San Jose, Costa Rica.

The short:

I was taken aback by how much I liked San Jose, considering it was only ever intended as a stop-over to our next destinations in Costa Rica. I must have told Michael 5 times “how much I really like this place”. What I found most captivating is how colourful the city is, with almost all the buildings painted different primary colours and graffiti lining a lot of the pavement walls. This, combined with the bright blueness of the sky and the mountainous backdrop, literally made me feel like I was on the set of a coca-cola advert several times.

The locals spoke impressively good English; this never fails to surprise me when I am abroad and makes me ashamed of how much we rely on other countries bothering to learn our language when we make so little effort to learn theirs! They also came across as very honest and were always extremely helpful, in a very genuine way. What I guess both Michael and I found most interesting was what I can only describe as "over-employment", with lots of shop employees just standing idle, with the same applying to the strong police presence we saw around. 

I would say that San Jose is well on its path to becoming a developed city, with every conceivable Western fast-food joint making an appearance every couple of blocks, albeit this is still contrasted by vast amounts of litter, which lines most roads, and slightly haphazard overhead electricity cabling.

The long:

Sunday:

Having hit the deck immediately upon arriving at the hotel, jet lag woke us pretty early and we were out on the streets ready to roam in our apparent new favourite outfits (worn by this point for a solid 40 hours) by 7:30am. We strolled up and down the different avenues making sure that we saw all the "hit points" recommended to us by our hotel, including two really well kept parks; the national bank and theatre; their "Parliament", and even a Costa Rican Chinatown (what city would be complete without a chinatown?!)

Unfortunately, however, we managed all of this pretty quickly and by 11am were ever so slightly at a loss as to what to do next… so we went to the Gold museum. In all fairness, it wasn’t too bad and I was able to cope due to the fact it was fairly small and it was interesting to see the evolution of their currency (oh, there may also have been some jewellery made from gold). For whatever reason, some rather peculiar and disturbing artwork was on show as well, which I will leave you to judge for yourself:

Upon wandering some more we came across a stall selling fresh coconuts; now, anyone who knows me knows that few things make me happier than devouring these beauties! So, it seems only intuitive that for the rest of my travels I have decided to adopt the classic saying, “an apple a day keeps the doctor away”, and replace apple with none other than COCONUT! Of course, my urgent need for a spoon then took over our casual strolling and we headed to McDonald’s with our street-bought coconuts to acquire one which, aside from amusing us, says a lot about the world today.

Even though there wasn’t a huge amount of attractions to visit, it was an absolutely gorgeous day and there were so incredibly few tourists that it was really just quite nice to observe the on-goings of every day normal life. For example, there was a huge queue for the bank in the central square, with many people shading themselves with umbrellas and, having heard a sermon from the street, popped our heads into a church only to be stunned by how packed the church was. Having "popped our heads" into many churches on our various travels, I can safely say that it was definitely the most full I have ever seen a church, so that was pretty cool to see. 

By this point, a well-deserved pit stop was in order and Michael got a pint of local beer for £1.30 (not too shabby). We then hit a local supermarket as we both 1) love exploring any supermarket but, 2) love checking out foreign supermarkets and how their produce differs to what we are accustomed to at home. After stocking up on a few bits and bobs, we trundled off to the hotel with incredibly high hopes that our bags would have arrived. Obviously, they had not. But the good news is it wasn't long before they did; the bad news is it wasn’t long before we discovered a brand new full bottle of sun lotion had exploded over all of Michael’s things. So, all in all, a super smooth journey from London. Naaat. Oh well, after a serious scrub and adorning some much appreciated clean clothes, we left our room feeling a million $$$.

We headed in search of a bar for some pre-dinner drinks, but failed miserably; a serious lack of bars in San Jose it would seem! However, it did mean we ambled down lots more of the back streets at a different time of day, which enabled us to once more see the city in its true light. It transpired that both of us had individually noticed how liberal San Jose is, with some fairly vivid PDA being exchanged between each possible gender combo. Although I’m all for free love and what-not, I guess it was mostly surprising since it’s both well-known, and we had seen first-hand, how religious the community is. 

So, having given up on our search for a bar, we headed to our chosen dinner restaurant to celebrate my boy's big achievement slightly before schedule and, BOY, were we not disappointed. It was an Argentinian place and it was cool, and quirky, and busy, and, not to mention, mmm DELICIOUS!!! Some seriously amazing steak was consumed, washed down with a beautiful Malbec. We left merry and smiling from ear-to-ear; it was most definitely a memorable evening.

Monday:

We made a bee-line for the local market, which sold all manner of things from food to clothes to jewellery, and even live animals (which I wasn’t overly impressed by). The space was incredibly crowded and it was undoubtedly as "local" as you can get, with many people buying freshly cooked savoury pancakes and "Gallo Pinto" (a traditional form of rice and beans, which we both have yet to try but looks pretty yummy).

Having grabbed our bags from the hotel we headed to the bus station to make our journey to Tamarindo. We stood out like sore thumbs, but hop on board we did, with a 4.5 hour travelling time to go. I can only describe the temperature on the bus as akin to what I imagine a fat man being buried alive in the dessert would feel like. This "situation" was in no way improved when the bus engine overheated at just over the half way point. Everyone was literally drenched in sweat and there was practically a stampede off the bus in search of some cool from the 30-something degree weather outside. We were told that a replacement bus had been sent from the nearest town and would be with us in 20 minutes… Just shy of 2 hours later the bus arrived (we must remember that we are on “Tico time” now), and we all piled on to complete the remaining 3 hours of travel. 

The only upside to our unplanned pit stop was that there were some gorgeous parrots just chilling in the trees above us, which reminded me of how far from home we are, and made me very excited for all the amazing wildlife that should simply be around us the next few weeks.

After 7 and a half hours in the coffin we arrived at our hotel; last stop, of course! Pleasantly surprised with our hotel and room for the next 6 nights, we ventured out in search of some much needed dinner and decided to leave exploring until the following day when the sun was up.