Around the world

Breakfast 7a.m, start 8a.m. We knew that it was going to be a long, very long day. Well, it was. 3h30 to the summit and 4h down. In between it was raining, the trail transformed either in a small river or mud pools. Terrific! our goal was the lagoon at the top of the Volcan maderas (1394m) in the crater. What to say ? we saw the clouds. We still had a wonderful point of view 1h after the start on the island and other volcano. We should have stop a that point. Dinner 6p.m, bed 7p.m.

Well, nothing special today, just an another on the road again day. Chicken bus followed the kind of ferry which make you think that you could go faster by swimming. The island looks really nice, even if we can’t see the two volcanoes. We end up in a beautiful finca close to the second volcano we want to climb and surrounded by petroglyphs, depicting humans and birds. These remnants of the Chorotega settlement.

We wanted to improve our surf in the best waves of Nicaragua”. It will be for another time. First of all it was raining like hell when we arrived there and apparently it was the worst day of the season “wave speaking”. You should know that October is not the best month to travel through Central America. Anyways, Marco was enjoying the multi direction waves and I finally had some fun. The following 20$-an-hour-massage was great. Makes you forget for a while, the hardest thing of being a backpacker, carrying heavy bags, using new muscles, being constantly stress by wondering where is the next place to eat, and so one. Well we really earned it.

One month of travel and none of us has been sick, yet… today is Sarah’s turn, she is not to well and we decide to have an easy day hanging around in San Juan.
In the afternoon, the newly discovered surfer in me makes us move to the beach and with my shiny pink board I go try to stand up. By night Sarah calls me Kelly

Nicaragua here we are. Today is crossing border day, apparently the worst crossing of the whole trip. So we decided to take an international bus which, although being a bit more expensive, should speed up the process of crossing. It did, beside the fact that we had to wait a couple of hours on the panamericana because people kept on giving us random departure times. In late afternoon we were in San Juan del sur, the nica counterpart to Tamarindo, supposedly the best waves in the country.
Nicaragua looks and feels really different from Costa Rica, the people here are much more typed and the indio heritage is clear. Also Nica looks poorer but people are still friendly and welcoming.

After a relaxing did-nothing-day we move our asses to the pacific and go surfin’… well go surfin’ is a big statement, we take our first two hours lesson! Fitted with 8ft boards we go to the beach where Santiago tells us how to stand up… remember the cutie in point break teaching Keanu!? Well he was more lucky than me (with the teacher look…). Well after a couple of “stay low” on the sand we go in the water. Beside the paddling part it feels good when you kind of catch the wave and stand up and go straight toward the beach… and let yourself fall in the water because carving is not yet in our repertory (ask Sarah’s nose…).
Two hours later we are starving and tired so –> LUNCH&CHILL!!!
Cheers, Marco

Well meeting 3 friends in Costa Rica does not happen too often, having met Cedric and Mily (kind of planed) and Steffi from Laax (walking around) we decided that we had to go partying… By coincidence, that night at Babylon there is a Reggae festival which we won’t miss although the entrance fee of 7$ which luckily include 2 beers and a CD (NB everybody gets a CD and no trades like 2CD’s for 1 beer or so ). Couplo of hours and beers later we feel like it’s 6a.m., somehow we’re not used to party that much anymore. Mental note train this winter!
Cheers, Marco

So, finally today was time to dive again! The target is the Isla Catalina, around 45 min of navigation from Tamarindo. It is our first dive in this side of the pacific so we’re exited about maybe seeing mantas, eagle rays and sharks…
During the boat ride we see couple of Green Turtles couples having their private businesses and enjoy the beautiful coastline. Once at the dive site we gear up and jump in the water. As soon as we drop down Cedric points out an eagle ray that I miss… uff! but no worry, many more will pass by. As well we see some nurse and white tip reef sharks.
The second dive is halfway home and for the first half nothing spectacular, but then we saw two octopuses and more spotted eagle rays. cool! So, no mantas but very very cool eagle rays. The evening, as crowning of a cool day we decide to go for a good dinner, i’m craving for sushi since I left Zurich and wonder what!? We find an all-you-can-eat sushi place that for 15 U$ serves me a plate with 46 pieces of sushi and after that asks me if I wanted more… hard decision but I already forced me with the last 16 pieces so I kindly deny
Cheers, Marco

