Costa Rica

From Panama, we back-tracked up to Costa Rica. Our original plan was to meet Chris is Panama for a week and then slowly make our way up to Costa Rica by bus while he flew to Colombia for a couple of days and then to Costa Rica to meet us for his third week of vacation. We had made it to San Jose and were prepared to leave the following day to Tamarindo when we heard from Chris. He said that he was being quarantined in the airport and that he was not allowed to enter Costa Rica!! Apparently, you must have your yellow fever shot to come to Costa Rica from Colombia. The officials didn't let Chris into Costa Rica so Darren and I were on our own for the rest of the trip. We decided to stick with our original plans and go to Tamarindo. After a LONG day of travel with 2 buses breaking down on us from San Jose to Tamarindo, we finally made it to our hostel, La Botella de Leche. We were shocked to see that our hostel had a swimming pool! It had private bathrooms in each of the rooms and even gave you towels to use for your stay! It became a running joke between our all of the guests that we were staying in a "resort" because it was the nicest hostel that any of us had stayed in during our travels. We actually met a lot of really great people at our "resort" that we became close with because every day we would wake up and all hang out by the pool together and then go out at night together.

At a "full moon party on the beach

Because Rachel's dad works for American Airlines, we were flying on a pass, which meant we were flying stand-by. Since our trip was coming to an end in about 2 weeks, we started looking at the flights online to see when the flights looked the most open for us to get home. Bad news... Because it was spring break and Costa Rica is a popular destination for travelers around the world, there were no open flights for about a month. Darren had to be back in Albuquerque by April 2nd to fulfill his guard duty for the Air Force. We began searching frantically for an open flight from all of the surrounding countries. We found an open flight from Panama City on March 24th, but that meant that we would have to bus BACK down to Panama on another 32 hour bus ride... You gotta do what you gotta do! We booked it and planned to leave Costa Rica in 4 days. Because we were cutting our trip a little bit short and we were doing so great with our budget, we wanted to stay somewhere nice for one night. When Rachel mentioned this to her dad, he said to totally spoil ourselves and put some money in our account to take care of it. We took advantage of his generous offer by booking a room in the nicest real resort in Tamarindo, The Diria. We had 2 nice beds with REAL mattresses, a hot water shower, a free breakfast buffet, our own t.v. with cable, 2 beautiful pools (one of them was the biggest pool that either of us had EVER seen!), and an absolutely breath-taking view from our room. It was such a treat!! Thank you so much Howard!!!  

Tamarindo had some absolutely beautiful sunsets, and even if we stayed at our hotel all day, we always made it a point to go to the beach and watch the sunset.  These are some pictures of the beautiful evenings that we were lucky enough to witness. :)

On our last day in Tamarindo before we were heading to Panama, we went with all of our friends from La Botella de Leche to a rodeo. We had heard that the rodeo consisted of a ring with a bunch of local people inside of it taunting a bull... and anyone could join! We didn't really know what to expect, but when we got there, that is exactly what it was. We were some of the only non-local people there and could not believe our eyes! It really was just a ring with about 60 locals taunting a bull and then running when it chased them! It was probably on of the most dangerous things that we saw on the trip. And of course, all of the guys in our group, including Darren, decided that this was the opportunity of a lifetime and that they HAD to get in the ring. Rachel and the other girls stayed in the stands and filmed the whole thing. The guys stayed in the ring for about 45 minutes and luckily non of them got hurt before the rodeo was officially over. It was a pretty epic last night in Costa Rica. 

The next day at 3 in the morning, we left Tamarindo for Panama City. After a full day of bus travel, we arrived in Panama City at 5 in the morning. Because Carnival was over, we expected all of the hostels to have vacancy and didn't bother to make a reservation. We arrived at Mamallenamercado de las artesians to pick up some moles, an indigenous Panamanian art, as well as some other gifts. Then we walked around to buy some cheap but nice clothes to wear on the plane the next day. Rachel found a dress for 2 dollars and a purse for 5 dollars. Darren needed pants that he found pretty cheaply, but not nearly as cheap as Rachel's outfit!

