Hey guys,
I'm going to list a bunch of stuff and tell you a little about them then do an extravagant trip report. To sum up Costa Rica, it's a laid-back, friendly tropical area that was somewhat cheap. Also, I really enjoyed the "learning vacation" concept. I basically wanted an immediate vacation and wasn't going to bother rounding up someone to go with me and I think a learning vacation is a great way to travel if you're going to go alone.
Some stuff about Costa Rica:
Volcano Arenal
We took a weekend trip up to Volcano Arenal, which is located in the northern mountains. It's a famous volcano that was dormant for 400 years when an earthquake caused it to erupt in the 60's or 70's, killing 80 or so people in the valley below. It's still active, and is constantly smoking and there are viewpoints where you can see lava flowing out sometimes, which we were able to see at night.
It looked something like this (didn't have my camera on this night
It was one of the most amazing things I've seen in my life. The lava flows off and on but flows like an avalanche and is so bright orange compared to the dark background there's just nothing like it in nature.
On the way back from the volcano we stopped at a bungee jumping place that was near San Jose. It was a 260 foot off a bridge overlooking a river. I was incredibly nervous, despite having skydived previously this year. There's just something a little more scary about having the ground right there when you jump.. but I sucked it up and did it. I'm glad I did it but didn't really enjoy the feeling of being upside down for so long. Some pics:
Manuel Antontio, Dominical
We headed south from Jaco on a 1 1/2 hour bus ride (only $1.20!) to what some consider the crown jewel of Costa Rica, Manuel Antonio. MA is a national park located on the pacific coast, which an abundance of amazing white sand beaches and monkeys. We only had time to spend about 3 hours here and I spent most of the time observing the monkeys. This is just something that anyone who comes to CR will have to check out.
A beach in MA:
Viewpoint in MA:
Then we made a trip to a surfer town called Dominical, on the southern pacific coast. From Manuel Antontio, the stretch of coastal highway to Dominical is only 44 KM, but it takes up to 3 hours by bus. There's no paved roads (according to Lonely Planet, this is because the government of Quepos/Manuel Antonio owns the roads and won't build as to prevent tourism easily spreading south.) It's quite a journey as every bridge makes you feel like it's going to be your last.
Dominical is a very small town but still one of the bigger towns in this area. There are no paved roads, but plenty of surf shops. It's known as a gringo place with a lot of surf bums and pot. Walking around I probably saw more white people here than in Jaco despite the fact there were many many more people running around Jaco.
The weekend was somewhat of a bust as I sprained my knee surfing the first morning. I got wrecked pretty good and felt my knee move akwardly when I slammed down with the wave. It hurt pretty bad and I couldn't move my knee for about 2 minutes, meanwhile I'm trying to stay afloat while getting hit by oncoming waves. It freaked me out a little and I was limping and off my board for 5 days (it's been a week and a half since it happened and my knee is still pretty sore, but I managed to go surfing again before I left.)
Here's what the surf looked like (taken off the web
Since I was holed up in the hotel room getting drunk to escape the pain, I didn't see much of the town.
Jaco
The town I stayed in, Jaco, is one of the larger beach towns (by large, I mean it has some paved roads and probably a local population of 20,000.) It's blowing up in development, though, and has a ridiculous amount of condominiums being built and will probably look completely different in 10 years (and remind someone more of Cabo San Lucas than a Costa Rican beach town.)
It's known as one of the more "ghetto" areas of CR since there's a large amount of drugs and prostitution. I got offered weed and coke on every street corner on some nights. Despite this, it doesn't feel that sketchy to walk around or anything. There's barely any violent crime here, word is there's some petty theft but I didn't see any of it. Basically you're not going to get your ass kicked and your wallet stolen but you might get pick pocketed in a club.
Prositution
Based on the Thailand thread it seems you guys want to know about this stuff. It's legal in CR and pretty prevalent in the clubs. Ho's are everywhere. It's actually quite annoying in Jaco because you have no idea who are the regular local girls are. One surf instructor told me, you just never know if a girl's a hooker or normal.
Only Jaco really has this problem. Other areas of the country, it's not going to be engrossed with so many hookers. There are a lot of 50+ year old white men who spend time in these bars and this is basically there reason for being in the country.
You also get your ass or dick grabbed by the hookers alot. I just found it annoying and had no interest in banging one. One of the surf instructors lived with a hooker for awhile and told me they're not as cheap as you'd expect and can run $300 for a whole night. I was thinking $15 blow jobs and didn't even want any.
I'll make a post in a little bit about the school, more about the learning vacation stuff.