As usual we had to wake up at 5a.m to take the first bus to Tamarindo. We had rode that this road was Costa Rica’s worst! Well it was. First of all, the early bus was canceled, which is really annoying when the only reason why you woke up that morning is to take this f… bus!!!
We took 3 hours to cover the enormous and huge distance of…40 km to the Panamerican-Hwy! I let you count the km/h average. At one point, the road was so bad that we had to get out of the bus. The bus turned then around and drove more than 1 km in reverse. We had to take our bags with us, walk 300 m, put our bags in the second bus that was waiting for us, then walk again about 2km to larger place where it could turn over because it was as well driving in reverse.(now that I write that I wonder why we didn’t ask for a discount).The rest was long but without incident. In Tamarindo we luckily saw Cedric working in his dive shop (Marco’s former boss in Playa del Carmen, Mexico last year)from the bus. It is time to speak about fondue and raclette again.

Today we decided to do some “adventurous” stuff… Canopy gliding, aka Tirolean lines. Basically you glide on an cable from a three to another using a pulley. Sounds like fun to me, Sarah tells me that it’s ok (she already did it in CH) but not the biggest thrill ever. We go anyway to see the scenery and check it out for me… it turns out that the scenery is really cool, but the “guaranteed adrenaline rush” is not as big as advertised. Anyhow, it was fun and the scenery really beautiful!
In the afternoon, we do… nothing, just hang around and plan a bit. The evening, a bit frustrated of never having seen the green-red-eyed frog we decide to go to a frog pond (frogarium ) and take a tour there where we discover 30 differents (and really really cool) frogs! Did you know that the males fight for the female (as usual) but when they win guess what!? No not that, they give her 15 days of massage… :/ hopefully not too many girls will read this post!
Cheers, Marco

Instead of doing 8 hours bus, we had the choice to take a jeep-boat-jeep trip a little bit more expensive but saving us at least 4 hours. They have apparently improved the road because it was a van-boat-van..less adventurous! Anyway the boat trip on the lake located just behind the volcano was beautiful. At our arrival in Monteverde, for the first time during this trip we were hunted by hostel manager looking for some customers. You could fell the law season smell! We end up in a nice hostel with view on the valley and Pacific!
We took then a guided night tour in the forest which was really cool. We saw a deadly snake, a poisonous frog, a tarantula (beuuuh) and finally a sloth with her baby! My favorite animal…you know, the one that goes very slowly and falls asleep all the time

The perfect volcano cone in la Fortuna is still active and you can always see fumes smoking from the top as well as lava flowing the volcano sides. That’s what we did tonight, watching the lava. We took a trail in the forest in order to go nearer, but still far enough not to be dangerous. It was really impressive. The red-orange lava is constantly flowing. After that we went to the hot springs!!! Actually it is quite strange to go in warm water when it is so hot outside. You feel like…you miss the cold weather! Anyway the place was very nice, there were about 15 pools, with bars in some of them, surrounded by tropical forest. Well it’s decadent..and we enjoyed.

The wake up was early, 5a.m., because you know it is always better to paddle along the river when it is not too hot and being before other groups is a good idea as well. The first our was perfect. We could hear the howler monkey from deep in the jungle, admire lots of birds, be amused by spider monkey flying from branch to branch. When, suddenly, what had to happened, happened. It began to rain….a lot. And it was no more amusing. At all. Considering that it is 7a.m, it is raining, you are freezing, you are paddling and apparently the only ones (Boats are now overtaking us. Either the guide is paddling for them or they have a silent motor). People are looking at you as if you come from Mars, because YOU are paddling under the rain without raincoat with a number… Well at least we saw some caymans!
During the afternoon, after a 20 min hot shower and a nap, we went for a walk in the national park to see our new friends the capuchine…

