Ah a brief sojourn in the beautiful surf before we found ourselves back on buses for the past next 9 hours. We returned to Gaudy’s Hostel in San Jose and were bumped up to a nice room on the 2nd floor. It seems that every time we stay (this is the 3rd) we have a nicer room.

Waiting to hear from Anthony (Marco’s son) and hopefully see a fun time in San Jose. He went to a technical college, like James, so I have my doubts :)

Tomorrow we head home. This past week has been great, I wish we had more time to travel and explore,

Now only to buy some souvenirs and good coffee for DIA/WFC folks!

We just saw a huge-ass sea turtle!!!

We’re staying at a hotel right on a national park/beach that’s a nesting ground for leatherback ocean turtles. We’re practically the only ones on the beach (there’s only one other hotel on it, and only one other couple staying here), and we didn’t see anyone as we crept outside in the pitch night. The beach is officially off-limits after 6pm this time of year.

About 100 meters from our hotel, we saw a dark trail in the sand, and at the head of the trail, heading back toward the ocean, an enormous blob. It was six feet long and five feet wide, and probably would have come up to my waist—this was a huge mound of something, 20 meters away from us. We weren’t sure what it was though, because low-tide had receeded the ocean by over 50 meters.

I froze. Johanna inched closer, and the creature moved at her and hissed. We thought it was some kind of ferocious jungle predator and started running, before we stopped, shaking with the anticipation and knowledge that we had a real-live-honest-larger-than-imaginable ocean turtle that could probably swallow us just by looking at us.

I tried taking a picture, but all I got was a screen of black. We went back and got Johanna’s camera, and in those few minutes, the turtle had gone another 20 meters and perched on the edge of the water. Johanna’s camera did no better than mine. So we have no proof, but it was awe-tingling and majescredible. I would never have believed the guidebooks claims of a “miracle of nature”, but I would never thought I’d see a sea turtle either.

Again we woke with the sun and after a filling breakfast were off before 8am to hike the waterfall trails of the national park. We esteemed we could do the 4km trail before we had to check out at noon, however, the walk to the park (about 2km) and a short discussion about paying the entrance fee ($10 per person) again left us only about 1 1/2 hours to hike. Few animals sightings to report other than a few cute coatis and mariposas that James lovingly renamed “flutterbys.”

Quick shower, tasty lemon juice and loading our packs onto burnt backs later, we found ourselves back in Offie’s 4×4 to get to the Leberia bus station. Luckily, we got there shortly before 1pm and were able to buy tickets and board the bus heading for Tamirindo.

The ride was longer than expected (3 hours, mostly due to unexpected stops to pick up and drop off passengers) and we stuck to the sweaty seats. By the last leg the bus was populated exclusively by gringos going to Costa Rica’s 2nd most popular beach. We arrived and quickly took in the grandeur (5 star hotel and the like) before getting a cab ($30) to take us to our hotel selected because it was away from the action.

Starving we set off down the beach to walk back to Tamirindo, it looked like we could follow the water around, but we discovered that was impossible. However, we found several water taxis (tho the hotels and cabs on the Tamirindo side assured us they did not exist) and got a beach-front bite at “Eat at Joes” Clearly this side was designated for the wealthy surfersort, we heard more English than anywhere else and saw 4 macs in our fist 5 minutes sitting at the bar.

Devouring nachos and a surprisingly substantial vegetable quesadilla, we got change to pay our kind water taxi driver and set back to our secluded beach to finally go for a swim

The water was perfect—gently rolling waves and several brakes and a lovely temperature. We splashed around for about an hour as the sun was setting and then took a walk down the beach watching for tortuagas and gathering sea shells. The beach, Playa Grande, is more national park than people-beach, and huge turtles are said to like this time of year to lay their eggs.

We are now listing to the luxuriant sounds of the waves in our quiet beach-facing cabin.

After a relaxing day in the shady breeze at our hotel, we decided to start a hike into the setting sun to some hot springs near the park. Little did we know that they were two hours away, and there were only three hours of sunlight left.

