Hidden Jungle Beach House

Puerto Viejo, COSTA RICA
Feb.10-16, 2015

I'm still not in the jungle, but, apparently jungle and rainforest are used interchangeably by us commoners who don't always know better.

They say that like attracts like.  After the sojourn in the mountains, I landed down on the Caribbean coast at the Hidden Jungle Beach House.

Puerto Viejo is a bit of a backpacker ghetto which attracts the young backpackers, families, young couples, older couples who were probably once young backpackers, and apparently solo women travellers.  It is a colourful array of coffee shops and restaurants run by locals and expats from all over the world, surf stands on the beach manned by local Rastafarians, artist shops, tourist shops with your standard beach tourist-wear the same around the world, and jungle tour operations with big modern posters and banners draped around the shop.

This part of Costa Rica is different - a creole flavour with roots from Caribbean migrant workers who came over as cheap labour during the banana boom.

The Snack Shack (Jenny's photo)

(Jenny's photo)

The Hidden Jungle Beach House is about a three minute walk just outside of the town of Puerto Viejo, 50 metres up from the ocean - you can't hear the town raucous, but you can hear the waves.  And the howler monkeys.

I'm using AirBnB to find budget places to stay - a recent tip from a friend at work.  It's similar to vrbo, but could be anything from a private room in someone's house (with the owner there too), to a separate dwelling (like my casita in the Central Valley), B&B or small motel.  You get a real sense of an advertised place from the reviews previous users have posted.  The Hidden Jungle Beach House is a three-storey dwelling with the owner, an American woman from the southern States named Lisa, living on the top floor, four rooms for rent on the second floor, and an open-air shared kitchen on the main floor.  I liken it to a "hostel for adults", ie. with grown-ups and private rooms.

The resident cat liked watching my iPad as I typed -
nice invention these two-way iThingy cameras

The back yard resident (for a day) ridiculously cute sloth
with baby 

I met Jenny (from Sweden) and Marie-Soleil (from Quebec) my first evening at the Jungle Beach House, both near my age and traveling solo.  For whatever reason, the Jungle Beach House attracted each of us and gave us exactly what we were looking for:  our own privacy, but also the company of someone else also beating down a new path.  Later on, we met Joanna (from Italy) while in town, and we became a force of four.

If you look at our human make-up, we are biological, electrical, consciousness/abstract, and a mesh of stories bridging one unit of time to the next.  In school, I learned that a standard story is made up of a protagonist and antagonist(s), sometimes surrounded with other characters, moving through a plot situation which eventually climaxes and reaches a resolve, with the protagonist having undergone some sort of change.  When you come across someone else's story which has one or more of those essecntial pieces with which you can find a connection or relate, it's like you've just found somebody who's on your side.  Maybe it goes back to being a caveman, and learning that finding a common ground between two strangers removes that fear of the unknown, and therefore means one won't kill the other...

Stories were the docile portion of the week.  We used the shared kitchen to make feasts together most evenings, Jenny perfecting smashed plantains while Marie-Soleil and I played variations on the guacamole theme.  I made my first ever banana pancakes - bananas, eggs and cinnamon, that's it!  In addition, my ribs and knees hurt from surfing, my need-to-be-doing-something muscles hurt from sitting on the beach, and my cheeks hurt from laughing.

Valentine's Day - United Colors of Beneton style
Joanna (grey hair), Jenny (blond), Me (red), Marie-Soleil (dark brown)

I'm trying to surf (Marie-Soleil's photo)

"Catch a wave and you're sitting on top of the world", said The Beach Boys
(Marie-Soleil's photo)

Making friends (Jenny's photo)

Jenny coming in at Playa Negra - the black sand beach that kicked our
butts on the surf board

Joanna, Jenny, Marie-Soleil, Me dining on our Jungle Beach House feast

In the Jungle, the Mighty Jungle, Where Everything is Supersized

Samasati Ecolodge (Caribbean Coast), COSTA RICA
Feb.3-10, 2015
[MAP II]

Actually, apparently I'm not really in the jungle, but rather the 'tropical rainforest'.  Jungles have thick undergrowth, while the rainforests and cloudforests have little undergrowth due to very limited sunlight getting through the tree canopy above.  So, there are no lions sleeping tonight.

