Episode I - A New Beginning (Friday, June 18th, 1999)
My plane took off from Ottawa a few minutes late. For some reason it took a long time to take off, but once in the air, it was a short flight to Newark, NJ. Before landing, we rounded the airport for 15 minutes. It gave me a chance to examine New York city and surrounding areas. Since the plane was late and Newark's a big airport, I almost missed my connecting flight to Houston, TX. I took off for Houston sitting in the seat closest to the bathroom (yeah!). Sitting next to a nice family from Newark. They were heading to Lima, Peru - the father's home country. The wife son and daughter had never been to his homeland. The flight attendants were extremely nice on that flight, but as usual the coach meal was crap (some kind of BBQ end-meat sandwich). Pretty much what I was expecting. Since the plane wasn't full I was able to change to a more comfortable seat and take a little nap. This was my first time in the state of Texas. I noticed the pavement on the roads was a different color, almost beige, and so was the landscape. It looked like where a desert met a swamp. The Houston area seemed to be a densely populated area. When I was waiting for currency exchange, there was a woman behind me in line, which by the way spoke an incomprehensible language (a Mexican Spanish slang mixed with some Texas and a bit of Brooklyn), who had a bunch of gold teeth. A lot of people in the airport, tourist excluded, seem to have such possessions. What the fuck? My flight was leaving Houston around 17h30.
Waiting for the plane, I decided to go to a small bar and order an overpriced airport beer. I glanced at the paintings on the wall. They were mostly of 19th century sailboats with French and even Acadian flags! Boarding began. Unlike the plane I just left, this sold out flight was full of weirdos. I went and sat next to a middle-aged man (retired FBI now high school teacher in Houston) and his college freshman daughter. A bit about our dear Continental plane. I didn't get a very good first impression of that plane. Kind of old looking, with patches of paint on its grease-dirtied wings and ashtrays on the armrests. After having the doors closed for a while, but not moved an inch, people became anxious and the captain cames on the PA system and said : "Sorry for the delay folks, but were just finishing up some routine checks." never heard that before They finally decided to move the plane onto the "funway". Odd, ...the plane's brakes don't usually make that big squeaking sound. Everyone went silent. After a few seconds, conversations resumed. The plane took off. In the air, the plane started doing all kinds of maneuvers (increasing / decreasing thrusters, swirving left then right, etc...). The loudness of conversations diminished. I looked out the window to look at the wing flaps, which should have retracted back in the wing by now, was still deployed. Just before turning my head, something started spewing out of the tip of the wing. At first, it looked like smoke. Why would smoke be coming out of the wingtip. The PA system came back on : "Ladies and Gentlemen, we're having difficulties retracting the front landing gear, so we're going to dump fuel for 15 minutes and land back in Houston. Thank you for your patience." So we went over the Gulf of Mexico for an agonizing 15 minutes - time didn't fly when we were dumping our plane's fuel in mid air. I think the fear sat in when the captain said : "Flight attendants, please take your seats for landing and buckle up." Every person in the plane went dead silent after feeling the back wheels land, hoping that the two front wheel would still preform their duties. After landing safely and applause from the Hare Krishna section, everyone in the plane was hoping for a new plane at the very least, but they refueled it and did maintenance on the front landing gear for an hour with the passengers remaining in the plane.
The plane next to us at the terminal had an ambulance next to it with two paramedics running up stairs to get in the plane. Before we could start talking about the medics, two armored cars pulled up between the planes at an empty terminal port. Four huge African-American men stepped out with M-16 machine guns and thick BP vests. A few minutes passed and a passenger airplane pulled up to the port and docked the plane. A Cadillac pulled up to the back of the plane. An Armani-dressed man stepped out to meet the four guards walking toward him. Everybody was wearing black sunglasses. A few other airport officials arrived. They opened the rear baggage compartment and backed up the conveyor belt next to the door. One of the armored cars backed up next to the belt. They unloaded approximately 25 bags in the first truck and 10 in the second. The bags were sort of cubic (0.5 m X 0.5 m X 0.5 m) and were either plain beige cloth or green plastic garbage bags. The well dressed man inspected each bag for tears or tampering with the openings. While the ex-FBI didn't pay much attention, myself and his daughter were mesmerized by this uncommon scene. The daughter proposed that one of the trucks had to be a decoy and only one of the trucks carried valuable packages. I proposed that both trucks were decoys and they were all actors hired by the airport to entertain us while we waited (sarcastically, of course!). We took off before they finished unloading.