With nothing but a water bottle, James’s Droid cellphone, and my camera, we trekked up and down innumerable rocky cliffs, forded three streams, climbed to a canopy-level zip-line platform, and evaded a stalking jaguar. When we got to the springs, all we found was a murky puddle, and the sun was setting.

Our journey back got progressively darker, as the trees inched in over our heads. We used Droid to find our way when we lost the trail, blinding the jaguar with my camera’s flash, and saw a bird in one of the trees. Returning victorious, we flopped back in the hammocks and starting planning our next journey.

What does waiting in lines, applying bug spray repeatedly and moving at a super slow pace so you can gab with your friends remind you of?

If you guessed summer camp, you are right!

Our day with the group of students from Indiana and Texas universities was dominated by waiting. I guess we had forgotten what traveling with 30 people is like (as in bathroom breaks all the time, nonstop giggling) and with a group mostly stopping at touristy places James and I would never go near.

Through Heidi’s local knowledge we were able to enter a beautiful waterfall/hiking trail that is off the map. James swam with the bikini clad coeds in the rushing water and like a camp councilor, I watched bags and cameras.

The hike was the gem of the day. Not so much explaining how to use latrines to people who have not traveled abroad. I think the next 2 weeks for them will be a crash course in living in nature, in addition to the important aid they are providing to Nicaraguans. Through travel they will hopefully learn more about themselves and their limits.

After the cataracs we piled back into the van and drove to Gracia to take a lunch break,. Surprisingly the plaza only had fried chicken places and we resorted to a meal of french fries. An interesting note: we thought aros de cebolas meant rice with onion, however, aros is not arroz; we got onion rings. So a completely fried lunch it was, yumm.

The town of Gracia has a beautiful church in el centro that was delivered there by accident. Sergio relayed an interesting story of how there church was intended for Puntoarenas, Chilie, but by a shipping fluke was unloaded at nearby Puntoarenas, Costa Rica. The local priest said that he was indeed waiting for a church, and took it away. The church was constructed entirely out of metal sheets that were sent along with the plans for assembly from Spain. The finished product is majestic (and the metal bolts can still be seen).

A few more hours in the bus, this time with me in the jump seat, we got into Leberia and parted ways with the group. We found the hostel that our guide book* said could arrange transport to Rincon de la Vieja. The hostel receptionists arranged for a 4×4 driven by the affable Offie to come at 8pm (an hour later) to take us to the isolated eco lodge just outside the national park.

Crash, boom, shift, ouch. Our 45 min ride over the rocky road tossed us around the truck and at last when we pulled up to the hotel, we discovered that we did not have reservations and they were completely full. Fortunately Offie (for anther $5) took us to a hotel where he likely got a commission where we luckily could stay. It is here that I type this up, and looking around, there seems only to be about 3 other couples staying.

The windy night greeted us as we checked into our cabin style room and apparently James did not get any mosquito attention. I, on the other hand, have a few welts I’m trying not to scratch.

We woke up this morning and headed to our daseyuno fuete. For the Costa Ricans, you ought to eat breakfast like a kind, lunch like a prince and dinner like a pauper. So we sat down to a heaping plate of fruit, rice, beans, flavorless queso blanco, eggs and plantains.

Laced up our shoes and after one or two false starts (James heard right, I heard left) we ran into some lovely Italians who drove us to the entrance of the National Park. There we hiked for about 4 hours on a challenging trail including many unmarked sections, several river crossings and at least 10 boulders to scramble over all to see these fantastic volcanic hot springs.

Once you accept the sulfuric sent, these amazing natural formations will impress you! Absolutely worth the trek through 4 habitats (jungle, plains, desert, forest) you will be impressed.

We lapped a group of elderly Germans at least twice (it was a loop) and have no idea how they managed their way out. Perhaps entering at the less steep exit? James commented that “by 80 I’ll be so good at hiking” just like the Germans.

We began the 3km walk back (uphill, in the sun, at noon) to our hotel and made it without sunburn or complete exhaustion.

Resting now in the hammock, I’ll have to relocate to the bar to post this.