The incredible view from Luna's Castle. It was surrounded by slummy apartments , vacant buildings, moss covered concrete slabs, and one really nice while house. 

Later that night, we decided to go out to Calle Uruguay, Panama City's hot spot, for dinner and drinks. We had some new nice clothes and wanted to break them in for the next day's plane ride. We ate at a Lebanese restaurant and had nice wine and good beer. It was a perfect way to end our 10 week adventure!!

The view of the Panama City skyline from our dorm room on our last night on the trip!

Penonomé Carnaval

One night when we were getting ready to go out to Carnaval, we were talking with the young guy at reception and he asked us why we were not at Penonomé. We had heard that a Las Tablas was the biggest party of Carnaval but it was 6 hours away and we didn't have a hotel room. We didn't know anything about Penonomé?! He told us that if he didn't have to work, he would definitely be there and that we should go. He said it is only about 3 hours away and that it is THE best place to be for Carnaval. He said it is an all day thing, that we should leave at 4 in the morning, go to a bus station and take a bus to Penonomé. He said we could find somebody to stay with or just stay on the street if we decided to stay there all night. We talked about it and decided that we had to go! We went to Carnaval that night, came home, laid down for 30 minutes, then got up to go to Penonomé at 4 am, just like we were told but none of us had any idea of what we were getting ourselves into!!

When we arrived, the town was deserted except for these massive water trucks lined up along the road and empty concert stages. It was about 8 am and everybody said that Carnaval started at 10 am, but then again, because this was the last day, it might start a little late. We had nothing to do except for try to stay awake and wait for the party to start. Darren was absolutely exhausted and really mad that we woke up so early come to this town when it didn't even start until 12 and ALMOST caught a bus back to Panama City. Luckily, Rachel was able to talk him out of it...

When 11 rolled around, huge crowds started coming out of nowhere. People just kept pouring into this little town on this little street that we were on. The music was on full blast and scantily dressed models started spraying everybody in the crowds with fire hoses from the water trucks! Eventually it got so crowded that we couldn't even walk around so we went around the water trucks to try to get up behind them because there were only a little bit of people and private stages back there. We asked what we had to do to get back there, and they said it was only 5 dollars!!! That was crazy because if we had been in Las Vegas we would have paid about $200 to get special treatment like that!

We spent the whole day up on our private platform with our private tables and private stage. Everybody kept getting sprayed and we were soaking wet from the second that we got there until the second that we left. It was the biggest party that any of us had every been to!! And the coolest part was that WE WERE THE ONLY FOREIGNERS THERE!!!!!!!! Seriously! We did not see one other person that was not Panamanian the entire day! The little town has very few hotels and locals book them up for Carnaval right after the one that just passed. We were the only people crazy enough to go to Carnaval in Panama City, not sleep, get on a bus and drive up there just for the day. The water party was over at about 4:00 and we found a bus back to the city just to party the night away at the last night of Carnaval in Panama City!! What a day!!

Panama Canal Gatun Lake Tour

We all really wanted to see the Panama Canal while we were in Panama City and our hostel had an ad for what looked like a really cool Canal tour. It was called the Gatun Canal Tour and it was an all-day thing, from 8 to 5. The staff told us that everyone that had taken the tour had told them it was really great so we decided to do it. We drove about an hour outside of the city, past the canal locks, to a dock and got on a boat for our tour. The guide was an expat who owned a houseboat on the Gatun Lake, which is where we were headed. Originally, we thought that we might go through the Canal which didn't end up happening but we did see the huge boats that were headed that way on the water. We felt like ants next to the enormous ships!!! And it turned out that we were on kind of a nature tour that was way cooler than going through the Canal!!