However, there are ridiculously cute sloths, monkeys, toucans, all kinds of other screeching and tweeting birds, zippy little lizards and geckos, iguanas, snakes, itty bitty poisonous frogs, Very Big creepy crawlies, and armies and armies of ants.  And fantasic vibrant flowers.

I spent a week high up in the rainforest mountains on the Caribbean side of Costa Rica, attending a writing seminar at an 'eco lodge'.  Hot, often wet during the day, and cool,

My room for the week

often wet during the night.  If you ask google "what is an eco lodge", it says:  a type of tourist accommodation designed to have the least possible impact on the natural environment in which it is situated.  I would add to that: "while creating a positive social and economic impact for the local people in the area".

In this relatively small lodge in the big rainforest, the creatures outnumber the humans probably a million to one.

It's a leaf... It's a bug...!

I only saw him because he moved...

My buddy Morton's coming for your food!  hisssssss!!

D'oh, Morton you idiot, you dropped it!

This fellow was perched a short distance outside my cabin almost the entire week I was there - this is pretty much exactly what I saw the whole time - a ball of fur:

Sleeping sloth

Stretching sloth

You can imagine the excitement and awe when one afternoon, he moved!  When these guys move, it is a sloooow stretch, a slooooow scratch.  They spend half their day sleeping, only come down from the trees once a week to go to the bathroom, and their fur is an entire ecosystem unto itself (often having a bit of a green tinge).  On my last morning, when I woke up and went onto the balcony to check on him, he was gone.

The howler monkeys wake up around 5am.  I know this because that's when I start to hear their other-worldly growls, howls and barking, which, upon hearing, you would think came from an enormous monster-like creature of your imagination's scariest creation.  It is rare to catch a glimpse of them, which makes it all the worse for your head.  In fact, they are just little black monkeys with very big lungs.

I only left the area once during my week there, for a morning guided walk down on the coast in Cahuita National Park.  Here, the rainforest meets the ocean directly - imagine walking in the forest, where only a couple metres of beach separate you from the ocean...  I had no idea iguanas hung out in trees, and would never have noticed if our guide hadn't pointed them out.  Our guide was a local indigenous lady (Bribri), and her description of plant uses - cooking, medicinal, internal, external - made me want to start my own rainforest back garden when I get home.

The writing retreat was run by two woman who make their living writing - Jeannie is from Canada, Leigh is from the US - Jeannie lives in Panama (for now), Leigh and her family live in Argentina.  Hmmmmm...

During an otherwise perfectly happy, hard-working, and extremely relaxing week, my only hour of angst came after a particular workshop discussing motivation and goals.  Leigh talked about her path towards becoming recognized as an expert in her field of writing, taking on speaking engagements, traveling to workshops and seminars around the world.

Wait a minute - that's where I was heading in my current job.  What the hell was I doing in the rainforest peacefully hanging with the animals, eating great wholesome food, sleeping like a baby in my simple cedar cabin, with a group of 10 lovely and inspiring women writers?!?!!!!!  How many hours, years, braincells, sleepless nights had I put towards my work, the people and relationships, the papers, the conference presentations???  You don't just casually walk away from all that, and go hang out in the jungle!  ...or do you?

Somehow, hanging out with the animals is soothing, relaxing.  They go about their business, inevitably interacting, the more complex ones finding moments of pleasure (although I do continue to wonder if insects or small amphibians do too).  And when another dead leaf falls from the canopy of the mighty jungle/rainforest, which they regularly do, it simply falls to the ground.

Sunrise - from my balcony

Sunset - from my balcony

Refreshments

Central Valley, COSTA RICA
Jan.31-Feb.2, 2015

Would you believe I just ate a whole lemon?!  Sweet, like an orange, right off the tree in the yard.  And then, apparently the big orange tree a few metres away produces sour oranges, like lemons, good for cooking only (ie. marinades).  Go figure.  There are also bananas, plantains, mangoes, papaya, coconut, guava, avocado, guanabana, yucca, beans, aloe vera...  Unfortunately I'm a bit early for most - due at the end of summer season in March-ish, other than the bananas.  And the early lemons.