After 4 hours bus, we had to take a boat to arrive at Trotuguero. A wonderful journey. The river was meandering and the boat “carving”. We even saw two alligators on the way!!! Rules n°3: even if you are hot, don’t put your hand in the water…
Tortuguero was a quiet fishermen village reconverted in a hostel village for tourist and half of the inhabitants are now guides! One of them had to accompany us at night to watch the turtles nesting. Here was the program: 5 people were patrolling the beach looking for turtles. Once they found one, they called the guides to precise the location. Then we had to run to that point before the turtle was done digging the nest. There was not flash light only red light. They try so to minimize the tourist effect on the process. The first turtle we saw went back to the see because of too many people. After that, luckily, the other big group of 20 persons left and we had the chance to see another turtle coming from the see. While checking the turtle, the guide called the tree of us to come quickly. What a huge surprise. About 60 little turtles were hatching in front of us and going instinctively to the see!! So cute! We couldn’t move, fearing to walk on one of them….What a great night.

Well today we wanted to go to Chirripo… the highest point of Costa Rica… but guess what? well as we get close it’s raining like hell.
but lets go back a bit in the day… 6am the bus leaves, we are supposed to get to our destination, San Isidro, by 11… forget it… the “good-looking” bus turns out to have the worst transmission ever and at 8 o’clock we covered 30km. At 9 still 30Km. At 10 still 30Km and we still have 4 hours of ride…
As I said before knowing how to open a coconut can be really helpful for example when you bus has a bad transmission and won’t move more than -1Km/h and you didn’t have breakfast and you don’t have any food with you because anyway it is a short trip…
Finally we arrive at San Isidro at 3pm, it’s raining and we missed the connecting bus to Chirripo so we decide to go to San Jose and to check out what to do later.

All in all the trip to Corcovado was really cool and we learned two important rules:
– you never ever travel without food even if it is a “short trip”
– know how to open a coconut

Cheers Marco

The day after we go kayaking in the mangroves but we are not as lucky as in Corcovado… we get to see some cool stuff but it is really really hot and the sun strong (ask Sarah’s legs…) and on the way back on the pacific ocean we don’t see any dolphins… buh
the really cool thing is that i learn how to open a coconut… will be useful later on…

5.25 am… damned early but the collectivo leaves at 6… the ride is semi bone-crunching but worthed… we get to Carate where we have to walk for about an hour on the beach to get to the park.. ah yeah and as first thing cross a river witch due to the rainy season is a bit higher than usual…
once in the park we keep on walking on the path and start doing cool encounters: cappuccine monkeys, spider monkeys, coatis, red macaws (ara), morphos (blue huge butterfly) and of course a deeper river to cross… Its a really cool trip and as we start walking back we realize hat it as not been raining yet. A couple of our later as we are on the overcrowded jeep (16 passengers 6 of whom not having had a shower in the last 3 days…) it start raining like hell and we have to close the plastic around he jeep… mmmm smells good!!!
at 7 Pm we’re finally home and enjoy the cold (brr) shower.

After a night in a strange hostel we leave early to Puerto Jimenez, our base for visiting the Corcovado national Park.
The ride is much shorter than we thought… for once cool!
in Puerto we just walk around and make some plans for the following days.

Today we went walking to Guadalupe, a tiny town above 2000m… really cool, we almost stay another night but then we decide to move to Costa Rica. Through winding roads we get to a small border consisting of two houses connected by a dirt road. Really smooth to cross, this the Rio Sereno border.

And Costa Rica here we are.

So, time to leave Bocas (and Panama) and move towards Costa Rica. We cross back to David again and then move on to Cerro Punta. But before we need money, so let’s go to the ATM… ups does not work… next-one neither… S#%&T we don’t have enough to leave nor to stay. so we start seaching for a place that would give us a cash advance on the credit card, none will. Around 12 the ATM works againand we can leave (with hours of delay) so we get to cerro punta around 8 pm… tired we go fo dinner.
so, say there is one kind of meat that you do not eat (not talking about just not really enjoy eating, really you hate since you are a kid) and say that there is one word in Spanish about meat you do not know and say that you ask the waitress what it is and she says beef and say you trust her and you take it… how big is the chance that what you ordered is actually what you hate? really small, no? NO, Murphy’s law always strikes when you don’t expect it… and there I’m with my Mondongo… aka tripe, the ONLY meat I hate.
whatever,at least the bed is comfortable!!!

