomates asked us if the massive welts covering her entire body were bad. Bad? We immediately started itching head to toe & promptly zipped all our belongings up tight & requested to be moved away from the bed bug infestation. An hour later, alarm set for 5am, tucked in & content- the girl with the bed bugs walked in our door. We swallowed our fears, coated ourselves in coconut oil, wrapped the sheets on tight, & got our first night of limited shut eye.

The next day the world redeemed itself for the bed bug debacle & we fell onto a direct bus to Santa Teresa that was kind enough to actually get on the ferry across to the Southern tip of the Nicoya Peninsula with us in order to transport us all the way to the center of the little beach town. We made ourselves at home at the cozy Tranquilo Backpackers hostel where from the picnic tables in front of the open-air jungle kitchen we could see two levels of mostly surfers swinging in hammocks, playing pool, & waxing their boards for tomorrows gnarly waves. After a lazy day strolling the town, cooking, napping, & pit stopping at the beach for sunset we forced ourselves to complete a day-to-day plan for the adventure ahead of us & set another 5am alarm.

Santa Teresa

Tranquilo

The next morning found us in Montezuma, a charming stretch of beach, town, & jungle. We climbed up the side of a hill to unload our backpacks in a bungalow at Hotel Luna Llena then hit the main road en route to an infamous three story waterfall. We rock hopped along a trickling river in a nonsensical zig-zag (Elise falling only once) to the first cascada. Here we dipped into the cool fish-filled water & pondered where exactly the second set of falls was located- & more importantly- the path to it. Over-confident advice from a Canadian sent us slipping up a sandy incline in hopes of reaching the second set- which lay right above the first, easy as that. After pulling ourselves upwards to the canopy grabbing tree branches that sometimes unfortunately turned out to be loose hanging vines, we found little more than zip line platforms. Resisting the temptation to jump on the wires & head down the easy way we explored until finally we came to the second & third falls. We jumped & rope swang happily in the third before looking down the long fall to the second. Remembering Lonely Planet's statistics on deaths on the second waterfall, we left that one to the Canadian. From there we took the supposedly easier route back, fingers crossed, up a rope & down a steep questionable path using uprooted tree roots as our makeshift ladder. One, or two, dramatic wrong turns later found us back at the bottom safely. Back along the rock route down the river scaring dragonflies & iguanas out of the way, we made our exhausted way back into town via a rocky beach for a quick dip. With the rest of our energy we had a long dinner, perused the hippy dippy jewelry stands, & climbed into bed up on the hill under the reassuring protection of a mosquito net just as it started to rain- & set another 5am alarm.

Tamarindo was our next destination & this wasn't an easy route. All the buses are unreliable & this time we had to catch a bus leaving at either 5:30am or 6am to make a ferry in Paquera leaving for Puntarenas at either 8am or 8:30am to another bus across town to Liberia leaving sometime between 9am & 11am, to our final bus to Tamarindo either at 12:15pm or 2:30pm- in which case we ended up catching the 1pm trip. Not to mention that the travel times vary depending on when the bus decides to show, take off, & rest for seemingly no reason (sometimes because the driver is hungry, wants to say hello to a pal, or run various other errands conveniently on our way). There is no such thing as air conditioning on these public buses & I think our last bus stopped about 357 times before finally dropping us off to the girls who we found lounging on the beach unaffected by the stress of our day- something I'm not used to considering we're usually suffering side by side.

Our first night in Tamarindo was celebrated with a feast at Pedro's- a popular seafood spot where patrons bring their own Pilsen & patiently await their meals fighting for limited picnic table space under a thatched roof of palms. After a quick jukebox stop at a refreshingly quiet bar we head into the much anticipated chaos of Reggae night at Babylon Bar where we danced until I think Elise may actually have fallen asleep before making our way along the dusty path back to the girls apartment where we did not set a 5am alarm.

The morning heat sent us early to the beach for relief. After waking up, Elise, Lauren, & I walked south down the coast of the peninsula to neighboring Playa Langosta where we collapsed moving only to push through a strong current across an estuary stream into the ocean where the surfable waves tossed us back onto the beach to scour for shells. That night found Elise & I cringing at the reality of the following day's travel agenda. We were heading south of Puntarenas to Quepos/Manuel Antonio & no matter how we rearranged the puzzle, it meant 10hours of traveling via at least 4 local buses & possibly a ferry. So before we head out for a last night on the town we let ourselves breathe a deep sigh of relief & booked a shuttle that would take us straight to the beach in 6 hours. With air conditioning.

