Costa Rica - Day 1

We reached at 2 am in the morning. CR is on central time, so we gained one hour. Immigration and customs was easy enough. Our luggage came out and we got a taxi to go to our “hotel”. It was not marked and it was in a residential area. It turns out it was a bed and breakfast place. There were people still out, maybe because it was Christmas eve. The rooms were okay. We had three rooms, one for 3 people and 2 for 1 person each. Bhaiya and I took the single rooms.

I could not sleep for the longest time. First I smelled the achaar. I took it out of my bag and there was oil in the whole bag!! I had to pack it in two other bags before I was comfortable keeping it. Luckily my clothes were not ruined. There was also too much noise from the outside, people talking, dogs barking etc. I also needed to go to the bathroom at night and I kept wondering how clean it would be. It was not attached to the room, so I had to go through the dinning area. Anyway, the bathroom was super clean! Thank goodness.

I was up around 6:30 am when I heard Bhabhi (my sister in law) in the morning! I don't know why she got up so early! I tried to go back to bed but did not happen. In another hour or so everyone was up and we were ready for breakfast around 8:30 am. We had a nice breakfast of coffee, scrambled eggs and garlic toast. The coffee was way to strong for me but good! We went out for a walk of about 2 miles. 

The  BandB lady told us there was a mall after the bridge, so we decided to walk towards there. The walk was all up and down as I learned that CR is all mountains and hills. There was not much going on as we walked, people were still waking up. Few shops were open. The city seemed quite clean, no bad smells. We reached the bridge and from there the mall seemed another half a mile away, so we decided to not go. Also, it would not be open anyway.

San Jose walk

Our host was very nice and had cool fresh juice ready was us when we came back. It was pomegranate,  orange and grapes, I think. It was purple in color.

I slept a little bit until our driver came at 10:45 am promptly. He was a nice personable person and really nice of him to work on Christmas day. 

We left around 11 am. The drive to La Fortuna was beautiful. So much greenery, mountains, streams and flowers. CR is big on farming – fruits (papaya, pineapple, mangoes, bananas etc) and flowers (it has a bunch of greenhouses from where it sends all the tropical plants to Home Depot).  The driver was very good in driving and personality. We stopped one time for coke and chips and once for bathroom break. Bathroom was really clean. (They have a strange thing of not flushing down any paper down the toilets).

We reached La Fortuna by 1:30 pm. Check in was smooth, the girls at the counter were really pleasant and helpful. We have two rooms, 2 and 3 people.  Very comfortable rooms with AC and TV (did not use). After lunch of puri aloo, we went to walk around. We had a tour planned for the next day but had no plans for today or the day after (we are supposed to leave for Manuel the 3rd day in the morning). The kids wanted to make chocolate at the chocolate museum, that would be about 1 hr. So we left them there and explored the city.

La Fortuna Hostel

La Fortuna is a very small town, just for the tourists visiting Arenal volcano, so there are plenty of hotels, restaurants, tour companies and coffee places. We looked at the menu also as we were walking and there was not really much for us vegetarians to eat, except pizza. We explored some of the day tours and eventually bought one for 4 hrs for the 3rd day morning for a steal price of $35 each. (It was $50 in the other tour place!)  We walked also to the sister place of our hotel, the La Fortuna Hostel, which has a hot spring. It turns out it is a warm swimming pool (tub!!) – it was so small. Totally not worth it. The massages in the spa are okay priced ($40 for one hour).

Choco Mesueo

We came back to the choco mesueo after the one hour. The kids had us taste the chocolate drinks they made – they were good! and they were to make their own chocolate also. And if they gave a review on TripAdvisor then they would get a free bar, which Sarvesh was all for!! We sat was a bit, had some tea, hot chocolate and etc. and left to walk more for an hour. It will take an hour for their chocolate to set in the fridge.

Outdoors was really nice. Weather was perfect and because it was Christmas, everyone was out and about. The central park was right across from choco meuseo. It has a nice fountain, a wire Christmas tree and lots of flowers around. The church near the city center was open, so we visited it. It was quite simple but nice. It was pretty area. We kept walking around and then came back to pick up the chocolate.  Sat near the fountain till about 7 pm and then came back to the hotel. Got our free complimentary drink (juice) in the bar in the lobby. All lobbies in the hotels were open and so many had open air restaurants – shows warmth and openness. 

Went back to the room and had puri aaloo for dinner also. (I think that is the last of it).