We flew over Mexico. We spotted some cities by the bunching of lights on the ground. They looked like little unconnected islands. Arriving over San Jose, capital of Costa Rica, the street light crawled over the mountainous terrain in every which way without many high rises. It looked like a fallen Xmas tree. The plane landed on a runway smaller than the one in Bathurst and used every yard available with thruster at maximum reverse. Locals surrounded the arrival area waiting for friends or waiting to screw over some unsuspecting tourist. In San Jose, you should take the official orange taxis. I took one of them to the place where I'm meeting Rachelle - Pension de la Cuesta. David, the hotel's host, showed me to my room. Rachelle was already there and we were relived to see each other at that late hour.
Chapter II - White Water Rafting on Rio de Pacuare (Saturday, June 19th, 1999)
I heard a knocking at the door, but it didn't register. The third time David knocked, we simultaneously realized that we had slept in and the alarm clock set for 06h00 hadn't work. It was 07h00 and the tour bus was in front to pick us up. We frantically dressed and grabbed the essentials (passport, sunscreen, money) and locked the rest in our room. We got on the minibus still not awake. I looked across the street to see 20 big police dirt bikes lined up 2 by 2 along the side. The policia were all dressed up in black suits with white helmets. Each of them had a Uzi automatic machine gun attached to their side with a strap. The reason for this armada was that the B&B were staying was located next to the Legislative Assembly. The bus had already picked up the rest of the group. We left for a little breakfast place one hour from the city. After breakfast, we drove another half hour on the small mountainous roads and a half hour on a dirt road to get us to the starting point on the Pacuare river. We got basic instructions and safety equipment from our guides, and we were off. Simply breath-taking scenery. It was funny how little frogs and insects that mate every 30 years could make that much noise. We stoped on a little island on the side of the river 3/4 of the way to eat do-it-yourself sandwiches, fresh pineapple, watermelon, and McDonald orange juice. After lunch, we got back on the river for another 45 minutes, then we reached a bridge where the highway passed. We pulled the inflatable boat out of the water onto trucks. There was a little bar with a few local Gino's dancing the salsa, meringue or something. We had a drink and try drying off a bit before getting back in the van. It was a one hour drive back on the highway to San Jose.
Back at the pension, we took showers and tried to dry our belongings brought with us (passport and money). We headed out downtown in search of food. The food market was closed so we went to the small grocery store. The cashier's weren't great mathematicians. We had a little argument over 10 CRC. We got back at the pension and made noodles with tomato sauce. Sleep came easily and so did the dreams of big rapids.
Volume III - Public Transportation (Sunday, June 20th, 1999)
That morning was much more relaxed. We had a light breakfast at the pension. We took our time to get to the bus station and stopped to make a call to Canada. The bus station was in a part of town that I wouldn't like to be in at night. Our bus only left at 11h30. We had a drink while waiting. Before stepping into the bus, I went to the bathroom and when I stepped out, a guy asked me for 40 colones for having used the bathroom. I only had 5000-colones bills so I had to go break it. Not happy am I! We got in the bus and sat in the back. The fare was only 800 colones (4$ US) for about 5 hour ride! I soon realized why it was so cheap. The rear axel was bent so the back half of the bus was vibrating at just the right speed to make everything jiggle. =) At first, it was funny, but after 2 hours of head bobbing, the migrane set in. The bus ride was quite spectacular though. In every bus, a catatonic driver and a sidekick kid (Always there are two. No more, no less. A master and an apprentice.). The kid was there to yell out the bus' destination to the bus stops. If someone at a bus stop waved the driver to stop, he had to be ready to run to get on because most bus drivers barely stop. It was more of a slow down (exceptions were made for seniors...sometimes). This psychopath bus driver also liked to blindly pass 18-wheelers in curbs with no shoulder while having an entertaining conversation with his sidekick. My adrenaline level was getting low. We made a quick stop at a Soda (convenience store) and got some Lime and Salt chips. They tasted weird at first, but we quickly got use to them. After a few stops, enough people got on so I don't see the drivers fancy mountain maneuvers. I just hoped that if we hit something, that it was something smaller.
We passed through Naranjo and then San Carlos. Once in San Carlos, we thought that we were in Fortuna so we got off. We started walking around in the village and checked the maps. The city didn't correspond to the map. Shit! We ran back to the bus station and barely got back on our bus. We finally got to Fortuna 45 minutes later. The maps made much more sense. La Fortuna was a small village 7 km from the Arenal volcano. The enormous monument that we'd come to see, stood behind the church overlooking the town. The iguanas were running on the chuch lawn, as common as squirrels were in Canada. We got to a place which was recommended by Oscar (see above). Cabina Carmella were really nice and clean (Miguel Jr., who spoke choppy English accommodated us and Miguel Sr. was as welcoming, but without the English). The place next door made us a delicious supper. We made reservation for the Monday volcano tour. We were both tired from the bus ride and went to bed not a minute too soon.
Tome IV - Zee Volcano (Monday, June 21st, 1999)
After breakfast and a small walk, we both felt out of energy (mild case of tourista) and decided to go back to our room for a little nap. We woke up from our nap and debated if we had enough energy to go on this hike. Mark (A guy from Vancouver we met on the tour. He said he just finished helped on the filming of a documentary called "Sharks of the golden triangle" for Discovery channel US - look for it in Canada soon!) heard that it was 4 hours of hiking, which we weren't up for. We checked with Miguel and he said it wasn't 4h hard hiking but a 90 minutes stroll. Felix, who was a very nice guide with relatively good English drove us to national park in new van with AC which were both rare things there. We got to the trail's entrance into the jungle and started walking in. Felix showed and explained to us the wildlife such as leaf cutter ants, tucan, parakeet (flying over us), vultures, wild turkeys, and other small birds. Also, we were introduced to the different kinds of plants and trees. We heard a howling monkey in the distance, but never saw it. Without ever have seen this kind of monkey, I thought it was a 500 pound beast because of its deep long scream. I would soon find out though, that this wasn't the case.
The Arenal volcano is one of the most active in the world. Arenal is only 5300 feet high and 4000 years old and still has a lot of growing to do. It has erupted eight or nine times, with the last two in 1968 and 1525. It is ten miles from volcano to Monteverde (one of Costa Rica's national parks). Before the 1968 eruption, there were ten hours of powerful localized earthquakes. Most of the people in a lakeside town on the present site of the national park visitor's center got scared and fled on foot to Santa Elena, where we had just come from. The folks who stayed behind were unlucky. The west side of the volcano blew out and emitted a cloud of gas at a temperature of 600 to 800 degrees C. This cloud destroyed 12 square kilometers. Then the cap rock on the top of the volcano blew out and destroyed another 5 square kilometers. Between 60 and 80 people were killed and are buried under ash. People come to the volcano today because there are usually at least five mini-eruptions every day, each one accompanied by loud booms and glowing hot lava spilling down the sides of the cone. The show had attracted an Industrial Light and Magic crew from the movie Congo.
The torrential rains suddenly stopped as soon as we got at the base of the volcano ; so did the vegetation. We had to do a bit of rock-climbing to get on top of the 100m thick lava formation (the cooled off lava which had flowed down the mountain to its base). I don't know the names, but this wasn't a flowing metallic type lava. It was the chunky kind (I think that's the technical term). The view was simply remarkable. On one side of us, the impressive volcano was emitting huge steam clouds blending with the rain clouds, which had just passed us. On the other side the Laguna de Arenal (the man-made lake adjacent to the volcano and popular windsurfing spot) was panorama material. We took a few pictures and got a history lesson on the volcano from Felix.
We continued on the rocks for a while until we got to the other side of this solidified lava river. Climbing down was trickier than the climb - there were wet wooden steps to watch out for. At the bottom of the steps, we reentered the trail that we had left a few minutes ago. A few minutes walk in a sandy trail lead us to the van which was waiting for us on the other side. We all got in and went at the Tabacon hot springs. We got there at dusk (18h00) and are there for 1 hour. The water temperature was around 30-40C. The mineral rich water's extremely relaxing and rejuvenating. My soar-from-white-water-rafting muscles thank me. We left the springs and got back into the van. On the way back to town, the van unexpectedly stopped because the guide had noticed that we could see the lava flowing off the volcano. We stepped out of the van onto the shoulder of the road and watched for 10 minutes something I don't have words to describe. Imagine this : it's night; the moon shines a faint light through the thin clouds; we see the profile of the volcano very well; off to the right a thunder storm sporadically lights the sky; in the ditch (more like a lagune), the hundred fireflies blink their lights in their little dance; and finally on the right side of the darkened volcano, two red lines of lava slowly running down and every few seconds a red hot rock detaches itself from the stream and rolls down the mountain, emitting sparks as the darkened cooled off rock detaches itself from the whole. I was in a daze for a while... extremely cool!
