Final Post From Costa Rica....Summing Up Life Here

 Day one of our Costa Rican adventure began with 6 hours of travel to the capital of Costa Rica, San Jose. We left our truck at my cousin's house near Syracuse then she drove us to the airport for our early morning flight.  Thank you Wendy and John!  Long days of travel are never our favorite but this one went off according to plan with the only hitch being the traffic in downtown San Jose.  After picking up our four wheel drive Mitsubishi near the airport we attempted to drive the nearly 8 miles to our Airbnb during rush hour traffic.  Things were complicated by the fact that an outdoor concert was going on that evening right across the street from our room.  It took us longer to drive the 8 miles than it did to fly from Orlando to San Jose!  The drivers here are either bad or good.  Figure that out?  No horns or finger gestures or loud yelling just drivers all over the road competing for space with the myriad of scooters/motorcycles.  There seemed to be no rules of the road except if you got there first the opening was yours.  Very few road signs, stop signs or stop lights.  Folks just did what they did with impunity.  I can play that game too so we broke about as many rules of the road in 3 hours as I have my entire lifetime combined.  The scooters buzz by lines of cars on both sides, sometimes switching sides by swerving through the cars.  Many scooters had a passenger on it or large delivery boxes we assumed were carrying food.  The only accident we saw was a smashed scooter laying in the middle of the lane we were driving in.  We did see the ambulance rushing to the scene about an hour before we got there.  Hope the driver survived.  

As it was very dark on our drive in from the airport we did not find much to take pictures of but, while standing still in traffic we did notice the power grid here needs updating.  There were so many wires bundled together we wondered how the poles held them all up.  We even passed by a few crews putting up even more wires!

We arrived at our 32 story condo with an Alice in Wonderland theme (of all things), managed to check in and unpack our stuff before heading out to find a few supplies at a local convenience store. Boy was sleep that night wonderful.  As we were on the 22nd floor we had some decent views of the city and surroundings.

Above you can see the stadium where the concert was held the night we arrived along with some of the semi-modern buildings in the center of downtown San Jose.

We were excited to head out on some hiking adventures in the mountains in the background above.

Day one found us heading out on foot to sample some foods at the Mercado Central or Central 

Market.  Basically an indoor farmers market/flea market with lots and lots of eateries.  

It was only about 78 degrees but it was incredibly humid and quite uncomfortable inside so we purchased lunch and ate it while we people watched outside.

Laurie is posing with her lunch of pollo con arroz (chicken and rice) and I ate the better part of two empanadas (deep fried dough pocket with lots of queso and pollo).  Plenty left for our dinner that night too.

We did not find this an efficient was to water the plants up on the poles but our first thought was "hope he in not pissing in the flowers!  As the center walkway (Avenida Central) was incredibly crowded with people, the huge truck full of water was not only dangerous, in our opinion, but a bit of an overkill.  The diesel fumes were not very pleasant either.

Laurie is posing at a statue at the beginning of Avenida Central.  We tried to research what its significance is but only found its name to be Estatua de la Chola.

San Jose, in our opinion (based on a few days) seems very safe and friendly for an urban area but there are bars and razor wire surrounding many of the businesses and homes downtown.  We found it odd that even the cemetery in the middle of town has this iron pointy fence with razor wire running around its perimeter.  We did find the gate and chatted briefly with the caretaker who pointed out some cool looking crypts to look at so the security must be for when the cemetery is closed?

We found this poster in the elevator describing the building's Alice in Wonderland theme.  Had to go check floor 31 and 32 out.  As the elevator only goes up to 31 we had to walk up steps to find out that floor 32 is really the rooftop.  Below are some strange pics of these two floors, someone must have been on drugs!:

                                                      

Red Room with rotating disco balls

Rubber Duckies for your bath

Hanging beads help create a semi-private space

We found King Kong waiting to give someone a ride

Enter through the keyhole into a different world

Notice where the card is stuffed

Above is a video of the entrance to the rooftop.  

Below is a pic of what greeted us on the rooftop.  A big party space filled with sand and all the fixings for a beach party?  Strange what you find when you explore your surroundings a bit.