FYI,
it is possible to drive to the top of Volcán Poas and view the crater. The volcano lies within two large calderas,
and there are lakes on either side. One
of the lakes is cool and clear and the other is warm and acidic. Poas is the site of frequent small geyser and
lava eruptions but the last major eruption was in 1952. We did drive up to the craters in 1996 and
because most days the volcano has been clouded over early in the day we chose
to not do it again.
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| Poas shrouded in clouds |
When
not day-tripping we have enjoyed some downtime at the rental house which we
rented through VRBO. The owner of the
house is German by birth, lives in NYC, and also owns this Costa Rican home . .
. she fluently speaks at least three languages and I am staying in her home
struggling with Spanish! Her local
manager speaks very little English so we are mostly communicating through
gesture and the “Google Translate”
app. Love technology!
We’ve
spent some time poking around Heredia, the “City of Flowers” . . . but haven’t
seen lots of flowers! In our opinion,
Heredia is not a very photogenic city.
It is a busy commercial district and there is a university but other
than the central church and the old fort tower there just isn’t much to see.
To
the west is Alajuela, one of the nicest “busy” towns we have been in. Most of the major streets are nicely paved
and wider than average Costa Rican streets.
The town is clean and the locals enjoy the frequenting the park. The city’s moniker is “City of Mangoes”
largely because of the many mango trees surrounding the park.
One of our favorite memories from 1996 was
spending Thanksgiving in Alajuela where we walked to a restaurant for the
evening meal and the host met us with “Hola, we have turkey!” It was a wonderful holiday meal!
Alajuela
has become home to many corporate executives and North American expats, in part
due to its proximity to San Jose’s international airport. The airport is named Juan Santamaria, who is a
national hero. You might remember our
blog post NICA (1/17/16) where we wrote about Nicaragua’s ties to William
Walker, the TN statesman who became the self-appointed President of the country
in 1853. Walker also tried to takeover
Costa Rica. According to Costa Rican
legend, young Juan Santamaria fought bravely at the Battle of Rivas (NIC, 1856)
and set fire to the building Walker was held up in, killing him. However, Nicaragua claims that they killed
Walker in a battle in Honduras.
Regardless of whatever legend us true, Costa Rica continues to celebrate
the battle as a national holiday and honors Santamaria. There’s a large bronze sculpture of
Santamaria in a square near Alajuela’s central park.
We
enjoyed spending the day in Alajuela and have to confess to succumbing to
temptation. The “new” section of
Alajuela has all the trappings of the US with a mall, movie theatre,
restaurants, and a Starbucks. This
particular location is one of only ten stores in Costa Rica with the others
being in greater San Jose and Escazú. For
an hour or so, we sat and enjoyed drinking Americanos and told ourselves that
Starbucks buys tons of coffee from Costa Rica so we were supporting the local
economy as much as we were Starbucks.
Honestly, this Starbucks is one of the nicest I’ve ever been in and
we’ve been in several throughout the US and internationally. In addition to having a store presence in
Costa Rica, Starbucks owns a 600-acre coffee farm on the flanks of Poás where
they are cultivating its own coffee and doing research and testing against
fungal infections, which attack coffee crops across Central America drastically
affecting the national economy of those countries.
Our
stay in Heredia came to an end and we headed west on the Pan-American
Highway. Through most of Costa Rica the
highway is a mountainous, curvy two-lane road.
The distance from Alajuela to Liberia is only about 120 miles, but took
4 ½ hours to drive. Outside Liberia
there is a stretch of new four-lane highway under construction. It was a challenge to drive as the “new”
lanes are open for part of the highway and the “old” lanes are open for
part. All of it remains only a two-lane
highway. It’s hard to describe but
consider driving a serpentine road with no signage of when to switch
sides. Very confusing! We were pleased it was broad daylight as it would
have been terrifying to navigate at night.
After
dropping out of the mountains we were back in the Guanacaste and arriving at
Liberia. We have gone full circle on our
trip. You might recall we had flown to
the international airport at Liberia in early January before going to Nicaragua
for a week. The Guanacaste’s rainy
season is over and is actually experiencing a drought. The grasslands are just brown brush, and we
notice quite a difference from our arrival to the area in January.
The
destination for the remainder of our stay in Costa Rica is the Nicoya
Peninsula. The peninsula has many
beautiful Pacific beaches, and we start with Playas del Coco. It’s a small village with a big crescent
beach. There are a couple headland
points, which define this beach, mostly black sand reflecting the volcanic
geology.
The village is maybe a mile
long and a mesh of souvenir shops, cafes, bars, and condos. But we notice there are no real high-rise
buildings, which is nice. After staying
the night at the Hotel Chantel, high up the coastal hill we go south on the
Nicoya peninsula and explore a couple other beaches, most notably Playa
Flamingo.
Playa
Flamingo is a pink-sand beach and very pretty.
We enjoyed a nice walk on the beach and lunch. Flamingo is getting fairly developed and
wasn’t quite our “thing.”
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| Playa Flamingo |
 |
| Flamingo's pink sand |
Driving north
a few miles we were on a quest to see Playa Pan del Azucar, or Sugar
Beach. We remembered staying there in
1996 and think we found the hotel but didn’t stop. The beach is very white sand, thus the name.
Late
in the afternoon we checked into our timeshare, Villas Sol, at Playa Hermosa. http://villassol.com/ Unlike Coco, there is not an organized town
at Hermosa but there are a few restaurants, hotels, and several beautiful homes
overlooking the bay. Our unit, high up
the hill, has a beautiful ocean view and we have especially enjoyed the
sunsets.
One
afternoon we went north to Playa Panama and had lunch at El Mangroove, ranked
#5 in the list of hotels for the Gulf of Papagayo region. http://www.elmangroove.net/ It’s a very contemporary hotel and
beautiful. We can afford lunch but will
probably not ever stay there!
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| Iguana |
 |
| Pool at El Mangroove |
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| Panama Beach |
We
don’t have a lot of things planned for our last few days in Costa Rica. Mostly we want to relax and appreciate our
time here. It’s been interesting to come
back to Costa Rica and visit again. We’ve
seen many of the “stand-out in our memory” places from our earlier visit, and
we’ve seen some new places as well. I
guess that’s kind of like life in general . . . you always revisit your past
but hopefully are open to new experiences. That’s our insight for today. Bob’s mantra is “see new places and meet new
people.” It’s a journey!
We
met a Canadian who has been in Costa Rica for 27 years; he commented that his
favorite part of living in Costa Rica is the friendliness and hospitality of
the Tico people. We agree. And the sunsets are beautiful!
The distance from Alajuela to Liberia is only about 120 miles, but took
4 ½ hours to drive. Outside Liberia
there is a stretch of new four-lane highway under construction. It was a challenge to drive as the “new”
lanes are open for part of the highway and the “old” lanes are open for
part. All of it remains only a two-lane
highway. It’s hard to describe but
consider driving a serpentine road with no signage of when to switch
sides. Very confusing! We were pleased it was broad daylight as it would
have been terrifying to navigate at night.
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