From the Clouds to the Sea - Costa Rica!

A couple of years back I took a solo trip to Costa Rica.  I rented a Suzuki DR650 and rode from the ocean to the sea exploring some great eco parks, checking out many local critters and enjoying the hospitality of the wonderful people of Central America.  Now two years later I have returned with the intention of further exploring this interesting place and sharing that adventure with my friend and partner in crime, Paula.

Once again the bikes were rented from Motos Costa Rica and once again I chose to use the Suzuki DR650.  The advantage of the DR650 over its little brother the 350 and the other option of a Honda XR650L is that it's a little less of a dirt bike and more road worthy.  The seat height is slightly lower and the bike works well on the pavement.  Yes, our plans include a bit of dirt and rocks but I still felt that the DR would be more comfortable for both of us.  My only real concern was Paula taking on the dirt.  She has had some exposure on her recent trip to New Zealand but I was planning on taking her on something a bit rougher.  Fortunately my concerns were unfounded as you will soon see.

After a long night of flying from SF to LA to Guatemala City we arrived in the morning in Costa Rica.  Despite the lack of sleep we were both excited to go pick up our bikes and start the exploring.  After a 30 minute taxi ride we reached Villas de la Colina and the home of Motos Costa Rica.  Paul was busy with a couple of guys who needed to be checked out on the bikes so Paula and I hung out for a bit chatting with yet another customer from the States.  In time Paul returned and set us up with our gear.  Despite the heat we came prepared with our usual riding gear and a couple of moderate sized backpacks.  Our plan was to go as light as possible so we could enjoy the road without hauling around a serious amount of gear.

We hit the road around 11am and made our way from Atenas out to San Ramon where we picked up a wonderful mountain road out to La Fortuna.  I had ridden this route before and new what to expect.  It was great fun getting dialed in to the DR and soon I was slicing my way up the mountain one twisty piece at a time.  Paula was not far behind working out the differences between this little single and her typical ride of a large Ducati twin back home.  We stopped a couple of times to admire the scenery and take a couple of photos up on the mountain.  The heat was bearable especially when riding since the air flow over the bike helped to keep us cool.  There was a bit of cloud cover as well so it really wasn't as hot as I expected.

We rolled into La Fortuna in the late afternoon and spent an hour or so looking for a place to call home for the night.  In the two years since I was last here there had obviously been some serious construction going on.  We managed to get a room for $40 in a brand new place that consisted of 8 or so little bungalows.  Sitting on our porch we had the perfect view of the perfect volcano.  The shape of the mountain is about as close as you can get to the perfect triangular volcano shape.  We enjoyed the waning light and after dinner sat there watching the ever so slight orange glow at the top of the mountain.  All in all a perfect start to our trip.

After a good nights sleep we woke up ready for the road!  Today we would circumnavigate Lake Arenal and then head for the Cloud Forest.  It was really nice to wake up for a change and not have to worry about work, traffic, meetings, phone calls and email.  The reality of vacation really doesn't set in until you find yourself rolling along a road enjoying the greenery when out of nowhere runs a Coatimundi across your path.  At least that's the point where I realized I sure ain't in Kansas anymore!  Two more Coati's and a snake later we hit the shores of Lake Arenal.  Here the road transitioned from smooth pavement into my favorite ice cream...rocky road!

The DR's soaked up the bumps and potholes with nary a complaint.  We motored along for a few miles until we found a really cool arboretum and serpiente showcase.  This place was set into the hillside above the lake and featured plants from all over the world.  Some areas were covered over with netting while others were open to the forest.  We were handed a guide with information on each of the plants as well as each of the snakes in their cages.  We also were treated to a butterfly enclosure with a variety of colorful specimens.  Normally I'm not much of a plant lover but here there were so many shapes, sizes and colors of plant I couldn't help but appreciate the collection.

Back on the trail again we enjoyed a rather challenging climb on up to Monteverde.  The road transitioned from hard-pack dirt to a cobblestone creation with some rather severe combinations of rock and gravel.  Thankfully there were a few opportunities to stop and enjoy the views and take a break from the hammering the bikes were giving us.  By mid-afternoon we reached the outskirts of Santa Elena and stopped to make reservations for a canopy walk the next morning.  We then set off to find a place to stay for the night.  After a bit of searching around we settled on a place just off the main drag that afforded us a quiet place to relax, listen to some music and read.

In the early morning we jumped onto the bikes and zoomed on up the hill to enjoy a quite hike through the Cloud Forest.  Costa Rica is host to one of the most diverse plant environments in Central America.  Our hike today would take us along some wonderful paths through the jungle and then across several ravines and valleys via some small suspension bridges.  We pretty much had the place to ourselves and enjoyed the quiet time watching the birds, inspecting the plant life and listening to the ever present insect songs.  It was really neat!

