Here's to Feeling Good All The Time...: August 2008

…is kinduva national motto for Costa Rica, from where I returned late Sunday night after about 6 days in all parts of the beautiful country. It translates rather cleanly to “pure life.” In summary, no two words could be a poorer description of how my friends and I spent our time there. But I’m not gonna expand too much on that. Too many of the guys on the trip have girlfriends, fiancées, or potentially future political careers to protect (1 out of 3 for me – not too bad).

While for me the trip was largely a way to just spend unemployment in a different country, the trip represented a final hoorah for many of the others. Poo/Amit is moving back home to Cleveland, Anuj back home to Boston. PB/Vishal #1 is off to business school at Dartmouth. Alvin is off to relationship school (marriage) next summer. A non-pura vida was definitely in order.

After weeks of planning (with all the different options and only 6 full days, I’d say Costa Rica is definitely difficult to plan for), I arrived in San Jose late Monday morning after a layover in Miami. Early on, everything went smoothly. No passport issues. American Airlines didn’t lose my bag. And perhaps most surprisingly, I was able to find Anuj waiting for me at the airport rather easily, having already hired a taxi to take us to our first stop, Arenal. After several hours of a sometimes-bumpy, sometimes-scenic drive (very characteristic of the entire country), we finally made it. I started with a traditional lunch of arroz con pollo, along with the dominant national brew, Imperial (quite good) and then we hit the pool to start handling the handle of Skyy I brought with me.

A few hours later, after a little swimming and a lot of vodka, Fake/Neil/Vishal #2, Thug/Sameer and PB returned from their daytrip and we made plans to finally hit the town. Only there isn’t much of a town in Arenal to hit. The main attraction of the city (and perhaps the country) is the sometimes-active volcano, but Monday night was too cloudy to get a good look, so we bypassed that option. So we went into “downtown” Arenal, stopped at a zapateria to buy some watershoes that would be needed later, stopped at a bank so Sameer could lose his ATM card, and finally had dinner at one of the few spots that was still open at the time. (Note to future visitors to Costa Rica: Except maybe in more-touristy Tamarindo, most restaurants close pretty early.) We then looked for a bar to go drink at, but the only one we could find was packed to the brim with older, native Costa Ricans who looked at us funny. Not the funny looks we get from our girlfriends after inappropriate comments or from non-girlfriends after inappropriate advances. But the “this is our bar, and you don’t belong” funny looks. Despite the language barriers, this message came across clear, so we bounced within 5 minutes and proceeded to head back to the hotel to drink until 3:30 in the morning. It was actually one of the most interesting nights of drinking I’ve had in my entire life, partly due to the fact that I hadn’t drank with these guys in quite some time, but more due to the content of the conversations. While the four of us (PB doesn’t drink) polished off a bottle of Glenfiddich and a fair amount of hookah and vodka, we discussed politics, economics, the pros and cons of a progressive tax system and philosophy (the concept of luck vs. karma vs. destiny) for several hours on the porch. Good times all around. The only downside was that our hotel (do NOT stay at the Arenal Springs Resort) was so poorly lit that I admittedly was scared to go on ice runs by myself – thanks Sameer.

The next day, Tuesday, was action-packed. We started with white water rafting, which was awesome. Some of you might know that I’m scared shitless of natural bodies of water, so I was definitely a little nervous, especially when you throw in the concept of large, jagged rocks. But since I was so busy paddling and focused on keeping my feet secure so I wouldn’t fall off the raft, I really didn’t have time to think about being scared. It was an incredible experience and I would definitely recommend it to anyone who visits Costa Rica, especially rafting beginners (Anuj had been rafting several times and was apparently incredibly bored). The highlight was the fresh fruit they cut up for us as a snack – honestly the best pineapple I’ve ever had in my life and probably the best meal I had all trip. The lowlight was when we couldn’t maneuver the raft away from a series of rocks on one side of the river, one of which hit me rather hard in my helmet-protected noggin. Ouch.

After rafting and some lunch, we hit up the hot springs at the Baldi hotel. Think of a water park, only instead of rides, the park is full of a series of hot Jacuzzis. Considering how cold and soaked we got rafting (from both the river water and the pouring rain that day), we couldn’t have timed the trip to the hot springs better. Otherwise, it probably wasn’t worth the $28 admission fee, to be honest. After returning to the hotel, we hopped on a shuttle to head to the volcano viewing site, and were lucky enough to see some mini-eruptions (that’s what she said), complete with a good amount of bright-red molten rock. At least we assumed it was molten rock, since we didn’t think actual lava could flow down the mountain as fast as it was. Apparently 70% of visitors to Arenal don’t get to see the eruptions, because of the constant cloudiness, so we considered ourselves quite lucky. Anuj thought we were “destined” to see the volcano erupt, but I still think it was more luck than anything.

Wednesday was a travel day, as we were headed to Monteverde. We woke up early, and then took an amazing water taxi ride for like 45 minutes. Very scenic. We were met on the other side of the river (or giant lake? I don’t really know) by yet another shuttle who took us on a long, bumpy, slightly nauseating ride to our hotel. Fortunately I was luckier than Neil, who astonishingly was able to fall asleep on the ride, only to wake up to a particularly large bump, where he bit the inside of his lip and chipped his tooth to boot. Ouch.