We were so happy to have avoided an anxious day-long shuffle that we just shrugged our shoulders, laughed, & ordered happy hour margaritas & pina coladas when it started raining the second we set foot in Manuel Antonio. We assumed the rain would have let up by the time we head back to the hostel, but it only came down harder. At some points tonight we were legit screaming to each other in order to make conversation over the beyond torrential downpour that was periodically knocking out the electricity. We took advantage of the all you can eat spaghetti bolognese, entertained ourselves killing mass numbers of mosquitos, & now we're putting ourselves to bed with a long hike on the agenda for tomorrow morning.

Big City Life

Our mode of transportation across the country was a Toyota Yaris & it seemed to be the only type of rental car in Panama- it's popularity alone giving us good reason to feel like proud gringo road trippers. The first leg of the 12+ hour journey took our Yaris through shanty towns full of friendly waving locals, inexplicably gorgeous rolling green hills, jaw-dropping thick cloud forests, past waterfalls, around endless sharp curves, up & over hill after hill, & eventually to the mountain town of Boquete. We tracked down stubbornly hidden natural hot springs & (after the paying admission to the oddest of owners, surrounded by his crew of turkeys) we hot tub hopped through the five of them, daydreaming out loud about how great it would be to transport just one of them back home. The town itself was quiet, had great coffee, & kindly surprised us with an impressive fireworks display as we wandered through it's empty night streets.


The next day we drove through David & onto the Panamerican Highway which we rode straight into Panama City. First stop- the Panama Canal. I'd gone a little overboard scouring through my lonely planet guide the night before, & we were all pumped to watch as 52 million gallons of fresh water was dumped into the ocean as the giant locks opened wide & let the massive awaiting cargo & cruise ships slip through. The history of Panama, especially it's history in relation to us Americanas, is entirely tied up & focused around the canal, & it was great to see it close up in all its grandeur.

We head back into the city, found a Cuban bar that put all their effort & personality into making us perfect mojitos, had a long dinner at an outside cafe in a church-filled plaza with gorgeous old buildings looming over us & kittens rolling around at our feet, played a little pool, & head back to our hostel where we discovered their movie theatre- a big room with a projector & three levels of, I guess, massive stairs wrapped in padding & purple satin that plays only the best American movies nightly.

Thursday the boys dropped me to savor a taste of the modern world at the Multicentro mall en route to the airport where they took off back to the states. Leaving me alone- in a hostel overflowing with westerners that is.

I´ve been staying at Luna´s Castle which is located right along the water on a peninsula with this perfect view of the city from the second floor balcony. All the buildings lining the narrow brick streets of Casco Viejo are equipped with balconies- even those no longer consisting of any house beyond their often beautiful front wall. Considering that the first established area of Panama City was burned straight to the ground (by none other than Captain Morgan himself- I was secretly tempted to visit the ruins just to take a picture in the captain morgan pose, but thought just maybe they'd find that offensive), Casco Viejo is the oldest standing part of the city. In the process of being gentrified, the old & the new mingle down every street inside the peninsula- many dilapidated buildings don banners with a picture depicting the utter potential that the property holds, & I´ve got to admit it´s a great strategy. It wasn't long until I was imagining myself leaning back in a chair, looking out into the sky with my feet resting on the balcony of my beautifully restored home in antique Panama City.

Walking up Central Ave. through the rest of the city, as I did daily, each step brings you closer to the modern world. Dotted along the pedestrian streets, open-front stores blast latino music, carts sell everything from shave ice to hot dogs, & tables peddle plastic accessories, headphones, & fake leather belts. The parks overflow with locals lining every inch of sit-able space, talking & interacting in an oddly small town way. I indulged myself daily in two of my favorite travel routines- cruising through foreign supermarkets & perusing down alleys of shaded markets. Those stemming off of Central Ave. were mostly selling food, the vegetable stands hanging glorious bunches of aloe plants that almost made me wish I were sunburnt.

The infamous city buses- diablos rojos (red devils)

25 cents & so confusing you never entirely know where you'll end up

Central Ave.

I took a diablo rojo to the massive new bus station/mall on my final day to purchase a ticket that will take me 16 hours overnight back across the border into Costa Rica to meet Elise!

chau Panama