Part Seven.

This is Part Eleventy-Million of the story of our trip to Costa Rica. Here are Parts One, Two, Three, Four, Five, and Six.

So, here it is Tuesday morning, Saint Patrick's Day. I am writhing around in bed. No more waterpoop; apparently Costa Rican prescription diarrhea medicine corks that shit right up. But I'm still having the bad cramps and the sweats. I am writhing around, twisting up in the mosquito net, and Jason comes in and gingerly says, "Uh, so, Kristi and Chris are hiking to the waterfalls." We look at each other. I say, "Okay." We look at each other. I writhe a little. He says, "Um, so, do you want to go?" FOR GOD'S SAKES, JASON. NO HIKING. I DON'T WANT TO HIKE. I HAVE NEVER CLAIMED TO WANT TO HIKE. I HAVE NEVER SUGGESTED THAT I MIGHT WANT TO HIKE. I HAVE NEVER LIED TO ANYONE AND SAID "Oh, I like hiking."

Point is, I don't want to hike and I tell him so. Kristi and Chris leave, and I decide that I cannot spend another day in bed waiting to feel better. I get out of bed and sit on the porch and watch Jason draw and play solitaire while I sweat and cramp.

Kristi and Chris come back from the waterfalls with tails of almost dying, having scaled a sheer flat rock face that someone lied and called a "mountain". Kristi and Chris are pretty adventurous so I have to tell you, it surprises me when they come back sweaty and shaky and dirty, telling us that they both got so scared that they were shaking and weren't sure what to do and got lost and were having to leap and grab and pray that roots would hold until they got to the top, where Kristi realizes that the camera is gone. Apparently her purse wasn't zipped and their camera is gone, killing forever any hopes of my ever laying eyes on this terrible climb that they've endeavored 'cause I SHO AIN'T EVER GOING UP THERE MYSELF.

We decide to go sit in the pool for a while. Sitting there, the cool water makes me feel a little better, and suddenly I make a decision which I announce: "Well, I guess I'm just going to see if the beer can heal me, since I didn't have any yesterday and I'm still not well." Chris likes this idea, has been suggesting it all along, and walks down to the house to get us all beers. We float around and drink a couple of beers. I sincerely feel better. Kristi's rash sincerely doesn't feel better. It has spread from her arms to her chest, stomach, and thighs. She still fears that it's a flesh-eating bacteria. She goes to the main house and asks the owners; they say it's probably nothing serious, but go to the Clinico.

Chris and Kristi head to the Clinico in Cobano. She sees a doctor in the pharmacy (I didn't know they did that!) who speaks English (I didn't know they did that!) and who gives her a skin cream and some Allegra and is able to tell her what she is getting and how to use it and what it does (I didn't know they did that!). She comes back, slathers on her cream and pops an Allegra, and gets back in the pool with us. We spend most of the afternoon floating around, feeling better all around, drinking beers.

Was this when we played Euchre? I know we played at some point on the porch. I think this is when. We played Euchre and continued to drink. Later Chris and Jason cook dinner: by now we've been living on a steady diet of gallo pinto- beans, rice, plantains, and any combination of onions, avocado, tomatos, hot sauce, and salsa. At this point I haven't eaten a meal since Sunday night on account of my intestinal distress. I push my food around while everyone else eats. My stomach starts to feel gross, and I give up on the eating. We sit up and play Spades for a while. Around 10pm, I give up entirely and go to bed feeling grody.

The next morning we get up early, pack up, and catch our shuttle back to San Jose. We have to do all that traveling in reverse: head to Paquera, take the ferry, then catch our shuttle from Puntarenas to Hostel Pangea in San Jose. Apparently Kristi's cream has made her sensitive to sunlight and her arms are covered in blisters. It's a pretty hot, sweaty trip, but we make it, and we're STARVING. We go to the Banco and get some cash, then head back to Hostel Pangea for casados.

This is the first meal I have eaten since Sunday dinner. It's Wednesday Lunch. I effectively didn't eat for about two-and-a-half days. I am ravenous. We drink beers and eat lunch and check into our rooms for a little rest. We go walking in San Jose and buy souveniers and meet the funniest, nicest Costa Rican lady ever. She says things like, "Fuckin' damnit!" and "fuckin' shit yeah!" while she tells us how much she likes Americans and how she traveled across the U.S. from California to New York (or was it the other way around?) and how Alabama has the best fried chicken. She said we need to come back to Costa Rica and bring all our kids and stay at her house "and we'll eat some fuckin' fried chicken!"