Leo & Shelley's back garden

An over-ripe banana is a fantastic tool for bird watching - all kinds of birds seem to love the pungent sugary fruit.  In the mornings it's a constant parade of different bright-coloured happy birdies having their turn at the bananas - mesmerizing.

Leo is generous with his garden/orchard - after surviving the sweet lemon, over the course of the next few days he brought me a plantain - which I first tried raw, then properly fried with a dollop of sour cream on the side (so good), guanabana - a big prickly pear-like fruit which he sticks in a blender and then freezes in lumps, making for a hot afternoon cold treat, and my first Costa Rican cerveza - Imperial.  I shared my first Costa Rican wine with him - it was a very sweet, more fitting for a dessert wine.  I think I'll stick with Argentinian and Chilean.

First thing I do in the morning is grab my glass for a slug of water.  This morning, my eyes still half closed, I had the glass at my lips and was about to tip the water in.  Suddenly, my subconciousness registered a dark and scary object and I shrieked.

I managed to dump the water and save him.

Besides eating, I spent the rest of my time in the Central Valley doing what I want when I want:  reading, writing, doing some yoga on the grass outside, going for a couple runs (eeeeeearly morning - otherwise, you die), walking the 25 minutes to town for food, and sleeping NINE hours a night.

Costa Rica has waterfalls, and it's interesting: people love to go see waterfalls.  Insightful entrepreneurs the world over have figured this out, and have generated revenue - to protect the waterfalls, for profit, maybe a bit of both - charging people to go see waterfalls.  So what's the attraction?

Leo insisted on taking my photograph

They are big - far bigger than us, and they carry a lot of power.  That combination tends to evoke a sense of awe, along with a reminder that us mortals are but mere mortals.  It instils fear and a gut feel of danger - which attracts some, and repels others.

I went for a cool swim under the falls - glorious after the hot hike in, and gave myself a nice neck and shoulder massage.  Poking around the waters under Leo's guidance, there was an even bigger set of falls (which I only observed from a comfortable distance), and a line of gentle massages.

Little massage waterfalls

On the way back from the falls, Leo stopped off in town and picked up some ceviche for his family.  Inspired, I got some too - fresh fish "cooked" in cool lime juice with fresh herbs.

...refreshments come in many forms.

Looking the Volcano in the Eye

Poas Volcano, COSTA RICA
Jan.30, 2015

The little casita in Leo & Shelly's back garden is out in the country, amid farms, coffee and sugarcane plantations.

Coffee trees!

It would be utterly peaceful if it weren't for Leo & Shelly's five dogs.  The ringleader - the smallest dog of the bunch - barks incoherently whenever I am in its site, or it thinks I might be in its site, which sets off the other four dogs, and then all the dogs in the valley.  He's a "big" bully with nothing to say who stalks around the yard barking loudly (ie. beating his chest) to hide the fact he has nothing to say.  Reminds me of work.

However, I will easily settle for nearly utterly peaceful.

My Spanish impoves daily, thanks to nice Costa Ricans, my Spanish-English travel dictionary, and Duolingo [1].  However, the ability to catch what's being said, at 20 words/second, in response to my stuttering Spanish utterings needs work.  I wasn't sure if the fellow who gave me a lift back down the volcano mountain said:
a) when your boyfriend shows up, give me a call and my wife and I will take you guys to the best beach in Costa Rica,
b) if your boyfriend doesn't show up, give me a call and I'll make you my wife and take you to the beach,
or
c) none of the above.

Mom and dad -
I managed to look over the edge into the smouldering crator of a volcano without falling in.

I was pretty fortunate - to see it, not to not fall in.  The crazy storms hitting the eastern coast are being felt here too, with raging winds and cloudage.  And the clouds unfortunately all get stuck on the highest peaks, ie. the volcanos.  Poas Volcano is in a national park which also has cloud forest and some trails for local flora and fauna sightings.

