Corcovado National Park, Osa, Costa Rica

My girlfriend from California wanted to come down to Costa Rica for a visit again. I told her to come on down and I would meet her at the airport. I could hardly parade her around Quepos with all my flavor of the days we would run into so I decided to go on a trip to the Corcovado National Park on the Osa Peninsula to the South of Quepos/Manuel Antonio. The Osa is a much less developed area and it has a large National Park where you can see scarlet macaws, big cats like jaguars or pumas, lots of monkeys, tropical birds and many other interesting tropical rainforest things.

I met her at the airport and we spent the night at my house. We went to Cafe Aqua Azul because she always liked sitting up on the hill watching the monkeys and birds. Then we flew to Osa the next day. I had booked the trip with a travel agent so everything was planned already. We were met at the airport by a taxi that took us over to the river where we boarded a small boat for a ride to our hotel. There were four other people in our group. One older couple from North Carolina and a couple from the midwest in the States. On the ride down the river we saw lots of birds and some snakes. Of course there were crocodiles along the shore and some swimming out in the current of the river too. I was hoping to see a manatee but we were not lucky enough to find one.

The ride down the river was about an hour long and then we came to the mouth of the river and there were large waves breaking ahead of us. Our boat captain deftly drove our small boat over around and through the crashing waves. It was a bit on the dicey side. One mistake in waves this size and we would have capsized and we would have been swimming in the water with all the crocodiles. He made it look easy the way he slid through this dangerous area. I asked him about it and he told me he has been driving this route for over thirty five years so he was quite familiar with the method to the madness. We followed the coast south for another forty five minutes or so. We could see dolphins playing further offshore. There were fish following in our wake that were jumping out of the water. Our guide told us they were needlefish. Then we motored into a very small bay and he ran the boat straight into the shallows and grounded the boat on the rocky shore. We got out and walked through ankle deep water to get the rest of the way to the beach and they carried our bags for us. We climbed up the hillside to our hotel and checked in. There was one other couple at the hotel already so there was a total of eight guests.

We cleaned up in our rooms and got ready to go eat dinner since the hotel was all inclusive. There were lots of tropical plants growing on the grounds of the hotel and we stopped to look at the chocolate growing on the trunk of its tree. There were also bananas, mangos, papayas, coconuts and tons of flowers growing around us. The dinner was very entertaining as we all got to know a little bit about each other through small talk while we ate. The host explained our options for activities while we were there. All of us wanted to go to the park to hike around and see animals and birds. We booked an all day excursion for the next morning to the park. A boat would pick us up right after breakfast. We spent the night talking and drinking with our new friends before hitting the sack fairly early.

The next morning after a very good filling breakfast we again walked through the ankle deep water to get on the water taxi and we were off to the park. After about an hour we rode the waves into the shore and beached the boat again. We got out and walked to shore with absolutely nothing but jungle everywhere we looked. We were assured that our guide would meet up with us there. While we were there I spotted some scarlet macaws and we all ran up the beach to look at the beautiful scarlet colored parrots playing and eating in a tree right on the beach. Our guide showed up and after the macaws flew off we headed into the jungles for our hike. I was quietly saying, lions and tigers and bears oh my....In the morning we saw lots of monkeys and a few birds. Our guide was getting a little miffed at me because I was finding more things to look at then he was. I have a talent for seeing wildlife that I have had my entire life no matter where I am. I am just observant and I use my ears as much as my eyes to find things. We saw toucans, mot mots, parrots, hummingbirds, deer, sloths, birds birds and more birds, crocodiles, camens, snakes and more. I loved the hike.

Back in Manuel Antonio

It was raining a lot in Quepos/Manuel Antonio when I first arrived back this time. A hillside slid down and wiped out some houses near the gas station in town and for a short while closed the only station in town. That panicked some drivers but the station reopened quick enough so that there really was not a problem. The bridges north of town flooded and isolated the towns of Quepos and Manuel Antonio for several days. The stores quickly ran out of goods to sell since all the goods come into town by truck over the bridges. At one point a big tree came floating down the river and the city thought that it would take the bridge out completely but it just slammed into the bridge and then slid under it and went out to sea. The bridges were terrible and it would not have been a loss if it had gone down. It was built out of left over rails from the trains that used to carry bananas to the port from the banana farms before the banana blight wiped out the local banana business. Now the banana fields have been replaced with palm oil trees. Vietnam created a good market for palm oil to be used in the making of napalm for the war. now everywhere you look there are palm oil trees in the Quepos area. The processing plant is a major polluting eyesore on the road between Quepos and Parrita to the North. They burn the dead palm fronds to make the oil from the nuts so it is a self sustaining business that uses very little fuel. The nuts are brought to the plant in oxcarts and some tractor pulled wagons. There are common sights on the road to Quepos.

I found a house to live in near the top of the hill in Manuel Antonio. It was a brand new house just built by the owner in a nice family complex. I was one of only two non family members living in the compound of 10 or 11 houses. I never had to worry about thieves or anything because someone from the family was always around to guard my place when I wasn't home. I liked the security that offered. The house was a two bedroom with a living room and a kitchen dining room with one bath with a shower in it. One of my old girlfriends immediately found me and wanted to move in with me. Her and her 13 year old daughter were basically homeless at the time so I let them stay with me for a while. Living with a kid again was not my idea of fun. Girls at that age are at their absolute worst behavior and this girl was no exception at the time. All her teachers and everybody said she was the perfect child but at the house she was a total hormonal mess. One night she got up and made herself some food. She finished off 2 pounds of cheese, a loaf of bread, half a kilo of hamburger, a couple liters of juices and all the ice cream and sweets in the house. She also left the kitchen in a disaster zone. I had to laugh but I also could not allow that type of behavior or she would weigh a few hundred pounds real quick. I talked it over with her mother and we worked out a plan to prevent it from happening again like that.

Having a girlfriend and her daughter living with me curtailed my flavor of the day fun somewhat but did not eliminate it entirely. I just went to their place or did it when my friend was out of town which she was often. She had relatives all over the country and she went to see them sometimes. I had plenty of time for myself. I mostly hung out at the beach again. I really love the beach at Manuel Antonio. The palm trees lining it and the nice quality of sand with just the right amount of people to make it interesting but not too crowded. The police patrolled it to prevent nudity but there were still plenty of people that flaunted the rules. I played in the surf for a couple of hours a day to keep myself fit. I also walked along the beach. Walking in the sand was like going to physical therapy for me. It was very helpful for my leg pain and mobility problems. I would kick back on the sand and get nicely heated up then go walk for a while then so surf to cool down. The routine was improving my health and keeping my weight down too. Plus I met lots of dates at the beach. My friends were all amazed at the way I would just go pick a prospect out and go talk to her for a while then go have a date with them. The Ticas never say no. That is all you have to know to be successful, easy as picking grapes.