Back from the Jungle

Godd News,

I was not rendered extraordinarily!

I did not contract any diseases, nor was I able to smuggle any endangered species out of Costa Rica.

I recommend going to Costa Rica to that anyone with the slightest interest in and curiosity for wild animals. It is a country that truly understands the delicate balance between man and earth. It is reflected in its policies and its people. It is a great country that uses a lot of grass roots organizing to protect its nature, and even fix its roads.

I didn't inquire too much about the politics there but it seemed pretty obvious that our democracy can learn a bit from a country that doesn't have an army nor does it want one.

However, Costa Rica can do a couple of things to be an even better more tourist friendly country.

1. Fix the pot holes in the roads and (fix that road to Monteverde, one of the worse roads I ever drove on, litterally random rocks that seemingly clustered into a 6 foot wide winding treck of land that could have been created from a mudslide for all I know).

2. Ensure more than 50% of public phones work, and while your at it, ensure that the access code for the calling cards has the capacity to enable use of said calling card at any and all times, not just while you are surfing form broken pay phone to pay phone. It really sucks to finally find a pay phone that works and learn your calling card access number is busy for the next hour.

3. Fixing the operational aspects of the Puntarenas Ferry Boat. I reccommend buying your tickets at least 5 months in advance to relieve yourself of any and all hurdles to the process of waiting in a car line, then waiting in a people line, then waiting in a ferry boat line, and waiting in a line that is just a line to get on a line to get on the ferry boat. So either avoid that boat completely (as I did) or treat it as if you were buying tickets to get into a one time only Pink Floyd reunion concert.

These can all be frustrating, to the Costa Rica traveler. However, nothing that can't be cured by hiking through a cloud, rain, or tropical dry forest, all the while viewing rarities such as the resplendant quetzal (saw 3), capuchin monkeys (saw enough to believe they were Costa Rica's version of the New Jersey squirrel), sloths, frogs, snakes (boas and poisonous vipers), three-waddled bell birds, poison-dart frogs, Tucans, Cayman, agouties, caoties, and too many rare birds to count.

Also helpful is lying on a dreamy coral sand beach, snorkeling, or for that matter lying in volcanic thermal baths and getting a 1 hour therapeutic massage.

Like I said, it is a nature watchers (that's me) fantasy land, and a beach bums (also me) dreamscape (particularly the carribean coast, less tourists).

I will update the blog with a link to my very own attempt at a wildlife guide of Costa Rica.