Gatos: The Llamas of Costa Rica

We made it Montezuma and holy crap is it hot here!

Dinner last night was lovely, except for the fact that I decided Lisa and Sophie were really annoying - mostly because we ended up paying the bill with a credit card, dollars, and colones (Costa Rican currency - Beth and I were colones), and Beth and I ended up getting a little screwed on the bill, but I was so embarrassed by the negotiations I just threw in some extra to get it over with.

Today we were pretty lame in La Fortuna (at least I was) - Beth went for coffee and brought me back pan dolce (pastries) and a Coca Light (Diet Coke), and we watched an awful Harrison Ford movie and packed. We left our hotel at 11:30 because in the US you need to be a couple hours early. We assured the desk guy (who made our reservation here for us via phone - adventurous details to follow) that we would write glowing reviews of the hotel on tripadvisor.com and I plan to write letters to the guidebooks we are using to get them in there. Seriously, that place was awesome. Well, except for the muddy entrance part, but when it's totally done it's going to be amazing and still only $40 a night.

So last night after dinner as Beth and I started walking home it started sprinkling. Now, in the US a sprinkle is usually not a big deal. Here, apparently, it's foreshadowing something terrible. We got stuck in a humongous rainstorm sans any kind of raingear. Beth was trying to keep the cameras dry using her hand to block the opening to the top of the purse she was carrying, and she was kind of running, but my flip-flops were so slippery and my legs are so short I couldn't keep up and was yelling at her as we were laughing. A guy in front of us at least had a t-shirt over his head but we returned covered in mud (seriously, ALL of my pants/bottoms have mud on them) and soaked. I washed my flip flops in the shower today.

We also inadvertently let a mosquito in, and if you know Beth, you know she has sangre dulce, or sweet blood. I have two smallish bites on my shoulder that don't itch very much. Beth has bites on her arm (so many bites) that are so big they look like muscles.

Then, oh THEN, we got on the plane to Tambor. Well, we thought it was a PLANE (singular), but in fact is was PLANES - as in two very small, kind scary planes. Thankfully we arrived like two hours early for our flight (ha ha). No one was there except a kitten that Beth tried to steal. She named it Erica even though the guy at the bar assured us it was a boy. Oh so many photos.

Anyway, the first flight was into San Jose, the hub for Nature Air (our airline), and was extremely turbulent. Rob, if you're reading this you'll be happy to know I was assuring everyone as we were landing (in Maui-esque winds and fishtailing like crazy) that it would smooth right out once we got close to the ground. The gay couple in front of us liked that and thanked me for my calming words after we landed safely. I was admittedly nervous and I think Beth prayed. So we get off the plane, get into a minivan (oh right, NO security anywhere, no passport check, just let ya on the plane if your name matched their little printed out list!) where we drive to the terminal (of course we landed on the tarmac), then take the same van back to the same area with the same planes where we get on a different plane (this one had an intercom, as opposed to the first plane where the pilot literally turned around and yelled to the plane the "safety" rules - awesome!) to fly to Tambor. GORGEOUS flight - it looked like the Hana coastline (but it's much, much hotter) - and the landing - whew! The runway is RIGHT at a beach, so we literally flew over people horseback riding (those are the bravest horses I've ever seen) and we could see hair blowing in the wind from the props! Crazy! But our pilot was fantastic and escorted Beth and I to the "gate."

No, literally it was a chickenwire gate. There is no terminal here. Just some asphalt and a bunch of people waiting to get on the next plane. We grabbed a great taxi driver (who we were really nice to once we realized he wasn't ripping us off) who took us to our hotel.

Oh. The hotel.

We are right in the heart of Montezuma - a hippie haven apparently - lots of dreadlocks and B.O. (that Beth and I swore we could taste at one point, gross). The gentleman at our last hotel was kind enough to make the reservation for us. However, while we were clear that there were two PEOPLE, we were not clear on needing two BEDS.

Yes, our room has one bed. And it's the smallest thing you've ever seen - like hardly enough room for our suitcases. We threw an appropriately American hissy fit and tomorrow we move to a room with two beds. We have Ambien for tonight. We also have AC, and in my passive-aggressive hissy fit I left it set at 17 degrees C, so when we got back to the room later today it was so cold I had to make it hotter.

We have windows, but imagine this: you walk up a staircase. You turn immediately to the right, then immediately to the right to get into the room. Our "windows" are also the right. If you make three right turns what do you think you are looking at? Yes! The staircase! Seriously, we look at a staircase and a brick wall. And we think we're at one of the nicer places - there are lots of people camping on the beaches...

We found a custom jewelry shop and I think Beth has already scared the proprietor by asking him if he can make her a spider necklace (see Peru blog for reference), but we might buy each other presents there to justify spending a bit more on something nice as a souvenir.

Tomorrow we're taking a surf lesson (SURE to be an entertaining blog post), maybe the next day will be snorkeling, and who knows after that - maybe ATV rental? For now we are keeping cool with cerveza...