June 10: Puerto Viejo (Jaco & San Jose)

(1) As much as I was enjoying the peace and easy of hanging out in Jaco, I was interested in seeing a bit more of the country, specifically the other side. Few travelers I had spoken with had bothered to explore the Caribbean towns, leaving me rather assured that there was some hidden beauty to be found. Somehow, I managed to convince Fred and Jerome to join me in trekking across the map to see what we could see. We decided, then, to split a cab - again, time was not on our side. This driver agreed to take us way down to Puerto Viejo, a village close to the Panamanian border. Along the way, shortly after leaving Jaco, we stopped along the side of a bridge so the driver could point something out to us down below.

(2) Sitting around in the muddy waters was a large group of crocodiles. We watched them lounge in the sun for a short bit before heading back out on the road for San Jose. There, we hit a bank so Jerome could restock in cash. This was sort of a pain in the ass, as can be expected in some Central American country, but eventually we were back to cruising down the highway. Stopping only for lunch, the whole ride took us about 7 hours and cost a little over two-hundred dollars. We pulled into Puerto Viejo shortly before sunset.

(3) We checked into Cabinas Casa Verde, a pleasant little hideaway just off the main strip. After dumping our bags in the rooms, we took off for a little walk through this very Jamaican-esque town, eventually settling down at Restaurant Bambu for a couple rounds of Pina Coladas. They were surprisingly expensive for Costa Rica, but after watching the delicate care taken by the bartender to make them just perfect, we were quite pleased with our beverages. The sun was starting to sink lower in the sky, so we mellowed out on some chairs by the lapping water, resting our toes in the warm sand.

(4) Behold, another perfect sunset. With the sound of raggae beats in the air, I was fairly certain that Jerome and Fred were pleased that we had decided to brave the long journey over to the Caribbean. The only thing breaking the peace was a local man named "Snoop," who kept coming up to us to sell weed. Fred informed him that he was just fine. Snoop, seeing that there was no chance of making a drug deal, tried to sell us his other item in stock: "hot bitches who play ping pong." Basically, he was referring to hookers who would go room to room for us like ping pong balls. We weren't interested in Snoop's "hot bitches," but we certainly appreciated the comedy of the ping pong idea.

(5) Later, we ate some pizza and hit up the bars. There were very few travelers, or anybody for that matter. However, there was a film crew shooting some kind of music video. This created some brief excitement at the bar. We were all pretty tired, so we grabbed some beers and headed back to our bungalows... which were ready to go with mosquito nets and everything.