On the way up the river, we heard a frog like noise coming from up in the trees. The guide told us that this strange croak was the sound a Toucan makes. (Remember this because it is relevant later!) Our first stop was to see and feed Cara Blanca monos. When we were pulling up to where they lived, the guide gave us each a couple of peanuts and told us to go ahead and feed the monkeys, that they will probably come on the boat to get them. They sure did!!! The monkeys were not shy, they climbed right onto the boat to grab and munch on our peanuts.

The next stop on the trip was to the guide's house boat. When we pulled up, we were all amazed at how big it was. The river that we were riding up was so thin, but then we got to a wide part and there was this huge house boat that was really three skinny house boats connected to one another! We got off our boat and onto the house boat just in time for a delicious meal of tamales, chicken, rice, beans, salad, and pineapple for dessert. After lunch we were free to either siesta in one of the 20 hammocks hanging up or to jump off the boat and swim in the lake. We, of course, chose the latter. Darren and Chris were the first ones to jump off the boat and they were amazed at how warm the water was. They encouraged everybody to jump off of the 20 foot edge into the 80 degree water. One by one more people got the huevos to take the plunge! We were all doing tricks into the water, but Darren was the most brave with his flips.

Then the guide told us to all come over by him, and while everybody was slowly making their way out of the hammocks and the lake, he left to get his HUGE pet Boa. Everybody got a chance to hold the slimy, heavy snake. It was pretty scary because the guide put him around your neck and you just had to trust that she wouldn't get hungry and choke you!! Just when we thought it couldn't get any better, the guide comes back with an alligator!! We didn't think there was any way that we were going to hold this guy but sure enough, he hands him off! This was scary too, because he was pretty adamant about not placing your fingers near his razor sharp teeth, which made us think that there had been a couple lost fingers in the past... The guide also had a pet toucan and a very large iguana that he kept in cages. We were able to feed the toucan and we noticed that he had the strangest looking tongue we had ever seen. We didn't take this picture out, but to see what we are talking about check this out! The guide said that before we continued our adventure, he needed a human sacrifice. Nobody volunteered so he picked on Rachel. He set her up against a pole and told her not to turn around. He handed her a plate of fruit and told her to hold it out away from her face. (That was probably the scariest part because I had no idea what he was going to come out with! ) Then he came up behind her with this strange nocturnal monkey and set him on her shoulders.

When we were done seeing all of the guides rescued pets, we got on canoes, two people to a boat, to head to a waterfall. But first, we were told to head over to a specific group of trees where we saw these little white monkeys with black faces. The guide threw each boat a banana and we all were able to feed the monos. They did not come onto our canoes but they came right up to us and took the food from our hands! We couldn't believe how close we had been to wildlife all day!!

Then we all traveled up the lake and when we made it to this marsh that looked overgrown, he told us to keep going straight ahead. It turns out, the guide cut out this baby canal from the marsh that enabled us to  pass through! We ended up traveling about 2 miles through an absolutely beautiful stream and then we parked our canoes and hiked up to a really cool waterfall that we could jump off! The tour was absolutely amazing and we strongly recommend it to ANYONE that will be traveling to Panama City in the future! This is the link, but we heard people that paid ahead of time online say that they paid $100 per person and we only paid $50, so keep that in mind!! :)

Panama

From Nicaragua, we went straight to Panama and bypassed Costa Rica. This was because we had to meet our friend Chris Wells for Carnaval on March 4th. When we got to Panama City, we found our hostel, Mamallena and walked around to familiarize ourselves with the city a little bit. Chris was coming the next day and we wanted to have an idea of what restaurants and shops were around the hostel. It turned out we were right in the middle of things with lots of restaurants, shops, grocery stores (with New Mexico chili pods!), and the major bus line right there!

The next day before Chris arrived, we decided to go to the causeway to ride bikes. We got a cab over to the little strip of land that you can see the entire skyline from. The only problem was that none of the bike rental shops opened until 1 (?!?)  We ended up walking it in the scorching heat and almost unbearable humidity, but we didn't mind too much because the view was so gorgeous! And at the end of the causeway, there was a HUGE yacht docking point that we kind of snuck into and admired all of the incredible yachts. Pretty soon it was time to head to the hostel and wait for Chris.