*new guide book (about 10 yrs outdated) since our Lonely Plant some how disappeared…

Cloud Forest de Santa Elena

Our day began with a nice breakfast at Casa Tranquilo with some garlicky eggs I made for a protean rich breakfast. We set off at the suggestion of the great and hospitable owner David to find the strangler fig trees. One so large that James climbed inside! The fig stranglers begin as a weed of sorts and completely dominate their host so what is left is a hollowed out tree. I’ll post some pictures soon. We continued to the Secret Valley and bargained the $5/per person price down to $5 for the both of us to enter. Our time was very limited (we had to catch a bus back to San Jose at 2:30), so we moved quickly through it, No animal sightings to report.

We had a nice lunch (the best plato de dia to date!) at a place attached to the Tree house hotel called Coffee Bar. Tasty plantains with beans and vegetables cooked until perfectly tender.

Next we bought our tickets as soon as the la officina de billetes opened since we were afraid of having to stay another day in Santa Elena after exhausting the only free activity: hiking straight up a hill.

With enough time for a quick shower and to book a room at Gaudy’s Hostel in San Jose, we boarded the bus for the 4+ hours back. There was a really sketchy character monitoring our bags as we put them below the bus and James and I vigilantly watched as everyone got on the bus and the guy with the shifty eyes remained. Traveling with a laptop can be stressful.

We got back to San Jose around 7pm and took a cab to Gaudy’s (with limited success negotiating the price, we paid about $6) and James called Heidi to get an update on a group BBQ that was under way. We found out that it was wrapping up which was just as well since we had the grocery store a mere 3 blocks away and a hankering to make pasta. The proximity to the grocery store is one the few nice aspects of this gringos dominated hostel. We planned to meet Heidi and her group of 30 youths heading up to Nicaragua early the next morning.

After dinner we fell asleep exhausted and had a brief slumber. We were up in time (7am) for pancake breakfast and then set off to meet Marco (Heidi’s husband) at a Hyper-mas (big shopping mall) and hitch a ride with the group.

We got back to the airport with an hour to spare and waited in the airport, spending our last few pesos on postcards. We then flew to Costa Rica and appreciated how international flights (well Mexicana at least) still provide you a meal and lots of libations.

Around 12:30 we got in and got a cab to Gaudy’s Hostel located near one of the very decentralized centers. We had a nice room that oddly was named “Suka” and written out in Hebrew. We fell asleep around 2am exhausted after so many mornings of early wake ups and made scant plans for he rest of the day. We were waiting to hear from Heidi, James’s aunt who lives in San Jose with her husband Marco and son Johann. They have been busy with their upcoming service trip to Nicaragua.

At 8 when we got out of bed we discovered the folowing: 1. the hostel was filled with gringos watching TV 2. there was no breakfast as we had been counting on All in all, overpriced for what it was and lacking in character.

We walked down about 3 blocks to a supermarcado and picked up things for breakfast and sandwich making and then headed out to the San Carlos bus station to purchase tickets. We wondered the streets a little confused at first since: a) very few of the streets are named b) when there are street numbers, they aren’t in any consecutive order and they repeat c) every person we consulted told us to ask someone else

We got there, moving from the residential to the seedy area around the bus station and purchased tickets for 2:30pm to Santa Elena. With about 3 hours until the bus, we dropped our bags and headed to San Jose’s best reputed museo, Museo de Jade. For the steep entrance price ($8USD per person) and the 4 room collection we were not all that impressed. We next wondered in search of a popular vegetarian fast food chain called Vishnu’s where we found a tasty plato de dia and fresh papaya juice. Next we saw an attractive commercial area, stumbling across an international section (Indian incense, Chinese dried foods and Italian pastries all done in Costa Rican fashion, of course) and enjoyed the few streets closed off to traffic.

We return to the station and set off on a twisty ride up to Santa Elena on a crowed and old bus. At one point a torrential rain overpowered the bus and water seeped in all sides… About 20 km later, it was completely dry. There was no need for the jacket I brought as it is was nothing like Brazilian buses (which were freezing cold, AC on full blast!) and we got into town around 7pm.

After discovering that Pension Santa Elena (our 1st choice after reading the Lonely Planet) was overflowing with people, we looked for something a little calmer and came across the pleasant Casa Tranquilo. We are enjoying a private room and a hot water shower (breakfast included for $25). A little of exploring confirmed that this is a tourist town but tomorrow we hope to find a nice hike and hopefully see all the animals.

