#44 Costa Rica Part 4

With an action-packed tour of the country behind us it was time to make our way to Panama. We decided to take the Quetzal mountain pass again down to Uvita, stopping at a wonderful trout farm on the way. If fishing is new to you then this really is the place to be- grab yourself some string and a hook, and dinner is sorted!

It was a very peaceful campground (apart from Mother’s Day when every man and his dog were there), set amongst more of Costa Rica’s beautiful cloud forest, with a very entertaining tree trail to hike on. We spent four days chilling out after our Swiss family adventure.

Uvita had been a location that had served multiple purposes during our last three months in Costa Rica. In addition to being able to visit the famous ‘Whale’s Tale’ National Park (where we spent a lovely afternoon with our Pennsylvania friends Colleen, Jim and family), it was a place where we reunited with our good friends Fabio and Mar again, and; a base where I could get my new and old passports delivered to.

You may remember in our first Costa Rican post, reading about the nerve-wracking task of sending my passport to England for renewal. A few sleepless nights were had since then, with an accelerated heartbeat when approaching police checks and a little border post-traumatic stress sneaking in at night. The thing is when you’re suddenly whisked off to a detention center for two nights because of some discrepancies over a visa extension (read here if you haven’t already done so), one can’t help thinking that it might happen again if caught without a passport or better still, proof of entry to the county- this time, separated from your three-year-old child.

Well, her majesty’s passport office (as it was called back then- may she rest in peace) did a surprisingly thorough job of returning both new and old documents to me. We had used the DHL office (which is free by the way) as a collection point in Uvita and Mar kept them safe and sound- Thank you!

As for the police… having a chatty husband helps! We’d gone through four checkpoints where they had only asked for the driver’s identification. Richie did a fantastic job at diverting their attention to how lovely Costa Rica was, where we were heading next and stories of our trip so far. As luck would have it, it was not until after I’d received my red and blue booklets when the request to see all family member’s documents was required. Checks five and six did raise a few eyebrows upon looking at an empty passport but we were sent on our way!

Would it be as easy when exiting the country? Only time would tell…

But for now, it was time to revisit our favourite stretch of the country- the Osa peninsula.

Our tour this time around was set on making it down to the rough and rugged cape of Matopalo. On route, we stopped at Playa Plantaneres where upon arrival in the dark, we were invited to a local party and a free swim the next day at the nearby ‘Aguadulce lodge’. The following few days were then spent at a very secluded wild camp, we call ‘Hermit Beach’. Amongst beautiful tidal pools, we shared this hidden spot with a few hermit crab residents. Zoe was fascinated with her new six-legged friends- working hard to prevent them from escaping the sanctuary that she had built for them.

Matapalo itself was a little disappointing, the road was poorly signposted (we got quite lost), in dreadful condition, and when we finally got there really, didn’t seem worth all the trouble. Especially given that we were not surfers. This place definitely attracted those dudes and dudettes but for us, after one night camped in a little corner of the car park, we turned around and headed back to Playa Blanca.

We knew Playa Blanca from our last visit to the peninsula. There we had met Mario, a stranger who had spontaneously invited us to stay on his property and taken Richie fishing on a boat. Well, these calm sweet waters on this side of the peninsula had us back for more. And although Mario and his wife were not in town, they had organised their neighbour, Johnny, to open up their property and have us use their facilities again! Wow! We spent another four days swimming, fishing, dolphin-, turtle- and whale-spotting, hanging out with other Swiss travellers, Chanti and Didi, and gazing up at the tree that hung above our camper- for there snoozing away, was a sloth. What an end to our Costa Rican visit. We were quite chuffed with that!

So, off to the Panama border we went, with an overnight stop at Peter and Xinia’s. They lived just 5km from the frontier and happily opened up their home to us, upon the recommendation of Darren Mora, the guy you may remember from a previous post about Costa Rican hospitality.

Here we were again taking in the last drops of Costa Rican kindness. It has been the people (as always) like Darren, Bernal, Chema, Mario, Peter end Xinia that have us reflecting back on this country positively- that, and the abundance of wildlife and wild camping on offer.

As with any place in the world though, it’s not all what the glossy magazines portray. While the affluent enjoy their fancy eco-lodges, guided tours around nature reserves and eating out at chic gourmet restaurants, there are the poor, who if they’re not blatantly begging outside your camper asking for money, will resort to breaking in and stealing from it. The latter fortunately didn’t happen to us, but there were one too many incidents we’d heard of during the last three months which made us wonder if this western part of Central America really was the safest.

We only had one more country to make that judgment, and we were about to step over its frontier (hopefully!); Panama!

Thanks for reading and we’ll ‘meat’ you guys around the world!