There was some confusion about which hostel we were staying at (even though Chris made the reservations...) and he was kind of lost for a couple of hours but he eventually found up and we spent the rest of the day visiting and catching up because we hadn't seen each other in over a year since he moved to LA to go to grad school. But that was the first day of Carnaval so around 8:00, we needed to get ready for the party!

Everyone in the hostel was just as excited as we were for Carnaval and we all got ready and went together. None of us had any idea what to expect, but we were not disappointed when we got there. There were thousands of people in the blocked off street and a huge stage set up with Latin American artists playing. It seemed like the entire city was there- infants, children, people our age, all the way to 90 year old men and women! And everybody had these bags of dots (now we know where all the paper goes from 3 hole punches...) and shaving cream like stuff in a can they sprayed you with. And EVERYBODY sprayed and dotted EVERYBODY, it didn't matter if you were old, young, if it went in your face, down your shirt... all that mattered was that everybody got decorated. This was pretty much the experience of every night at Carnaval. One night we were able to see the floats with the queens that I suppose every other night we were too late to see. The floats were huge and colorful, and there were bands and different singing groups in between the floats.

***Random but super cool- In the Gatun Canal Tour blog, we told you to remember that the guide told us that the croaking noise that we heard was actually a Toucan that we weren't able to find. Well, one day we were walking to an ATM in the middle of Panama City when Darren heard that noise. He thought to himself, "Ha, that sounds like the sound the guide said a Toucan makes... Wait a minute... It's coming from up in the tree?!?!?" He looked up and sure enough... There is a huge Toucan in a tree in the middle of the city!!! We were pointing and some of the locals came out from their shops to see and were totally shocked that there was really a Toucan in the middle of Panama City! We all just watched it for a while, amazed that we saw such an exotic bird in the wild. Needless to say, Darren got VERY good at spotting wildlife on our trip, he could spot crocodiles, iguanas, crazy birds, you name it!!

The Toucan was up in this tree in the middle of  Panama City!!!

Nicaragua- Granada and San Juan del Sur

Once again, we apologies for the tardiness of this update...

On our way South from the D and D brewery, we headed for Tegucigalpa, Nicaragua yet again.  And once again, we were less than excited about staying in the capital city.  There is nothing wrong with the city, but there are not many attractions to see. Because of this we decided to take the 2pm bus to Managua, Nicaragua, even though the bus would arrive at 12 midnight.  Yup, that's a ten hour bus ride.


We arrived at the bus station in Managua a little after midnight and took a short cap ride the nearest hotel.  The next morning we decided to bus it to Granada, an hour away.  Granada is much more tourist friendly and there are many more accommodations.

 At one time Granada was the central city of Central America, and the first large scale home of the Conquistadors.  Naturally there are many ancient churches throughout the city, including some very colorful ones! We felt as though we had been traveling too much and we deserved to spend some more time on the beach, so our time in Granada was also brief.  We spent the two day there bicycling, sight seeing, sipping coffee, and people watching.  Now off to the beach!

The beach is the most popular beach in Nicaragua and is called San Juan del Sur.  While looking for an inexpensive place to stay, our guide books pointed us in the right direction.  There was a rather large hotel, with an unobstructed view of the water.  Naturally we thought that this place, with private balconies included, was far out of our price range..... we were completely wrong.  We ended up staying for 8 dollars a night, per person, with our own private room and a balcony overlooking the ocean.

During the weekdays the beach was relatively deserted along with the restaurants.  However, as soon as the weekend rolled around, the beach was a happening place.  There were locals, tourists, and the ever present vendors.  One odd occurrence was the Harley Davidson rally that flooded the streets with motorcycles and rowdy bikers. Thousands of Harley Davidson riders came from all over Central America, and we even met some Americans. Apparently there was a bar in the town that put together some concert for the bikers,  but the bars surrounding the concert seemed to have a better party.  Although the streets were obnoxiously loud for 24 hours,  it was a nice change of pace.

