Well, Costa Rica is a very pretty place. It is a rather rich country, compared to the places we have mostly been for the last couple of years, which although it slams our budget does provide some positives with regards to infrastructure. I think if we were coming from somewhere else, it would be much higher up the list for us, but after spending 6 months in Panama, it has been kind of a let-down.
Costa Rica is far more developed than Panama so it means that the landscape has much less of a natural feel to it. A large part of that development has been wealthy American ex-pats. What that means for us cruisers is that we are often not welcome to be certain places and often cannot afford to do basic things. For example, we were fairly close to Corcovado National Park. It would have been a cool place to visit to go hiking. But, with entrance fees and mandatory guide (they don’t let anyone enter without a guide), it would have cost us $600 to go hiking. I cannot imagine any hike being worth $600, so we definitely didn’t go. We did sail all around the southern shore of the park, and it was a pretty expanse of beach, but that is about as close as we came.
Roadsteads
We stopped at a few roadstead anchorages while making our way west through Costa Rica. These are the motel 6s of sailing. You stop for the night, and then wake up and get going first thing in the morning. They might have more to offer, but we can’t spend time at every single place or we would never get anywhere. The main reason for these stops is to give us rest. We have certainly done many overnight sails on the Hoss, but it is exhausting since we have to stay awake in shifts all night. So stopping and getting rest is usually preferable if there is somewhere to safely stop.
Pavones
Our first stop in the country was off a surfing beach on the way to Golfito. We were greeted on our way in by a handful of big dolphins who swam in our bow wake for 20 minutes or so. It was our best encounter with dolphins so far. The beach was very pretty and the rocks along the shore kind of reminded me of a miniature version of The Baths in the BVIs.
Quepos
OK, back story. When Grete and her sister Inge were little kids, they liked getting things in the mail, as most people do. So, they used to fill out all of the requests for free information on the postcards in magazines, etc. To add to the fun, since they were kids, they used silly names in the requests. Grete was Marsha Tootwoman, or perhaps Tootbottom, there is some uncertainty. Inge was John Balls.
When we were plotting our path out to Quepos I saw that a boat was anchored there. The man on the boat is named John Baals. What are the odds. So, when we anchored I dropped the dinghy so we could go swim at the beach and on the way to shore we swung by and introduced ourselves. He is from Colorado and turned out to be a nice guy.
The beach landing was a bit sketchy so we anchored out and swam in the waves for a bit. We saw the biggest sloth we’ve ever seen on shore and chatted with a family that is in Costa Rica on vacation. The dad is from Salinas, Puerto Rico, one of our favorite stops ever, and the son is 18 and headed to Navy bootcamp this summer. So, we had plenty to chat about.
Bahia Samara
Rolly-polly swell, and tons of little mothlike bugs that look like, but luckily are not, mosquitoes. That is basically all we got out of this place. It was pretty and we got underway right at sunrise the next morning.
Golfito
Clearing in to Costa Rica was the worst clearance process to date. It took all day starting at 11, and also a couple of more hours the next day. It cost us about $150 and I had to walk seven miles from office to office.
In my walks, I did get to see a small farm that had some huge round boulders that are a well-known historical artifact of earlier civilizations in the area.
The most expensive part was that an agriculture inspector comes out to the boat to check for pork, chicken, and animals aboard. Since we don’t check our cats in, we had to hide them in the bathroom while the inspector was aboard. Chicken from the US is prohibited and pork from Panama is prohibited due to disease of the livestock in those places. We had some pork from Panama that got confiscated, and I imagine subsequently eaten, by the inspector.
The running and walking was easy since the town was mostly flat and any time there is a secure dinghy dock we can get to shore with dry feet and not have to worry about the Sea Pug. Grete and I went ashore for a few run/walks while in town.
Since we were doing a good job exercising, we figured why not throw the effort out the window by having some ice cream rolls. We have never gotten them before and they were a neat experience though the ice cream wasn’t my favorite.
The marina we parked the dinghy at has some decorations up for Valentine’s Day so we took a family photo.
And my Shessimo made me the sweetest card. I’m glad I had made one for her as well.
Puerto Jimenez
We got ashore for a couple of walks, meals, milkshakes and even a decent run. Google Maps led me astray so I went a bit further than anticipated, but it was pretty and not very trafficked, which was better than across the bay in Golfito. When we got back to the dinghy one time, we found a cute little mangrove shepherd enjoying a bit of shade under our dinghy.
The town was much nicer, a bit more rustic and less hectic, than Golfito. It is a bit hipster-ish which tends to be good for us because we got gluten free pizza and were able to buy some gluten free bread and donuts at the grocery store :)
One night while we were anchored here, we heard strange sounds topside. We went up to see what was going on, it almost sounding like there was a fountain surrounding our boat, or possibly boiling water. Turns out it was hundreds of fish feeding on bugs, etc. all around our boat. It was really strange, and so cool. They stuck around for a few hours just gurgling away. That has never happened to us before and I tried to get the sound on video, but it doesn’t capture it well.
Bahia Drake
I really liked Drake. It had a dinghy dock (I love dinghy docks) and we went for a couple of pretty hikes on the most well-maintained trails we’ve seen in a really long time. The trails went up and over hills in the jungle and along several pristine beaches without a soul around.