The rest of Wednesday was a little disappointing. Since it was thunderstorming, we didn’t feel like adventuring into the “city” to one of the local restaurants, so we just ate at the hotel restaurant. Having already eaten a lot of seafood and other local dishes, I decided to mix it up a little and see what Costa Rican pizza was like. Bad move. After waiting literally like 55 minutes for our pizza, it was all-in-all one of the worst pizzas I’ve had in my life. The shot of Patron we had as an appetizer didn’t make it taste any better. Then, to make things worst, Alvin and Poo finally arrived. Just kidding fellas, just kidding. In the evening, we decided to do a nightwalk through the rain forest, which basically consisted of us paying $17 each to walk through the pitch black forest for a couple loooong hours, seeing some bats, a pretty cool tarantula, a tiny frog, and a bunch of insects. This is what everyone argues over whether to protect or not? We then went back to the hotel for another low-key dinner at the bar/lounge and a couple hours of drinking and hookah on the porch of one of the hotel rooms. We kept it tame, as we had some more early morning adventures planned for Thursday.

Thursday was probably the best day of the trip, from beginning to end. We started with a morning walk through the rainforest, which was infinitely more enjoyable than the nightwalk. We saw some birds (surprisingly not nearly as many different kinds of birds as I had expected in a rainforest), some owls, more insects, some other animals I can’t recall off the top of my head, and we even had a chance to climb up the inside of a hollow tree, which was really cool. Oh yeah, and a millipede poo’d on Poo’s hand.

Following the walk was the peak of the trip – ziplining. Just like with the rafting, I thought I’d be scared shitless ziplining at rapid speeds over the Costa Rican rainforest. Again, I surprised myself and thoroughly enjoyed all of the ziplines. The only thing that kinda sucked was on the slower ziplines, if you’re not very careful about your technique, you run the risk of slowing down and even stopping mid-line. On one occasion I did in fact stop and had to be helped to the other side of the platform, which was kinda embarrassing. On the final zipline (which was the most amazing since it was high up, basically in the clouds, and it happened to be drizzling at the time which added a cool effect), while I didn’t stop, I was so worried about stopping that I didn’t enjoy it as much. Plus the wind kept spinning me around so I was going backwards half the time. Still, it was an amazing experience, to be topped only by the Tarzan Swing, which is basically exactly what it sounds like. They harness you to a long rope, tell you to hold on tight and keep your legs up and crossed, and push you off the platform. Pretty scary since you come extremely close to the ground, and then on the way up, you come extremely close to just swinging your way right into a tree (which is the way Tarzan himself would want it, I guess). But just amazing, and a great way to quickly overcome a fear of heights if you have one.

After ziplining, we headed back to the hotel, from where we had yet another shuttle ride, this time about 4 hours to Tamarindo, a tourist-popular beach city on the western edge of Costa Rica. Thursday night we explored the best (and worst) of Tamarindo nightlife. Upscale hotel dinner, then a couple local bars in the central area of the city, and finally Aqua, the “club” of Tamarindo where you pay a $7 cover on Thursday nights but then get to enjoy 25 cent draft beers all night. Needless to say, Thursday night was messy, highlighted by Anuj’s unfortunate excursion to the beach. By the way, in a sidenote, major props to PB – I don’t know how you have the willpower/patience to stay out with us 6 drunken idiots until 4am.

On Friday, after FINALLY being able to sleep in, we headed to the beaches of Tamarindo. Only there really isn’t a “beach”, at least as far as we could tell. Just a large body of water (the Pacific Ocean) separated from bars/restaurants/hotels by, at most, 30-40 feet of sand. And no topless women either. Some “beach”, right? Finally we found an American who told us that Playa Grande was the best beach in Tamarindo, so we headed over there, which required a solid 15 minute trek across sand and through 3-4 feet deep water, then a $7, 45 second water taxi ride. On the other side was a minimally better beach that was by no means worth the effort it took to get there. But we were already there, so we enjoyed it to the best of our abilities, swimming (or mostly standing) in the pleasantly warm water, with several of the guys (not me) calling the ocean a whore and other mean names because its waves weren’t challenging enough. Keeping it sophisticated.

After a few hours of souvenir shopping, napping, a Pizza Hut dinner that Anuj and Fake couldn’t stop bitching about and pre-gaming, we headed to our hotel bar, The Monkey Bar, which is one of the local hotspots on Friday night. At first we went Guju. Since we had 4-5 bottles of liquor still remaining, for the first half hour or 45 minutes, we walked back and forth to the hotel room to refill drinks. But then it got too crowded, it started pouring, and we became too drunk to care anymore, so we gave up on that plan (and have A LOT of alcohol left over to show for it). After a little while, things started to turn south, as one of us (not me) pissed off a local weed dealer, and two others started arguing about God knows what. I guess that’s what happens when you throw 7 guys together in a foreign country for a week with no girlfriends and no “alone time.” So we realized destiny (or luck) said we shouldn’t be at Monkey Bar, so we headed back to Aqua for what somehow turned out to be an even drunker night than Thursday night. We closed the night with some chicken kabobs from a street vendor, quite a bit of gay wrestling back in the hotel room and some more drunken intra-group squabbling. Fortunately I assigned myself the task of being photographer for the night, so I was too busy to partake in the events you see below. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

At this point, this posting is already REALLY long, so I’ll wrap it up pretty quickly (that’s what he said). Saturday afternoon, our flight to San Jose was cancelled, so we scrambled to hire – yes, ANOTHER shuttle to take us. It was a 5+ hour trip, highlighted by us walking with our luggage across a bridge that for some reason or another could handle plenty of people and luggage, but not any cars whatsoever. We spent Saturday night eating at the hotel, and then partaking in some low-key San Jose nightlife. We had to calm down eventually.

Pura vida? No comprendo.

Volcano Shot from our Hotel Room: