Jan. 30/Feb. 1 – Costa Rica
Day 182/184 – Good news, bad news, good news. Henry is locked up secure in his own personal hotel room for the next ten days or so. I hope he enjoys his solitude and the rest from driving. We didn’t get to go on the ship with Henry. The port was backed up and the captain wouldn’t be coming ashore for another day or two – so we decided it was a better use of our time to backpack it by bus and plane to Chile, especially since we had no idea if the captain would even let us come with them. We get to visit the Panama Canal and see the Seahawks kick butt in the Superbowl, which we would have missed if we went on the ship. 🙂
waiting and sunset at Caldera
We spent two full days of sweating, waiting, doing paperwork, and drinking coffee at the port of Caldera, until we loaded up the van and locked it up. Not too exciting.
loading Henry up into his temporary casa.
tied down and locked up
now fully homeless with just our bags and two feet
We met a nice gentleman who offered to give us a cheap ride to San Jose from the port, in one of the nice turismo vans. It was a very pleasant ride and our first time being in the rain since leaving Seattle. Now we are in San Jose at a youth hostel; man, seeing all the young ‘kids’ makes me feel old! We are now looking for bus tickets to Panama City. The Tica bus is full for the next nine days! That was the bus we wanted to get on, but now we are looking into others. Once we get down to Panama we are planning on trying to get a standby ticket at the airport, to fly down to Santiago, Chile. This is the cheapest way we can think of getting down there. Any suggestions or help on cheap flights to Chile would be wonderful!!! 😉
there was a line of ants outside our hotel that were carrying leaves and petals back home, it was really cartoon like to see.
Tags: 13 - Costa Rica, central america, costa rica, san jose, shipping car
admin
TACA flys from San Jose to Santiasco but the one way flights look really expensive. My one way from JFK to SCL cost $252 with a nice layover in San Jose but I’ve never found a price anywhere near that since.
My suggestions are:
http://www.taca.com
http://www.lan.com
http://www.kayak.com (general price comparison)
Also look into flying to Buenos Aires and taking a bus from there. It’s about 20-24 hours (and maybe $60US) from BsAs to Santiago but the bus is much nicer than Greyhound and you get to cross the Andes which is A-Mazing. You can even break up the trip by stopping in Mendoza. We splurged for the sleeper bus and got a good nights sleep and champagne. I don’t know if flights to Buenos Aires are any cheaper, but it might be worth looking at. Same with Lima. I think Joel took a bus straight from Arequipa to Vina (mad man). Bienvenido a Chile!!!!
This looks like a better way to see more country and now we get to keep in touch.