We got to see some scarlet macaws, white-faced capuchins, and some kind of iguana we’ve never seen before.
I was very impressed by the area and wanted an excuse to stick around an extra day. I know Grete wishes she were riding horses every day, but it had been quite a long time so I arranged a horseback trip for us all to a waterfall nearby. The ride in town was soooooo hot, but then we rode the horses in a river that was at times up to my shins (the horse was almost having to start swimming). That kept us and the horses nice and cool.
The waterfall was more impressive than expected given that it is the dry season, but at about 220 inches per year, this area is the wettest spot in Costa Rica so I guess that is enough.
Bahia Herradura
This bay was a bit strange. It wasn’t too bad as far as comfort goes on its own. But, there is an uber-rich sportfishing marina in the same bay and there were fishing tournaments two out of the four days we were there. Those big fishing boats go in and out at high speed and throw a wake that is 3+ feet high. It slams us around like crazy. And, since there are 100+ boats, it means hours of that slamming when they are all heading out, and hours of it around sunset when they come back.
On the day we left there was another tournament, and I had just seen an article that Michael Jordan had arrived in Costa Rica because he is big into fishing tournaments. The article had a picture of his private jet and said that his boat is named Catch 23.
As we were crossing the path taken by the fishing boats, we could hear the crews each calling away the number of people aboard. Catch 23 called away twenty something people and then steered just a little bit away from our stern. After a minute or two of trying to figure out if it was his boat, I noted that the paint job was almost the exact same as the paint on the jet from the article. I snapped a picture and looked it up shortly after. Sure enough, that was his boat and from what I saw in the pictures I could find online, the guy facing aft on the lower deck is in Mike’s seat, so it is probably him in the pic. So that was exciting even though I’m not a basketball fan.
Monteverde
One of the only things we really knew about Costa Rica before we were planning to visit was the cloudforest of Monteverde. We rented a car and drove the 2.5 hours up from the anchorage and it was an amazingly beautiful day. Not a cloud in the sky, so we kinda missed out on the cloud forest feel of the place, but the views of Golfo Nicoya, the mountains, and the volcano were breathtaking.
We decided to go zip-lining in Monteverde since we haven’t done it since the Dominican Republic. Again, the weather was great, so we enjoyed it quite a bit. Dublin and I were a bit cold since the area is just over a mile in elevation so it is kind of chilly.
The kids had a great time and even got along. Some of the zip-lines required more weight or something, so the kids got put together a couple of times and Grete and I each got paired off with them once too.
We all laughed at Grete always zooming in to the end really crazy. The kids found it extraordinarily funny.
Comin’ in hot!!
After the zip-lines, we had hot beverages while we waited to do the challenge course.
That turned out to be really neat and we were the only ones who did it so we had the climbing, and bridges all to ourselves. That was good because Fira is quite scared of heights so one of the guides had to escort her through the whole way and she had to get slowly lowered instead of doing the free-fall jump we all did. There were high-wire bicycles and a Tarzan swing as well. It was cool and at the end we were exhausted.
When we got back to the car to get in, a white-nosed coati jumped inside the car and we had to chase it out. Everyone in the parking lot was watching and laughing. Clearly too many tourists are feeding the wildlife.
To top off the great day, I got to drive 2.5 hours back in the dark :) It is worth noting that some other cruisers in the anchorage, who turned out to be friends of friends, dropped us off on the beach and picked us up. It was really nice of them since we weren’t comfortable with leaving the dinghy on the beach all day, and honestly we would have had a hard time getting out through the surf in the dark at the end of the day.
Bahia Potrero
We were finally headed up to Playa del Cocos on the side side of Papagayo Bay. The Papagayos are reinforced Caribbean trade winds that blow across the lake in Nicaragua and make for rather windy, and extremely gusty sailing when departing Costa Rica. So, we were headed to Playa del Cocos to clear out and wait for a lull in the Papagayos.
The wind hasn’t been very good since leaving Panama and we have been almost exclusively motoring. We had a little bit of wind early on in this passage so we sailed a bit, and then the wind went. After another hour or so the wind returned and shortly thereafter our over-temp alarm on our motor went off. I immediately shut down the engine and went below to investigate. The belt for the alternator (and coolant pump) had fallen off. That made sense for why the engine overheated, but it wasn’t clear how in the world the belt fell off. I remounted the belt and had Grete fire up the engine.
The belt started working its way off the front of the coolant pump pulley so I had her shut it right back down. I started checking every little thing and noticed that the shaft on the pump was jiggly. Turns out the coolant pump bearings are shot and we need a new pump.
So, I checked the charts and found an alternate anchorage that wasn’t so far away so that we could arrive in daylight. Bahia Potrero fir the bill and even has a marine hardware store which I figured might come in handy while trying to get necessary parts.
I re-mounted the belt and figured we could run the engine for a few minutes when we get into the anchorage. As we approached the anchorage, a few miles out the wind died completely and we were drifting toward a large rocky island near the mouth of the bay. So, I lowered the dinghy and tied up to the side of the boat. We spent the next hour or so with me getting splashed and bouncing off the side of the boat while towing it in to port with the Sea Pug.
Right when we approached the anchorage, I put the Pug behind the boat again and started the main engine for the final approach and setting of the anchor. All’s well that ends well, and now we have a little more confidence in our abilities to deal with extra ‘fun’.