Day 8 – Puntarenas, Costa Rica - Jan 10

Day 8 – Puntarenas, Costa Rica (Tuesday, 2012-01-10)

Weather: Sun, Hot, 30c+, more humid in the PM

Arriving in the port of Caldera, Costa Rica, which is the container port on the Pacific Side of Costa Rica. Puntarenas is about 20km to the North of here and it is an island, a very narrow one.

We are both just glad to be off the ship after 3 days at sea not seeing another ship or having some time on shore to do stuff.

Anyway today is action packed, we are off the ship at 9am sharp and onto the bus for a 30 minute ride down the Panamanian Highway (Costa Rica #1) to Parque Aventura at Esparza. This will be our first experience on a zip line, and we did seven segments, one was 550m in length, and it is exhilarating. I could have repeated the lines, but back on the bus back to Caldera pier.

Changed over to the Puntarenas Shuttle bus for a 30 minute ride into Town, arriving around 2pm. This gave us time for lunch of fish and rice, which is a traditional Costa Rica lunch meal. Karen and I were here in 1993, but we could not fine the restaurant we eat in back them, anyway this place was local, no English, but we managed to get served have a Imperial Beer which is local.

We spent about 2 ½ hours exploring around town, including:

• Nuestra Senora el Carmen Church
• Mercado Municipal (which is very much like the St. Lawrence Market in Toronto), except this has more fresh fish and lots of exotic fruits and veggies.
• Paseo de las Touristas, which is a big walkway along the beach, lots of people, just a fun place.

The bus returned at 5pm, which was the LAST BUS!, back to the ship, we depart around 9pm tonight, for the Panama Canal (one day at sea to get there).

Karen and I said that we would return to Costa Rica, and we did, and it was a very positive experience as it was back in 1993.

 

What is of note the electric Railway is gone, very sad. Back in 1993 I had an entire set of narrow gage Germany made Electric Locomotives moved in a yard into the right photo position by just handing out Canadian Grain Elevator hats, it was a good way to reduce my collection of 60+ down to one or two. All of the electric lines are gone, there is no longer any freight or passenger service to Caldera. BUT!!!, the tracks are in place and there are railway cars here and there, even three in the outdoor museum in Puntarenas, OK reason for another visit, by car and more exploring.