Learned rules:
- ATM’s do not always work, especially when you really need them.
- Mondongo is a BAD word for me
- Murphy’s law is TRUE

cheers, Marco

After a we-gonna-do-nothing day(no, no! no hangover), let’s enjoy a two tank boat dive. We start by the dolphin watch in the bay, pretty cool. A pitty that we are not allowed to go swimming with them. The dives are ok, nothing special. The visibility is about 5m and the water is very warm, maybe too warm. Inbetween, we have the opportunity to play beachvolley! it has been such a long time. We really appreciate.

Cheers,
sarah

The journey through the mountain to get to the coast is beautiful and i manage not to get motion sick
After a 30′ ride on an highspeed boat welcome to Bocas. That’s it! I have been dreaming of tall, blond and sexy surfers for ages …well, it’s rainy season and there is no waves, thus no surfers! bouhh. . I’m sure everybody knows a place where some baba cool tourists don’t want to leave and they end up making necklace in order to survive. That’s Bocas, a nice cool rasta place to relax. We are quite the only one that want to go diving! As a remainder we are both carrying our own backpack plus a third “trolley” bag that weights tons and contains our diving gears. (we both believe that it is cheaper than renting!). In Panama, the discount for beeing so fool is 5 $. Makes you doubt. Anyway, we spent more than this in Capihrina that night…

No way it is possible, yes it is, 3500 mm is the average annual waterfall in the Boquete region… and we had a good proof today. After waking up at 5.30 to climb the Volcan Baru we decided that the weather was to bad to go for a 10 hour and 2000m hike and went back to bed until 9ish… some (1 or 2 rays) sun was then shining and we decided that a visit to the hot springs of Caldera would be our best bet for the day…
After the usual wait-for-the-bus-again hour we reach the village of Caldera where we start the walk to the hot springs. Some locals tell us that it’s going to take us around 45 min on a slightly muddy path, very correct! at around 14.30 we are enjoying the warm water of the springs under a light rain… so far so good…
mmm it’s raining heavier, oh it’s pouring, damned where does all this water come from??? 20 min after our pool session started we are under a really heavy thunderstorm but who cares, we are in the warm water!
At around 15.45 the rain still didn’t seem to diminish so we decide to hit back to Caldera… wery ineresting… the mud path it’s now a rivers, the flat parts are little lakes and it keeps on raining like crazy.
Around 40 min later we are soaking wet and hitchhiking… luckily a man with a pick up has some space left in the back (with bananas and cooler boxes) for me and Sarah (wich btw gets offered an inside seat but kindly refuses (i think for being kind to me, se’ll tell me later because she didn’t know what to tell to the man ). The ride is really intersting, we’re freezing, it rains like hell and we do not see where we go… fortunately 20 minutes later the car slowes down and we get dropped of at a bus stop.

at home a warm shower awaits us and after 2 friends episodes a good meal and a couplle of beers make us laugh about our little adventure.

morale della favola: in the rainy season it RAINS!!!

cheers Marco

we are now in the highlands of Chiriqui, more precisely in Boquete. Boquete is a small town with an awesome settling, lush forest allround, beautiful mountains and nice peoples, only drawback in the 3 days we spent here it has almost allways been raining… who care, we get to relax a bit!
If tomorrow the weather is better we’ll try to climb the volcan Baru, 3475m and Panama’s highest point… we’ll see!

cheers

So, finally no more work only our passion, traveling!
yesterday (9th Sep 07) we flew from Curacao to Panama where we started our 3 month trip with destination Playa del Carmen, MX.
After unpacking in the hostel we went for food and guess what… we found a swiss restaurant… so not having had any swiss food for the last 4 months we thought that a raclette would be cool… and indeed it was superb!
Today we visited the Panama Canal and saw 2 kick-ass container carrier… HUGE and they pay more than 220’000 US for passing the canal… not bad!
Now i’m in the hostel again using a random unprotected wireless connection to write this… but i think i’ll go to bed now…

c u soon
Marco

here i’m