Our day in Mexico City was packed (since we only had 8 hours before our flight to Costa Rica). We headed to the Zolaco, a plaza with political buildings of import and a vibrant market place on Sunday including indigenous dancers replete with feathers. It was very sunny and the open square provided little shade so we walked toward the metro en route to the highly recommended Mueso de Anthropologia. We found the metro system easy to navigate in part because each stop has a signifying picture (ex. “constitution”stop has a quill and legal looking document, “desportes” has a soccer ball) and the lines are all bright colors. We were the only gringos using the metro and in most places we traversed. Along the way we had an awesome juice (James still calls them sucos) made with with a combination de frutas and then set off to the Museo. The walk from the metro to the the museo (not just across the street as we were told) was beautiful, with parks and zoos and sculptures and cotton candy on either side. The museo was certainly as impressive as promised and beautifully laid out. Split into regions, it detailed the indigenous peoples and history of pre-columbian Mexico. We ate an over priced but much needed lunch at the museo’s cafe. We found out that HSBC was the only international ATM we could use and when one could not be located, we traded $20 for 220 pesos with a hot-dog vender. Another note on street food: we saw lots of people holding what looked to be an edible plate (it looked like bark or a thin dough with spices cooked until crispy) with a pizza like assortment of toppings, something tomato, something green and cheese sprinkled on top. Next time we will have to try it!

We really liked Mexico City, especially after San Antonio: it’s filled with people, and shops, and culture. We like not speaking the language too.

James and I arrived in San Antonio Texas on Thursday after a easy start from DC at 6am and a little layover in Denver.

What brought us to the Lone Star State, you may ask?

I was slated to give a paper at FLAN, the Food Representation in Film, Literature and the Other Arts (so more like FRIFLOA). This was my first invitation to give an academic paper and I was very excited to speak on the silenced voices of the Food Network. After many drafts and a lot of loving critiques from James, I felt prepared to speak about personal creative expression, experimental learning* and female potential for subversion thorough interactions with food.

At the conference we (James paid a nominal registration fee that got him into all of the receptions as not to raise any eyebrows) heard so many though provoking speaker, engaged in great discussions and made some friends, including a Cincinnati-based artist (http://uturnartspace.blogspot.com/) and a historian from Canada whom we hung out with. They also made up the ‘under 30’ crowd of the conference. Check out the program here: http://flan.utsa.edu/foodconf/default.htm

The U of T San Antonio Campus (downtown) is one of the satellite UT campuses and housed in a super modern building, and suspiciously unpopulated with students. But that’s no surprise: all of San Antonio a ghost-town, except for the tourist-infected areas.

Our first day: -We visited the Alamo (on our ride from the airport to our hotel learned about the namesake for the Yellow Rose of Texas: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Yellow_Rose_of_Texas) -Walked around some of the downtown -Found the most efficient routes from hotel-to conference-to downtown -Ate at the oft-recommended (we heard it about 40 times), grossly atmospheric Mi Tierra, with desperate mariachi performers.

Friday was filled with lectures and breaks to eat Tex-Mex (see review for Pico de Gallo), further exploration of the marcados (primaraly set up for tourists), wandering around the highly commercialized River Walk, the city’s main draw, and caved and ate at a place there (Italian food, not that remarkable called Peasonos).

Today, however, we got a ride to the Pearl area which is a repurposed factory/brewery come art and restaurant space and on Saturdays, a great farmer’s market. Thank you Alice for introducing us and giving us a lift! She is also a very accomplished scholar and cool person: http://www.chatham.edu/departments/humandevelopment/undergraduate/women/facutly_get.cfm?FacultyID=222

We are now exhausted and sunburned from our long pursuit in the sun to find a post office that was open (which we never did, and instead relied on the business center at the new, fancy Hyatt) in order to send my new, fancy clothes back to DC and lighten our load. Our final meal here was at Azuca, a nuevo-latin favorite amongst those in the know (we stumbled across it and were told we must be expert stumblers).

On to the next adventure Mexico, Costa Rica and Nicaragua

(*ESG prides itself on this one:)