I wonder why it's called cloud forest:

Halfway up the road to the volcano, and I find my head
in the clouds

I was begrudgingly trying to muster enthusiasm for the cloud forest trails after arriving at the volcano crator lookout and seeing:

Volcano Poas viewpoint

...when it felt like somebody suddenly turned the lights up.  The clouds parted, the angels sang and I ran (literally) a km back along the path to the lookout to see this:

Poas Volcano - main crater

I had walked 3km from my casita to the nearby village, ridden the public bus up the windy road for 45 minutes (think: yellow school bus with exactly that kind of (non)cushioning), walked another 10km up the volcano, and paid my two bits to see a smouldering crator...

The parting of the clouds lasted only about 10 minutes, but wow.

And yes, that's real smouldering (not clouds) coming from the lake.

Afterwards, I went back to the (super-sized) flora and (sadly lacking) fauna of the cloud forest with great enthusiasm.

Costa Rican fungus?

Moth or butterfly with translucent wings

Supersized fern

Poor Man's Umbrella

Poor Man's Umbrella - with watch placed on top of leaf (left side) for scale

My only disappointment of the day was not seeing the infamous resplendent quetzal birds.  Or any small untamed felines.

The stars are out now (the sun gets up at about 6:00am, the sun goes down at about 5:40pm. 11:35 hours of daylight at winter solstice, 12:40 hours of daylight at summer solstice), the dogs have finally shut up (first time!!  they must be starting to like me), the crickets are cricketing, there's a warm breeze, and my glass of Costa Rican wine needs refilling.

Pura Vida

Alajuela & San Pedro de Poas, COSTA RICA
Jan.29, 2015

From the book Colin is reading - Tim Cope's "Off the Rails"

So here I am, landed in Costa Rica [MAP - Leg II].  I am on my own, as Colin couldn't get the time off work - he will instead take some of his vacation in a month or so, and catch up with me then.

I'm starting off in this town called Alajuela - definitely not a tourist spot, but, close to the San Jose airport for my late evening arrival, and a heck of a lot cheaper than San Jose, the capital.  I'm in a B&B with a fantastic breakfast - none of this continental breakfast sugar pile of bread and jam, instead Costa Rican style rice and beans, eggs, bacon, fried caramelized plantains, coffee, fresh squeezed juice of some fruit or other...  After that, I can face anything.

Some people think of traveling solo as a Scary Thing.  It is, to start off with.  You basically show up knowing only what you've read (if you've had any time), what you've heard from other people, and hopefully with a place to stay for at least the first night or two.  But you have no idea if the people bite, if what you learned is in fact the language they speak, where is the bank, how to get food, what to do first, what to do next...

But, if I could deal with my IT department at work without getting fired, I could certainly navigate day to day life in central Costa Rica.  As with anything anywhere, pants on one leg at time, then set off one step at a time.

It becomes a series of small accomplishments and victories, maybe an occasional setback or two.  Finding the bank.  Finding food.  Finding the bus station and how to get around on local transport.  I find I become friends with a place only once I've walked around, got to know it a bit.  Because fear comes mainly from not knowing.

No lingering in Alajuela - after a day of taming the masses, I left for San Pedro de Poas on the bus, barely more than a school bus.  I rehearsed and used my best ever Spanish to ask the nice lady sitting in front of me about the place I wanted to get off - "get off by the yellow sign for Finca Nazareno" were my instructions, a farm about 2km outside of San Pedro.  Once off the bus I asked any local soul who would talk to me where Leo's place was, and was sent first in one direction, then in the other.  That's OK - I'm missing most of ski season this year, so wandering the road with my pack, Big Bertha, made my ski legs feel better.

When finally I set my pack down in my own little casita in Leo's back garden, I was elatedly proud.  Not necessarily on the edge of dangerous trouble, but, I wasn't sleeping in the ditch tonight.

As they like to say here in Costa Rica, Pura Vida...  Life is good.