Day 3 - Following the sun to Jaco

I woke up at about 7am and it was still raining hard. I also found that we had no water in our room. I couldn't even flush the toilet! There wasn't anybody at the front desk yet so I headed to Tortilla Flats to get some coffee and figure out where we were going to go next. We had originally planned on continuing south to Puerto Jimenez and then Zancudo but since the rain wasn't showing signs of letting up (and locals said it had been raining for several days) I decided it might be best to head north to the Nicoya Peninsula where it is hopefully going to be sunny.

At about 8:30am someone came into Tortilla Flats and said there was a landslide blocking the road back to San Isidro and some trees were down on the road that heads south out of town. The road to Quepos was still open so that made up my mind to head north.

I went back to the room to wake up Kat so we could get on the road. There was still no water in the room and when I asked someone they just shrugged and had no idea when there was going to be water. I found this strange since there was running water at Tortilla Flats just 100' away. We packed the car back up, got some pasteries at the bakery and headed north towards Jaco where we would spend the night before continuing to Montezuma the following day.

The road between Dominical and Quepos is 44km of bone shaking gravel taking about 90 minutes to traverse. We learned that the road is in such poor condition because it is owned by the Quepos regional government and the last thing they want is to give tourists a reason to travel beyond Manuel Antonio. None the less the road is still traveled by cars, buses and 18 wheelers.

Once in Quepos was returned to the land of paved roads and found that one of the narrow railway bridges north of Quepos had been replaced by a modern 2 lane bridge and another was being built.



Once in Jaco it was still raining. We drove around town a bit until we found Villas Creole which was recommended in the Moon guide. The rooms were modern and and a good value ($55/night) with a big pool, a/c, hot water, cable TV, kitchen, and breakfast included. The hotel is located on a quiet dead end street a few blocks off the main drag. Since we never got to clean up earlier in the day we took showers and then headed into town to find something to eat.

It had stopped raining and the sun was peeking out from some clouds - we found ourselves at Clarita's bar/restaurant on the beach where we got some cold beers and quesadillas and watched some American football on their high definition TV. Unfortunately our good time was ruined by some very LOUD (and I do mean L-O-U-D) fat gringos who had their hookers in tow.



Back on the main drag we found an Internet cafe to check email and then headed back to the hotel to rest a bit before finding somewhere to eat dinner.



Later, we took a walk along the main drag of Jaco finally settling on grabbing a few beers at Jaco Taco. With our beers we got some free chips and salsa and since we were both still full from eating at Clarita's earlier decided that we didn't need dinner and walked back down the main street to Villas Creole.



Once at the hotel we had a few beers and conversation with the owner and her son who was visiting from San Jose. At about 10pm we retired to our room and went to bed - needing a good night sleep for our drive to Montezuma the next morning

Day 2 - Drive to Dominical

We woke up early and had the Orquideas Inn’s delicious buffet breakfast. Breakfast included: fresh fruit, gallo pinto, potatoes, sausage, orange juice, tamales, plantains, coffee, juice as well as a made to order omelets and pancakes. After breakfast the driver from Tricolor car rental arrived right on time at 9am. We checked out of the hotel and he drove us back to the office near the airport. The paper work was completed quickly and we were on the road by 10am in our Daihatsu Terios.

Since we were headed to Dominical we had to get through San Jose but fortunately I had some good directions to avoid going through the downtown area. We missed the turnoff from the highway but I was able to make the next exit and then backtrack. The directions we had were excellent for getting through San Jose and onto the Pan American Highway except I somehow took a wrong turn and we ended up stuck in traffic in Cartago where there was some sort of street fair going on and the streets were jam packed. After about 45 minutes we were able to find our way back onto the highway and onward towards the Cierro del Muerte (road of death) which got it's name from long ago when crossing the mountains from the Valle Central meant a three or four day journey, on foot or on horseback, and many ill-prepared travelers succumbed to the cold and rain.

It was a nice drive up the mountain but once we crossed the summit at 11,000' it became pretty foggy and then was pouring rain. I started getting a bit nervous since we were almost out of gas but had just enough to get us to San Isidro where we were able to fill up.

The drive towards the coast was nice but once we arrived in Dominical at about 2pm it started to rain REALLY HARD. We didn't have any reservations but checked out a few places that I had looked into (Dominicolos and Rio Lindo) but they were both full. Since it was raining and we were tired and hungry we found Cabanas San Clemente and settled on a crappy room for $30/night but at least it had a/c and hot water.

We hadn't eaten since breakfast and were quite hungry. We checked out Tortilla Flats but their restaurant was packed (a good sign) so we went to the San Clemente restaurant (same owners as the hotel but a much nicer place located a few blocks away) had some good tacos and beers for lunch and then back to our room for a nap.


We woke up at about 6pm and it was still raining really hard. There was so much rain and watter and mud we piled in the car and drove the 100' to Tortilla Flats. We hang out there for a while - it was fun place and the bartenders were very cool. We wanted some tequila shots but they had run out of tequila so the bartender gave us some free shots of vodka with some juice. Later in the evening they ran out of beer! Whomever does the ordering there needs to get their act together - as there were still lots of thirsty people at the bar!

Day 1 - Arrival in Alajuela

On previous trips we either left at the crack of dawn or a red eye flight - this time we had the "luxury" of sleeping in and catching an 11am flight with a short layover in Houston and then arriving in Alajuela at 9:45pm. We whizzed through customs and immigration but after leaving the airport were couldn't find our driver who was supposed to take us to Orquideas Inn. This will have been our seventh time staying there and never had a problem so we were a bit surprised that the driver wasn't there but it was a forewarning of things to come with their transportation services (more about that later). We quickly got a taxi at the booth - paying in advance $9 for a ride to the hotel. This turned out to be a bit better deal since the hotel charges $12. After getting to the hotel we saw our friend Lucy who works the front desk, dumped our luggage in the room and quickly made our way to the bar for some Pilsens with chips and salsa before calling it a night.