That night we sit at the bar at Hostel Pangea and eat the tastiest nachos I've ever had and drink Imperial and relax. Some of Kristi and Chris' law school friends have just gotten back from Jaco or Manuel Antonio or some place and tell us about getting pick-pocketed by gangs of hookers and harrassed by policemen (they have to bribe them to stay out of trouble) and going deep-sea fishing. At some point one of the girls says something like, "Well of course we had air conditioning. We had to have air conditioning."

WE DID NOT HAVE AIR CONDITIONING. NOW GET THE FUCK AWAY FROM MY TABLE.

The next morning, Thursday morning, we head to the San Jose air port and fly home without incident. And that's the story of Costa Rica, in only seven parts.

Part Two.

This is Part Two of our trip to Costa Rica. Part One is here.

So we're standing at the bus terminal with all our luggage with no clue what to do. This Costa Rican cab driver who barely speaks English starts shaking us down to take us to Puntarenas for $100. We are hesitant, and he finally says $80, and we take it (keep in mind it's a two-hour drive). The four of us and our five suitcases squeeze into his tiny red car and take off for Puntarenas. He is playing a mix cd that is all American 70's and 80's music and includes Journey's Faithfully and Billy Idol's Eyes Without a Face. He drives like a mad man to try and get us to the nine o'clock ferry. I fall asleep about half-way there. When I wake up we're pulling up to the ferry terminal as the ferry is pulling away. They tell me that the only reason we missed it is because some bitch on a scooter was driving really slowly and wouldn't let us pass.

So there we are, standing in the middle of the street with five suitcases, and the cab driver points out a restaurant where the food is supposed to be good. We drag all our shit up the long, metal staircase and take a seat in a lovely, open-air place that overlooks the water. The next ferry leaves at twelve, so we have a few hours to kill. We order gallo pinto with juevos, with sour cream, or with beef in sauce, and the waiter suggested we use this sauce. It is GOOD STUFF. We eat slowly and drink hot, strong coffee and smoke cigarettes until twelve.

It is HOT on the ferry, espcecially after dragging all those suitcases up the black, metal stairs. We sit inside and rest. I realize that I still get a little seasick, and curse everyone who ever told me that really big boats don't rock. YES THEY DO.

We get to Paquera and it is HOT. Dripping sweat. A swarthy little man tells us he'll take us to Montezuma for $50. He points at his SUV and says, "That's me." We take him up on it.

He proceeds to take us on one of the wildest rides I've ever been on (from this Wikitravel article: Driving in Costa Rica is, by American standards, dangerous. Costa Rica has one of the highest deaths by car accidents in the world.). He drives very fast on small dirt roads, passing people and honking and giving them dirty looks. He keeps giving us the thumbs-up and saying, "Montezuma! Pura Vida!" (from this article: Costa Ricans use the phrase to express a philosophy of strong community, perseverance, good spirits, enjoying life slowly, celebrating good fortune, whether small or large.)
He turns off the main road onto a red clay road that is so bumpy, so much like off-roading, and Kristi says, "Um, is this a short cut?" He replies, "Si. SHORT CUT." When we discuss it later, we realize that we were all thinking the same thing: he was taking us out into the woods to rob us and maybe kill us.

What happens next? More tomorrow.

Part One.

Crazy morning.

We're back from Costa Rica! It was a pretty wild trip.

San Jose is bizarre, with crazy drivers and scary policemen and cold winds at night and really tasty casados. We stay there the first and last nights at Hostel Pangea, a fucking awesome place with a rooftop bar and restaurant that is cheap and really good. They also have complimentary music at night- apparently there is either a tiny odd venue or someone's practice space very close to the window of our room and we are treated to free, shitty reggae. This particular hostel also has a lot of safety features, because apparently San Jose is somewhat unsafe. Bueno!

The real excitement starts the second morning when we all get up early to take a shuttle to the bus station, where we we are supposed to catch a bus that will take us all the way to Montezuma beach, where we were staying for the bulk of our trip. Apparently the internet can't be relied upon for totally up-to-date information like bus schedules, because our bus leaves an hour before we get there. So we're standing around at a bus station, which is really just a metal shed with a bunch of buses parked outside, and we can't decide what to do.

You see, it's a two-hour drive to Puntarenas, where we're supposed to catch a ferry and ride it for an hour over to Paquera and then it's another hour's drive to Montezuma. In other words, we have a long way to go and not much clue how to get there, since we have missed our planned mode of transport, the bus. So we're four gringos, standing there with five huge suitcases, surrounded by native Costa Ricans who are looking at us like we're crazy gringos with a bunch of suitcases at this tiny bus station that might as well have chickens pecking around in front.

What do we do? More tomorrow.