Nicoya & The Coast
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So I spent about a month in Costa Rica and slowly travelled through a metropolis, a tropical Caribbean wildlife destination, cold highlands and a clouded forest valley... Guess what’s missing? Right, the Pacific.
As this country is snaking through both the Atlantic and Pacific Ocean it offers some unique beach discoveries, the Pacific peninsula specifically being subject to a true tourism outbreak.
As this country is snaking through both the Atlantic and Pacific Ocean it offers some unique beach discoveries, the Pacific peninsula specifically being subject to a true tourism outbreak.
Soon the next questions pops up... Costa Rica is the most expensive country in South- and Central-America where I travelled in so far, so how am I going to financially survive the touristic exploitation of this rich man’s favourite travel hub? Three options came to mind: 1) A work-exchange, 2) house-sitting, 3) Couchsurfing. The first two usually require a minimum stay of a month... Beaches are nice, but to see a pile of sand and some water every day for 31 days, for me that's just too much (call it traveller’s arrogance). Instead, let’s make some friends with the locals and live their life for a week or so. As the local beach-bums rather earn money from your visit than hosting someone for free, it was quite a challenge to get in touch with anyone. Until one morning a happy email from Couchsurfer Jona(than) from Nicoya jumped out of my inbox: Of course I was welcome, mi casa es tu casa, he would even prepare a private room for me upon my arrival.
Together with his semi-girlfriend, yoga-teacher Adi from the Philippines (who he also met via Couchsurfing) and the cats Lucas & Lino, I filled up the house with some deep red-wine-conversations, smells of cooking attempts and the sound of silence, which can be the most beautiful of all sometimes. I fell asleep satisfied and after a night of resisting the heat I woke up one year older: 28, what a beautiful age to have no obligations or responsibilities rather than going to the beach.
As I needed to save money for a birthday cake, coconut lunch and vegan dinner I put up my thumb and hitchhiked down to Playa Sámara, the touristic epicentre of beach life. Once you enter the wide, pristine coastline dotted by palm trees you understand why the masses come down here though. The sea temperature is spot-on, the skies are straight out of a popsong and even the people seem a bit more pleased with their lives.
A quick evaluation showed me that at this milestone-day I’m exactly in life where I want to be: Free, independent, at a fine distance from routines and without external pressure to block internal growth. Let’s continue this way.
I never suspected to end up in the little town of Nicoya (or the village next to it, Curime), but now I found myself here anyway I might as well explore it a bit... I was done with that little mission quite fast: There’s just a standard main park-square-thingy in the middle, some old church, a mini bus terminal, a tiny market and a bunch of shops. Some towns just serve the purpose of providing a place to live without making an effort to impress anyone in particular, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
I never suspected to end up in the little town of Nicoya (or the village next to it, Curime), but now I found myself here anyway I might as well explore it a bit... I was done with that little mission quite fast: There’s just a standard main park-square-thingy in the middle, some old church, a mini bus terminal, a tiny market and a bunch of shops. Some towns just serve the purpose of providing a place to live without making an effort to impress anyone in particular, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
The next day I therefore decided to head to a place with a bit of a bigger wow-factor: Playa Carrillo. However, when you’re committed to hitchhiking you never know where you end up in the end. First an old farmer brought me halfway to the coast, while unintentionally discriminating my Philippino travel buddy by calling her “Chinita” and imitating her presumed ping-pong-pang-language (for the record, her native language is English). Ignorance is the disease of mankind. After that I got picked up by some wacko surf-hippie who seemed to have walked straight out of some Hollywood blockbuster: long blonde curly hair, wild moustache, only wearing some boardshorts (no shoes) and a pair of John-Lennon-glasses wobbling on his nose. While ducking down to not be hit in the face by his surfboard loaded on the backseat I listened how he spent a few weeks living in a tool shed and how he grows weed for a living. This character wasn’t heading to Carrillo, but brought me all the way up to Playa Nosara, a surftown about 1,5 hour up north.
I didn’t know it was this far, and I also didn’t know the last bus back already left when I got there, but who cares? If it wasn’t for spontaneity, I would probably not have visited this place at all. I decided to enjoy this big, beautiful beach filled with half of the Dutch population and trust I would find a way to get back somehow. After one hour of trying I did: Loaded in the back of a smoking pick-up, right next to a motorbike that was tight on the back I bounced back all the way to Curime.
The last day I made it to Playa Carrillo after all, but it wasn’t meant to be: Dark clouds transformed the scenery into a depressing affair, a tropical rainstorm forced me into a local supermarket for 1,5 hours and bathing in the mud I sadly hitchhiked back to where my home was that week.
Time to go. Hello Nicaragua.
The last day I made it to Playa Carrillo after all, but it wasn’t meant to be: Dark clouds transformed the scenery into a depressing affair, a tropical rainstorm forced me into a local supermarket for 1,5 hours and bathing in the mud I sadly hitchhiked back to where my home was that week.
Time to go. Hello Nicaragua.
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- The green treasures of Costa Rica: Monteverde & Tortuguero National Park
- The concrete jungle of San Jose, Costa Rica
- Hiking adventures and a haunted house: Paso Ancho, Costa Rica
- My 1-month Workaway-project on an (almost) uninhabited island in Panamá: Isla San Cristóbal, Bocas del Toro
- More beaches in Panamá: San Blas, Santa Catalina & Costa Abajo
- Beach and surfspot in El Salvador: El Zonte
- The beaches of Honduras: Tela & Roatán
- Enjoying the beaches of Nicaragua: Isla de Ometepe & Playa Gigante
- The beaches of Mexico: Cancún (don't go there), Cozumel & Tulum
- Beach hangouts in Uruguay: Cabo Polonio, Barra de Valizas & Punta del Diablo
- Argentinean beaches: Puerto Madryn & Colón
- Brazilian beaches: Florianopolis, Ilha Grande & Rio de Janeiro
- Paraguayan beach: Encarnación
- Bolivian beach: Copacabana & Isla del Sol
- Colombian beaches: Palomino, Cartagena, Santa Marta & Tayrona National Park, Colombia
- Relax at the beaches of the Algarve, Lisbon
- Spain and its beaches: Barcelona & Malagá
- The ultimate off-the-grid beach & surf spot in New Zealand: Port Waikato
- Lush, beautiful and with the bluest waters: Northland, New Zealand
- Visiting the national parks of Belize: Belmopan & Sarteneja
- Malaysia's tropical scubadive-island: Pulau Tioman