Back in town, we delft with Miguel Sr. to find drive to Playa del Coco (the beach) for the next day. They usually needed minimum of 4 persons to get the minibus, but he found one of his buddies to drive us. It cost us 35$ US per person. Pricey, but I wanted to get to THE BEACH ASAP. We were both hungry again after that tour. For supper, I ate spaghetti with the best tomato sauce (pureed fresh tomatoes & onions). Rachelle's didn't feel well after her's with meat. I made cards out of some sheets of paper I had. We played a bit and then went to sleep.
Book V - Trip Two (Tuesday, June 22nd, 1999)
Our drive was leaving la Fortuna at 08h30. We had an orange juice and met up with Umberto. We left for Playa del Coco around 09h00. To get to Coco we had to go around Laguna de Arenal, the impoundment of a 1980 hydroelectric project that generates 40% of the country's hydro power. The road got progressively worse as we continued around Lake Arenal. Some sections were washed out and potholes the size of compact cars frightened me. Muddy water filled the holes and made it impossible to determine how deep they were. Since Umberto was himself a tour operator, he was able to spot and describe a lot of wildlife. Along the way, we saw huge blue butterfly (about 9" wing-span), laughing falcons, vultures, herons, tucans, wood peckers, coatamundi (a relative of the raccoon and an opportunist of equal impudence and skill, but with a long nose), and my famous howling monkeys. We stopped to observe almost every animal we saw. When we stopped to see the monkeys (which are about the size of raccoons), they weren't happy that we were on their territory (mid-day is siesta time for them). While walking under the trees where they were, one of the monkeys almost "bombed" Rachelle. Pretty funny!
On the side of the lake, we passed next to a long line of windmills that were very big. After driving two hours in the tropical rain forest we fell on the pacific coast land, which is less dense and with more trees (I think it was called a cloud forest), we finally arrived in Coco. We didn't bother looking for a good restaurant and got screwed at the a corner dump. Payed ridiculous prices for crap and didn't eat much. Instead, we paid and headed out to seek lodging. Walking along the road to get there, I spotted something under the trees on the side of the road and first thought it was a spider or some kind of insect, but I quickly saw many more next to it. When I got closer, I realized that they were small crabs living in holes in the ground. The sight freaked me out because I had seen these crabs on TV, but I never thought I'd find them in Costa Rica. The first hotel was not really nice and the can of bug spray on the ground wasn't encouraging. The second place was better - Hotel Vista Mar. We drop our bags in our room and we hurried to take a swim in the Pacific Ocean for the first time. The 8 to 10 feet waves were a nice change from my usual 2 feet ones home. After a little swim, we got cleaned up and went for a "not bad" supper "downtown", which was about a kilometer from our hotel. We then went to the grocery store to stock up on beer and food. We SLOWLY walked back to our room to drop off what we'd bought. We went to sit on the beach with a beer each and watch the long-awaited-for sunset. I busted half a roll of film just taking pictures of that sunset. We went back inside and washed a few pieces of clothes. After putting the clothes to dry, we went on the front porch, armed with our Muskol, beer, and cards (real ones this time) and played a few games before going to bed.
Edition VI - Ah, the Pacific! (Wednesday, June 23rd, 1999)
I woke up as usual at 5h30 with the sun and the birds to go pee. A bit later that morning, we went back on the patio facing the beach for our breakfast. Coffee, Toast, and fruits always taste better when eaten in a beach-side resort. After breakfast, JP and Caroline passed us some snorkeling equipment. They indicated to us where we should go and where not to go. We walked up the beach to reach the spot that was indicated to us, but the huge waves were messing up the visibility. Snorkeling visibility wasn't dependent on the season (rainy or dry). It's usually a lot of things that contribute to water visibility like wind, tides, rain, etc... We just weren't that lucky. We went to the grocery again for other supplies. While walking through the town square, Rachelle got stung by one of the wasps who were eating fallen mangos. It was a long walk back for her and her pain-filled foot. We went for another swim later that day. After supper, we went to played cards again. Evidently, I didn't spray enough muskol and got bitten 25 times on my feet. The mosquitos on the coast were vicious. The beginning of my trip had been nothing but an adrenaline rush, but this day was giving my unaccustomed body a deserved break. Falling to sleep was simply not an issue with the sound of waves crashing.