From the mountains to the sea it was time to drop down onto the Nicoya Peninsula!  We gathered up our gear and followed our intended path per our National Geographic maps on down into the flat lands.  The ride was rather fun with a mix of hard pack and splotchy pavement to keep things interesting.  Sure enough as we lost elevation the temperature started climbing up toward the triple digit mark.  Fortunately there are plenty of little towns scattered about each with a friendly "Soda" available for a quick stop to refresh.   We found one such place down near the Pan American Highway where we soaked up a Coke and an empanada.  Yum!

Once down on the Pan American we shot up north a couple of miles and then pealed off onto the Nicoya Peninsula.  From there it was a long hot ride up the center of the Peninsula until we passed Filidelfia (no relation to Pennsylvania!) where we then turned west for the last little section of dirt highway to Playa del Coco.  Note that we encountered a couple of Costa Rica's finest along the main highway somewhere near Santa Cruz.  Luckily we were only 10 mph over the limit and by the time they saw me we were somewhat legal.  Shooting radar is about as busy as these guys get.  Most of the time we saw cops two up on motorcycles or cruisin' around down in a beat-up little Toyota-type car.  Mostly they would hang out and chat with the locals.  Never saw anything else worth their effort.  Kinda cool actually!

In Playa del Coco we circled around town for a half hour or more getting pretty flustered with the lack of good hotels and the poor directions of the guide book.  We finally located what we were looking for by riding down the beach boardwalk.  A second floor room in a third rate motel for $40 a night.  It had a great view of the ocean with a nice breeze in the evenings.  Finally, time to relax!

We spent the entire next day on the water.  Paula went out with a local guide and did some snorkeling while I hooked up with a dive outfit, Deep Blue Diving Adventures and did a couple of scuba dives off Catalina Island.  It was great fun and along the way we were surrounded by 30 or more dolphins.  Too bad we didn't get to swim with them!  We did however encounter a couple of stingrays, a moray eel and a juvenile white tip reef shark.  Not bad for fair water conditions!

Between dives we were treated to fresh sashimi!  Our boat driver got on the radio and next thing you know we were side by side with another small boat.  Soon a plastic bag comes flying over and then a tube of wasabi.  Man these guys know how to live!  That with the fresh pineapple was just about too much for me to bear.  I was ready to quit my job and relocate to Costa Rica on the spot!  Whoo hoo!

We spent the latter half of the day chilling out on the porch reading books and listening to our Ipods.  Dinner was yet another fabulous meal of local fish with beans, rice and potatoes.  I never quite got over the combo of rice and potatoes though,  I was always brought up eating one or the other and never both at the same time!  Funny!

The following morning we suited up in our riding gear and hit the road for venues south.  First stop?  Playa Conchal!  Now our National Geographic maps showed a fair amount of detail for this area of Costa Rica but we weren't sure how passable the roads would be.  Some folks said we would encounter very poor roads and some difficult trails.  Others said that we would see a lot of changes and would be surprised at what we found.  Who was right?  Both!  Yes the roads were all dirt and in some cases crossed river beds but all in all we were able to motor on down the peninsula with nary a worry.  Ok, so Paula was a little nervous about a couple of the river crossings but in the end she did fine!

As you can see from the photo Playa Conchal was quite the find.  Thanks to Paula's guide book we took a slight detour and ended up spending an hour or two playing in the water and snorkeling off the rocks.  The only drawback was having to put our riding gear on after letting the salty water dry on our skin.  The price one has to pay for playing in paradise!

Thirty or so miles later found us entering Tamarindo.  This major resort town is home to the usual cast of surf enthusiasts, fisherman and vacationing families.  We managed to score a nice room with AC and a poolside porch for $60 or so.  I must say it was awfully nice to be able to lounge and read a bit.  This dusty road travel is fun but hey, I'm on vacation!  That evening we spent time wandering the beach and enjoying a few more tropical cocktails.  I'm really beginning to like these rum and colas and Pina Coladas!

In the morning we took our time gearing up and hitting the road.  The truth be told we were not as eager to go riding since we were beginning to relax and enjoy the lazy latitude lifestyle.  Not to mention the heat was really slowing us down some.  Its one thing to wander the streets in shorts and Tevas when its hot out but quite a different thing to don a pair of heavy black boots, socks, knee pads, long padded pants, a jacket with elbow pads and armor and then helmet and gloves.  At least we cooled off some while riding since the air was not so stifling.

