Costa Rica...the unknown country

We've been a fair amount of places, but really haven't spent any time in Central America, if you don't count airports. We decided that it was an opportune time to drop by, as it was between home (Canada) and home-away-from-home (Ecuador).

Playa Junquillal, near Paraiso, where we're staying

We embarked on our 6 week hiatus from real life, renting an Air B&B and car (Alamo) to get us around the diminutive (relatively speaking) country. This portion of the blog will cover the first week of our new experience.

View from our patio

View of our patio (it's a shared entrance porch)

Right out of the gate, we got to enjoy (if one can phrase it that way) the transit police corruption. We'd been on the road for 3 or so hours when we got pulled over by a motorcycle officer. He claimed that we had passed in a no passing zone. (We didn't.) The long and short of it was that he wanted money to "help us out" with the ridiculously high penalties for traffic violations. (The high cost is actually true, but  he really just wanted some easy cash.) We were taken aback, not expecting it. (In general, but more specifically, during our first few hours in country.) We weren't equipped to play it cool and handed over enough Colones to make the "officer" laugh all the way to the bank. 

Near Playa Blanca

Needless to say, it ruined our first day. For general information purposes, 10.000 Colones would likely suffice. Play dumb (if you do speak Spanish, don't admit it) and claim only to have a small amount of cash on you. Doing my research (after the fact), some people claim that you can just ask for the ticket, which is unlikely to be produced, especially if they've offered you a "get out of ticket cheap" solution. Asking for a bribe (and paying one, btw, as we discovered later) is against the law here. I've also read that the Transito can't actually arrest you, but have to call the Federales or municipal force to take you to jail. This can make for awkward questions, which the transit cops want to avoid. It's your call and I'm certainly no expert.

These crazy patterns are made by...

...these industrious little fellows

We've also learned that Costa Rica is NOT Ecuador. Of course, we didn't expect it to be, but the CR is much more expensive for many things, including a lot of produce, food staples and gasoline. Happily, wine and our accommodation are both fairly affordable.

A resident lizard

He feels that this is his good side.

Costa Rica is a land filled with butterflies. Everywhere you go, they're flitting through the air, flaunting their colours and giving more sensitive souls heart attacks as they blithely soar on the currents in front of the car's windscreen. We have yet to peel any off the front of the car. While numerous, I've been having problems getting a photo.

Good milk, not so good beef, so we've heard

Barely another beach goer in sight

Other denizens of the nearby area include Brahma cows, crabs and numerous birds. It's also HOT. Of course, we're here at the start of summer, during the wet season, which makes for humid weather. We're finding the heat okay for now, but I do occasionally wilt under the sweat running down me. Thank heavens for the pool!

I'm pretty sure we'll have a good time here, despite the start. So, if you're coming to Costa Rica, bring your cash, a vacant smile that indicates you don't understand a word and lots of sun screen.