Manuscript VII - Trip Three (Thursday, June 24th, 1999)
We woke up to again another beautiful morning in Coco, but it was kinda sad because today, I was starting my trip back to civilization. JP gave me and Rachelle a lift back into town. I bought my ticket to San Jose which cost me 8$, but Rachelle was continuing North on the Pacific coast so she didn't. We went for a walk before my bus left to get some money and souvenirs. Stepping in a bank in Costa Rica was an experience in itself - there were always at least two armed (12 gauge or AK-47's) guards. I got some money and went to look for souvenirs. I bought a hammock and a bag and when I asked the salesman for a deal he said no and as soon as I started to walk away, he caved. I'm sure he still maid a profit though. After I left Playa del Coco at 14h00, Rachelle took a taxi to Playa Hermosa. I was heading back to Pension de la Cuesta in San Jose. Costa Ricans (Ticos) talked Spanish slang and not well so it was hard for me to follow what they said. I think the bus driver was insisting I put my bag under the bus, but there was no way in hell that I was loosing sight of my bag. Fortunately a Canadian woman living in Coco came to my distress. Jody calmed the bus driver down and got him to leave my bag and my hamac alone on the seat next to me. She resided in Coco and managed a small pub called Banana's. She explained to me a bit about Costa Rica and its culture. Quite interesting. Every time the bus stopped, mobile food vendors tried to sell pop, bingo cards, lime-salt chips, and some sort of semi-liquid beverage in plastic bags to passengers. I noticed a climate change when we approached San Jose (high altitude). I arrive at a bus station in San Jose, but of course, it wasn't the one I had thought. There's no central bus station in the city - each destination has its own bus station. Since it was dark, I really didn't feel like taking out my maps to try and orientate myself. I started walking hoping to see street name or somekind of landmark, but nothing. I knew that I could orientate myself if I could only find a street name, but after walking a couple of blocks without seeing one street name, I spotted what seemed to be a police officer. I asked him to direct me to the street I was looking for, but he didn't have a clue where the street I was looking for was located. I took out my mini-map of the pension's surroundings and showed it to him. As soon as he saw that the pension was located next to the Legislative Assembly, he knew which way to direct me, but advised me to take a cab if I didn't want to get mugged or killed. So I took his advise and flagged a cab down. The ride to the pension was an exciting one. We hit a truck and a motorcycle fell in front of us. There went the adrenaline again. I got at the pension and asked for a wakeup knock at 7. I had a hard time taking off my shoes before falling asleep.
Season VIII - Layover, You Say? (Friday, June 25th, 1999)
I had a nice night's sleep at the pension. The wake up knock wasn't necessary, because as usual, I was awake at 5h30. After I made myself a small breakfast, I paid the bill and asked David to call me a cab with a driver who spoke English. When the cab arrived, it was no surprise that the driver didn't speak a word of English. yeah! So I took out my little book and I managed for him to take me to the airport. Once at the airport, the driver was asking 3 times what it had cost me for the opposite trip. I didn't have enough money to pay him or the vocabulary to argue with him. And what's worse is that I didn't understand Spanish ATM and had to go to the bank in the airport and put it on my Visa. I finally got the money and paid him. I also paid the airport fee of 17 $. I then bought souvenirs, coffee, and alcohol. I was relived to finally get on the plane after a hard time with the Continental clerk. I got in the plane and sat down. While the engines were reving up, just before we backed up away from the terminal, surprise surprise : there were problems on my plane. The auxiliary power jet failed and every electric gizmo on the plane went dead. A few Americans freaked out and wanted to get off the plane. The pilot came on the PA system and tried to reasure us, but I just didn't give a shit anymore to listen to this guy. An hour passes and we finally took off at 08h30 for a 6 hour flight non-stop to Newark, NJ. Blast from the Past was playing in the plane - not bad. We arrived at 17h00. That was a long flight. My connecting flight to Ottawa was only leaving the next morning at 07h30, so instead of leaving the airport and busting 200$ US, I bought a book : Hannibal (the sequel to Silence of the Lambs). I managed to finish the book within 24 hours. I got in Ottawa Saturday morning very tired and glad to be home.
