21 March 2010 * Los Lagos

San Jose to La Fortuna

Three sleeps are now past in the land of Pura Vida. We three have been enchanted. But there has been some discomfort: vomiting episodes for Tara and Tessa. The bus from San Jose to La Fortuna defeated Tara, when frequent stops and winding roads conspired to throw her stomach up.

The driver was kind, though, waited while she heaved in a side-of-road crouch. Then let her sit on the front step, with door open. He spoke to her and joked and gave her candies.

All the while, Tessa lolled between consciousness and limp drooling torpor. I had applied a Scopolamine patch the morning of our flight, but didn't anticipate the impact it would have on her. She was OK and not airsick between Vancouver and L.A., but fell under the drug's powerful spell at LAX - sleeping most of our 5-hr layover. Then she slept to El Salvador and growlingly moaned of sleepiness during our stopover there. Then lights out again to San Jose. No motion sickness, but a paucity of consciousness!

Tessa was awake for an eventful traffic-weaving, bus chasing, culture-shocked taxi ride from the airport to the bust station in San Jose. I, in front, attempted to converse with our friendly driver, fumbing for words and trying to prevent Tibetan from leaking into my 1977 high school Spanish. For 12,000 Colones, our driver delivered us to the bust that would bring us to La Fortuna.



Riding that bus was extremely pleasurable for me. We carried our bags aboard and kept them close, fearing the notorious bus thieves of San José. But, our fears were unfulfilled. We only encountered friendly fellow travelers, and a vibrant slice of life: mothers with well-mannered children; elderly men and women with bowed legs and broad smiles; young men in sharp tee shirts and spiked hair; young women in skirts and striped knit shirts. Vendors boarded from time to time, hawking bottled water, box juice, plantain chips, candy. The bus stopped frequently, picking up anyone standing by the roadside that wanted a ride. We filled to standing-room only and the driver requested with a Pura Vida for all those standing to move back make room.

We stopped in Quesada for a 20-min rest break. The bust station was alive with little shops and hundreds of travellers. I bought a bag of mandarins, a bag of mangoes, a wrapped plate of cut mangoes, and two orange ice cream cones (for me and Tessa -- Tara was in no shape for it.)


We rode through verdant hells. Everywhere, tropical agriculture flourishes: coffee, heart of palm, taro, papaya, mango, coconut, banana, plantain, orange, melon, squash, pineapple, cane. Frequent road-side stands made my mouth water, with their ripe arrays of bright fruits and vegetables.


Traversing a lush valley, we made our way to La Fortuna, a small town, whose central core spans ten blocks. We disembarked, wandered to the main drag and sat down for two Imperials, one sandia refresco, a plate of spaghetti and a casado vegetariano.

Los Lagos

By nightfall, after 30 hours on the road, we reached Los Lagos, our resort hotel. Eagerly, we changed into swimsuits and headed straight for the hot springs. The volcano-warmed mineral waters of these springs is soothing and healing. The resort has 5 hot spring pools, 2 cool-water pools, 2 cool plunges, 3 water slides (1 hot), and 2 kiddie pools. One pool has a built-in wet bar, where visitors sit on submerged stools to drink Piña coladas and watch futbol on the TV. Most pools have mushroom-shaped canopies, beneath which on can shelter from the rain and look out at the sumptuous gardens, streams and fish pond.

All of these are inter-woven with a beautiful and fantastic variety of tropical vegetation. In the evening darkness, we listened to frogs and toads croak in jungle thickets.