#5 Um...I miss you too (OK, I'm scared, is Jack OK? Did he fall on his head while I was gone?).
#6 It wasn't all rose-scented farts or whatever. I'm pretty sure I left behind at least a quart of blood to the mosquitoes. I put on some DEET-based lotion when we got to Tortuguero, as the bugs were heaviest there. During dinner about 30 minutes later, I had a severe reaction to the DEET, which I haven't used in years. Citronella lotions aren't worth the time. A newer version of OFF with something like picardian (I don't have the bottle handy) was better than citronella, but slid off easily in the sheets of sweat I produced in the jungle. Fortunately, I carried some cortisone cream, packed at the last minute, which helped a bit. At last count, I had 34 bites. There is a distinct mosquito zone in Costa Rica, however, and I like to call that zone "Pretty Much Fcuking Everywhere outside of San Jose". Naturally, just about every bar, eatery, etc., in the country is open to the outside air. I just bit the bullet and used the cortisone each day after being attacked (a couple bites left blood running down my legs, I **** you not).
#10 I did. I admit I had a chuckle when reading about snow back home. Then I went and sat in the bar at Lomas del Volcan (at the foot of Arenal Volcano), smoking an RyJ churchill, drinking a Pepsi, and enjoying the relatively cool 83 degree night while mosquitoes almost left me alone.
#11 Actually, I had recorded some travel channel shows on CR before we left. I knew that CR has some snakes you really don't want to get close to. When I spotted a sign warning of some on the hanging bridges hike (suspension bridges that were really cool until people who had never been on them before, and don't know you walk heel-toe in a straight line to keep the things steady were allowed on), I asked our guide in Spanish if we found one, could we play with it. She laughed and said no, they are very dangerous...good to know, especially since she didn't speak much English.
#12 Funny stuff. Sadly, it's tough to look at p0rn when you're in a hotel lobby and people speaking about four different languages are wandering in and out. It's tough enough explaining some things in English, let alone Spanish, German and Dutch. And no, I didn't miss the P.B.S. However, even though I'm a foodie, I still dig hamburgers and hotdogs, pizze, stuff like that. By day four, I was just hoping for food we could identify.
I didn't see bacon for over a week, which should be considered a violation of international law. It wasn't until we got to Playa Ana and the Doubletree resort, a week into our trip, that I got any bacon (and then it was all I could eat, which only about halfway makes up for it, since apparently what passes for sausage in CR is closer to hot dogs in the U.S.). Oh, and I couldn't get any French Toast for at least a week, which I'm pretty sure is a violation of the Geneva Convention, even if that supplied by the Doubletree was fantastic and fresh.
As for the nightclubs, I'm afraid I didn't see many, except in perhaps San Jose (a town where everyone, even the churches, have fences topped by razor wire or barbed wire, except for the couple of places we saw that had broken glass inserted in concrete fence toppings), so we didn't go out at night. Then there was Fortuna, where the town has a really nice park in the middle of what is a slightly sleazy-feeling touristy but not entirely legit business-lined feel to it. After being asked in Spanish at the bank (where I went to change some American fifties to CR colones, since few merchants could break a fifty with an exchange rate of 571 colones to the dollar) to remove my hat so my it wouldn't obscure my identity, and wondering just how often the tellers behind the steel-lined wall and thee inch plexiglass got robbed, we decided that Fortuna en la noche was not a place we wanted to see. Especially not after witnessing a mid-afternoon drug bust go down in the middle of that really nice park. BTW, no one in the bank spoke English, including the tense armed guard at the door...thank God I speak enough Spanish to get us through there safely.
Sorry about the lengthy posts, guys. I figured those with the time and interest could read. I didn't want to light up the boards with forty different threads on a single subject.
Glad to have gone. Saw a lot, no one died, no one went to jail, and despite being in a group of 42 people, we had a pretty manageable group. Never had anyone super-whiny or always late. No high maintenance folks. You can opt out of the various boating and busing excursions, but we participated in nearly all (we skipped five hours of bus ride to go to Manuel San Antonio Park or some such-named beach, as 2.5 hours there did not appeal to us even before we heard it would be much hotter than the Playa Ana, which was 94 at the time).
If anyone is interested, we went on a tour run by Caravan. First time doing so, and they really had everything pretty well planned and mapped out. They seem to have been doing this quite a while. If you can go and want a recommendation, our guide Carla was also very knowledgeable, spoke good English, knows the people who run the places where we stayed and ate, and I'd recommend trying to hook up on a tour run by her if you go.