From Tamarindo we enjoyed a wandering coastal trail ride that took us through San Jose Pinela, Paraiso, Lagarto, Marbella, San Juanillo, Ostional, Garza, Barco Quebrado and finally to Samara.  Somewhere along that route I took me eyes off the road to take in some of the scenery and promptly nailed a rock with the front wheel.  It was one of those hits that sent a message directly to the cerebral cortex and registered on the "Oh Crap" meter.  No, I didn't bend a rim or toss the bike down but I did manage to get a tiny hole in the tube that registered as a wobbly front tire within a couple of miles.  Luckily for me we were just entering town and with sudden inspiration I pulled up in front of a soda and requested the location of a llantera (tire repair shop).  The reply was wonderful!  Three hundred meters ahead on the right!

Sure enough we found a nice little repair shop nestled into the side of this guys home.  It took him about an hour to remove the rim and tire, locate the hole, patch it with a truck tire patch and then reinstall everything.  All the while a rooster was crowing in the back of the shop and Paula and I stood there with sweat dripping off our brows watching in amazement.  Once it was all back together I inquired as to the bill.  1500 colones.  Hmm, quick mental calculation.......$3.00!  Cool!!  After purchasing a cold Pepsi from his wife we jumped on the bikes and continued on our merry way.  This place is way cool!

Our day ended in Samara where we paid premium dollars for a fully furnished place on the beach complete with kitchen, pool and my all time favorite...hammocks!  Gotta love relaxing in a hammock with a cold beer and warm breeze.  Pretty hard to beat if you ask me!

Another lazy morning although both of us were feeling pretty eager to hit the road.  According to the map we would have a little more adventurous of a day ahead of us since there were streams and rivers indicated on our route.  Hmm, this could be fun!  We had to backtrack a little to top off the tanks but it was worth it.  The day before we had to stop and buy gas from a kid with a 55 gallon barrel and a 1 gallon jug for a transfer container.  Not the best method of filling the tank.

Once on the road we settled into a rhythm of riding, stopping, photoing, repeat.  Lots of interesting things to see including a rather large and fast snake that took me by surprise.  He was at least six feet long and moved so quick that I didn't catch a photo nor a really good look.  I could see him up in a tree about ten feet off the road but his camouflage was so good it was tough to figure out what kind of snake I was looking at....yikes!

As we came upon interesting places we would often stop, order a soda or a pineapple and water drink so we could relax a bit and soak up the ambiance.  Occasionally we would simply soak in our own sweat as the temperatures would often climb a bit closer to the triple digit range but that just goes with the territory.  Once we were back on the bikes and up to speed the wind would help keep us cool.

As we rounded Punta Coyote I noticed a small sign with a turtle on it.  Being ever the curious one I peeled off toward the water following the signs.  We soon found ourselves rolling along a sandy two-track toward a research station for turtles.  I came close to losing Paula along the way as I suddenly noticed a giant dust cloud in my mirror.  Apparently she was experimenting with traction and the lack thereof in the sand.  Whups!  No dropsies but a bit of an adrenaline rush!

The turtle camp was nothing more than a couple of open tents along the beach with one in particular laid out with a set of grid of lines and other paraphernalia indicative of research.  Within moments of our arrival a twenty-something year old guy in shorts and t-shirt smoking a cigar came up to investigate.  Turns out he is both a turtle researcher as well as a shark guy.  He was the only one at the camp because it was after turtle egg laying season and all they needed was someone to hang out and watch the gear.  He took us around the camp showing us photos of the turtles, bottles of pickled eggs and baby turtles as well as other pamphlets on the foundation who funds the research.  Pretty cool stuff if you ask me!

After a pleasant chat Paula and I took off down the trail with all this new information running around our heads and a better appreciation for wildlife research.  As romantic as it sounds the guy we met was living in a tent with no fresh water available for showering and very few amenities.  You really have to have your heart into your work to do something like this...

By mid-afternoon we entered Malpais, anther surfer town on the peninsula.  After a bit of wandering around we found "The Place" to stay.  Literally!  For $70 we were given the Honeymoon suite,  a nice little bungalo that was really neat until the ants came to visit.  Ah well, bugs in paradise!  It was still a neat looking room despite the bugs.  The pool wasn't too bad either nor did it hurt to have fresh sangria available at the pool bar.  Hic!

While lounging at the pool we noticed the clouds breaking up a bit.  That's when I remembered the guy at the turtle camp mentioning that there would be a solar eclipse that afternoon.  Sure enough the clouds thinned out enough for us to have the perfect show.  Paula and I rattled off picture after picture as the moons shadow drifted across the face of the sun.  The light became fuzzy and gray as the sunshine diminished in strength.  It was really pretty awesome and we marveled in our luck at being in the right place at the right time.  Once the show finished up we wandered into town for dinner and a beer to celebrate yet another cool day on the road.

From Malpais it was a hop, skip and jump down to Montezuma.  We had now turned the corner at the end of the Nicoya Peninsula and were heading back toward the east.  Montezuma turned out to be a crowded little surfer town and we chose to turn tail and run.  I had been thinking of staying in Tambor for our last night so we motored on over to check things out.  Turns out there really wasn't much to the place so we stopped for a coke and a map consultation.