Our last night on the beach Rachel and I went for a two hour sunset fishing and booze cruise.  Apparently the waters around the beach are rich with tasty marine life, and I was the only one lucky enough to reel in a large Mackerel.  Very Nice!  One of the highlights of the booze cruse were the three dolphins that we saw swimming next to the boat.  Even the boat guide was excited because apparently that was a rare spectacle.  It was a very beautiful sight to see.  When the boat was arriving back to the dock there was a perfect view of the sunset.  Rachel and I were able to keep the fish that I cought, and we took it to a local restaurant and they cooked it for us with rice and veggies.  It was delicious!  What a great way to top off the trip to the beach!

Honduras

We took a travel bus called Tica Bus from El Salvador to Honduras because it was an easy, direct route with no stops. The travel buses are said to be ¨land planes¨ and they really are.. there is more room to lean back, air conditioning on most, bathrooms, no stops or people selling chicle or chicken, movies, you get the idea. Anyway, we got into the capital, Tegucigalpa, at about 8 at night on a Saturday. Tegucigalpa is a huge city and we had no Limperas (teh national currency) so we had to ask our taxi driver to take us to an ATM. After we visited number 3, it finally worked and we found our hotel. We were STARVING when we got there as we had not eaten all day. We looked for somewhere to eat and everywhere was closed except for Wendy´s... so we ate our first North American fast food of the trip, a spicy chicken sandwhich. All and all, this was the worst day of our trip so far because we had to travel for so long, without eating, we got in after dark, had to eat at Wendy´s, etc. But it wasn´t THAT bad, so we have been very lucky!

The next day we took a bus to Lake Yojoa, the biggest lake in Honduras. We read in our guide book that there is a microbrewery owned by someone from Oregon and you can camp there for $2 a night so we were all in. We took a bus from Tegus to Peña Blanca, a small town and then proceded to walk 2 km to Los Naranjos where the brewery is located. Luckily, someone picked us up about 2 minutes into our trek and it turned out to be the owner of the brewery so he took us right to where we were going! D&D Brewery is a small microbrewery inside a beautiful garden right by Lake Yojoa. We set up our tent, drank some cerveza, and hit the sack.

The next day, we rented a paddle boat and rowed upstream to the lake. It wasn´t as easy as the sea kayaks that we have been used to on this trip where we both paddle, Darren was the one doing all of the work- facing backwards! I suppose that is the way you are supposed to use a paddle boat...It was absolutely incredible how many different types of birds there were; a birders paradise!! After about an hour of enjoying the lake, we (Darren) paddled back to shore. On our walk back to D&D, we saw a local billard bar and decided to go in for a game of pool because there was nobody in there. I guess that gringos in the local billard is a big deal because withing 2 minutes, the place was PACKED with local teenage boys! We stayed for 3 games of pool, Darren won-but barely... and then we went back for dinner and some sleep.

We woke up for the 6:30am bus back to Tegusigalpa and suffered through the ride; 4 hours without air conditioning, in the back of the bus right above the scorching hot engine with the fumes making us sick... But when we got back to Tegus, we hopped right on another bus to Valle de Angeles, a spot recommended by Rachel´s family; her uncle was a Peace Corps member stationed in Honduras, so Uncle Bob, Aunt Barbie, and cousin George (thanks guys!!) knew where to go and what to do! Valle de Angels is an absolutely gorgoes mountian town an hour away from the capital. We weren´t there on a weekend, so we had the place pretty much to ourselves! It was very a very beautiful town with fresh mountian air and sweet as can be locals. We strolled around, looked at the shops and handmade goods for sale, ate dinner, tried some local rum in a drink called ¨Por que no¨(as in, ¨do you want another drink?¨¨¿Por que no?¨ -why not?!)and then headed back to Tegus for the night to rest up for our long bus ride to Nicaragua the next day.