Cashew Hill Jungle Cottages Puerto Viejo

... for dinner ... I picked a place that had live music on a balcony on the beach. They had a big tank of lobsters, so why not? After a fantastic meal and many guerro's (local liqour) later we grabbed some coconut flan for the room and headed back to the room. There were probably the sounds of monkeys again, but they were drowned out by the AC and the flat screen TV .... roughing it is harder than it sounds!

This morning we woke up and ...

... is there a better destination (for me) than Jamaica?

There are a lot of similarities to Jamaica, but also it is very different here in Puerto Viejo.
The climate, smells, rain, etc. are similar. The beaches are pretty here too, but there are also black sand beaches here that I have not seen in Jamaica (black sand as a result of volcanic activity). Some of the beaches, however, look like the ones I grew up near, in California; waves but not the ...

... swiss guy from the hostel, dressed them up in green to get free shots and the rest is history. There was lots of singing and dancing on tables, just like home. We also got to explore some of Puerto Viejo´s many beautiful beaches on bikes (manual ones) and went for a surf on one of them. It was our first surf in Central America and the big waves favoured some more than others.

... peninsula. The bus from the border to Liberia (100km) took an hour less than the bus from Liberia to Tamarindo (50km). One reason being the state of the road and the other being due to the bus stopping at every single beach town on the way down. It did not matter if the beach town was 10km there and back on a dirt road, the bus was still driving there to see if there was anybody to pick up or drop off. This appeared to be a never ending bus ...

... were finishing our food, a fire baton juggler set up outside. I really enjoyed his routine; I left the table and stood out front to watch him until our dessert came. The most exciting entertainment of the evening, however, was when a crab, perhaps six inches across, found his way into the restaurant. (It wouldn't have been difficult; the place had only three walls and was across the street from the beach.) The fire juggler, who was inside collecting tips, valiantly ...

... I met a canadian girl who I travelled with to Tortuguero to see big giant seaturtles (about 1.5 m in size) lay eggs on the beach. The poor thing pooped out about a 100 eggs in a hole whilst about a 100 people shine a light up her vagina to see the eggs drop down. After she layed all she can lay she covers the hole with sand and drags her exhausted body back to the ocean (with again a 100 ...

... of insect, bird and animal noises. There are tours through the forest which I´d like to do and see if I can spot any sloths, white faced capuchins, tapirs or mantled howler monkeys. There is also a tour to an indigenous tribe which would be great because they support themselves by teachng tourists about the plants and wildlife as well as selling crafts. I think that would be really interesting. I think that´s everything for now, Love and God Bless xxxx

... at least one time we asked two guys at once, and one pointed one way, and the other pointed the complete opposite direction), and dodging all of the people offering us marijuana (it is a very Rastafarian town--there is even a cafe called the "Magic Buzz" which had a sign for "whole weed bread"--we had a long discussion about whether or not that was a typo...), we made it to Jhonny's. Luckily, there was a live reggae band, and we were early ...

Checked out the Caribbean side briefly as I´d heard it is like a whole different part of the country with many blacks, different food, more indigenous communities, etc. My time was brief as I needed to escape before the hordes arrived for spring break. But the small, funky town of Cahuita was beautiful, I didn´t care for the slightly larger Puerto Viejo, and the ride through Limon, which is a port center for bazillions of bananas and pineapples, etc. was interesting.

... and the crew dressed in bling and costumes. I had a smooth long island and settled in to the fire again. We met some great ladies from Kentucky in the United States and said goodbye to all our new buddies. The Brazilians have invited us to stay with them at their beach house in Brazil near Salvador. We weren`t really up for the quick rasta fling so have decided to take the early bus out to the Panama border and cross to Bocas Del Toro.