We decided to continue on up the road to see what was between Tambor and the ferry terminal in Paquera.  About 10 miles up the road Paula suddenly pulls up next to me motioning to stop.  She motioned towards her map case and said something about her GPS.  When she finally settled down a bit I found out that her nice Garmin GPS was missing and that the last place she had handled it was back in Tambor.  Unfortunately we were running real low on fuel so we had to charge ahead a couple more miles to the nearest gas station before turning tail and hammering back to Tambor.

At the little Mom and Pop place where we had enjoyed our sodas we asked the woman at the counter if she had found the GPS.  No joy.  We searched high and low and even rode back a few miles searching the side of the road but unfortunately the GPS was no where to be found.  Drat!  Nothing takes the wind out of your sails like losing something expensive while on vacation.  Paula was pretty depressed.  It didn't help much that we saw nothing interesting in the way of hotels either.  We finally chose to backtrack to Tambor and get a room in a roadside hotel as our last resort.  At least the drinks were cool and the pool clean.

Our last full day on the road turned out to be filled with even more trauma and drama.  Well, maybe not trauma but it wasn't quite what we had planned.  I figured we would load up, hit the road, catch the ferry and end up at the Bed and Breakfast place by early afternoon.  That was the plan anyway...

So the real story is that we had a nice easy ride on into Paquera.  We followed the signs out to the ferry landing and stopped to take a look around.  The 8:30 boat was already cruising across the bay and according to the sign on the wall the next was due to sail at 12:30.  Figuring we had a couple of hours to kill we decided to back track and explore the town.  I motored on up the hill and then back down to the main road.  Sitting there at the stop sign I became concerned because Paula was not there behind me.  She rarely dropped back that far when we were riding together.  So I turned tail and back tracked a mile where I found her on the side of the road shrugging her shoulders.  Uh oh!

Turns out her bike simply quit.  No lurching, no warning just phut!  Hmm, this was getting interesting.  We pushed the bike over to a shady spot and I began inspecting the bike for clues.  Unfortunately having no tools with me I was unable to really do what I needed to do.  I did locate the dummy wires for the clutch interlock and sidestand interlock but those both looked ok.  The bike would light up when turned on and the starter motor worked.  Just no spark at the plug.

About that time a guy on a quad goes by and then doubles back.  He introduced himself and then offered what help he could.  In no time I was using his tools to remove the seat and look for blown fuses or other signs of failed equipment.  He suggested we use his tow rope to go back to the ferry terminal and work on the bike there.  Turns out the sign we read was wrong and the next ferry was due at 10:30.  Cool!

So I had Paula jump on my bike to which the tow rope was attached.  I in turn got onto her bike and held the rope down against the handlebar in such away as to keep the bikes tethered together but not tied off.  I could release pressure on the rope in case something happened and it would drop away from the bars.  That worked fine for a mile or two until we reached the hill.  There was no way I could hold on going up the hill.  What to do??

Then our new friend suggested tying off the rope to the quad.  It had a much lower 1st gear and would allow us to make the climb at a much lower pace.  I could safely tie the rope to Paula's bike and ride it up that way.  To my surprise it worked and in no time we made it to the top of the hill.  There were untied the bike and handed everything back to our friend.  He waved goodbye as I coasted away down the hill and right onto the next ferry.  What timing!

The ferry ride was pretty uneventful.  We did our best to relax in the air conditioned upper deck while we transited the Gulf of Nicoya.  In Puntarenas we gracefully exited the boat with me pushing Paula's bike while wearing all my gear and giant backpack.  I called Motos Costa Rica and told Paul our tale of woe.  He responded by telling me he would be there in an hour or so to come pick us up.  Cool!  We killed time by chowing down at a little soda by the terminal.  I do enjoy the fresh fish and rice!

Paul showed up with his Toyota flat bed truck and apologized for the bike problems.  I told him not to worry because it was all part of the adventure.  I'm sure my response would have been different if it had happened at the beginning of the trip.  While Paul and Paula shared the truck ride back to Atenas I enjoyed my last little spin on the DR.  I got to weave in and out of traffic Tico-style avoiding the millions of pot holes just like the locals.  Zooming up the hill was fun and I even got a chance to enjoy a little thunder and lightning show!  At the top of the hill I paused for a cool drink at a place with a view and was later joined by P and P.  It was a nice way to finish up the ride.

A few miles later we pulled up in front of Paul's house.  In no time at all we were sitting on the porch, sharing ride stories and sipping a very fine rum.  You can't get much better than that!

So for a few pictures of our trip go here.

For info on Motos Costa Rica go here.

Craig