Home » Panama Costa Rica » Central America (part III)

Hello my dear readers,<br /><br />In the past five years, while I travel extensively, I have visited most of the places which "I wanted to visit for all my life". Fortunately I found more places I wanted to visit, mostly from reading other travelers' stories. One of my favorite is Vladimir Dinets. In Central America I follow his footsteps. See "America Latina" at his Internet site: http://dinets.travel.ru/

Central America (part III)

Alex Mumzhiu
2006-03-22 18:36:24

Displayed times (last time: )

into the forest. This forest is un-penetrable, without a machete. I climbed on fallen trees and walked on their trunks inside this amazing green madness as far as I could. As for animals, I saw with help of a guide only a monkey and quetzal on the guided tour, which I took on the second day. Quetzal is a bird very respected by all Latin Americans for its beauty and spousal fidelity.

From Santa Elena I went to the city of La Fortuna to see working volcano Areanal. Again I was not as lucky as Dinets, it was rainy and cloudy and the volcano was not visible. From La Fortuna I took a bus to San Jose, the capitol of Costa Rica. I am staying here in "Tranquilo" backpacker's hostel for $11 per night and wait until my toothache disappears. I got it several days ago. Local dentist is eager to do my root canal for $150, even though it is not 100% clear that it is a root canal problem. All dentists are the same. It seems that home medicine (mumie) is improving the situation little by little. Next I will go to Panama.

Few little notes on San Jose: Costa Ricans, they call themselves "ticas" are very proud of themselves and believe that they are the "different". They really are: San Jose is the only capitol in the world where the homes do not have numbers. Address (officially) are given like this: "From Mc-Donalds take three blocks North then 2 block East, Right in front of bakery."

Their ATM machine are also quite different. Machine gave me money, than receipt and I go. When I return in an hour I learned that after giving you money and receipt, machine keep your card quietly until you answer couple questions printed on the screen: "Do you want another transaction" and so on. Fortunately nobody came after me. So after a while machine eat my card. It take pretty long time to get it out from bank headquarter. I also visited theater here, using the same technique as in St. Petersburg. I ride bike to theater, put in in bag and give ...