"Welcome to the Caribbean, love..."

Last week was, in a word: long. I managed to get very little sleep throughout the week and by the time I staggered out of class Friday night at eight o'clock, I was drastically in need of an escape. From everything to anywhere. As my good fortune would have it, a few friends had made plans to go to Puerto Viejo and they invited me along. All told, there were four of us. Two left on Friday and the two of us with class on Friday, left at o'dark thirty Saturday morning. I dragged myself out of bed at a quarter to five, threw my stuff together, called a taxi and was off to pick up my friend Anne by 5:15 am. We caught a bus out of Heredia to San Jose where we caught the 6:00 to Puerto Viejo. The morning went off without a hitch.

First, a moment to revel in the glory that is the Tico bus. There is padding and upholstery on the seats. There are curtains on the windows. It is quiet (especially at six in the morning). They make bathroom/food stops. There are no chickens. There is no a/c, but I'm not about to complain about something so trivial as that... That, my friends, is luxury you cannot appreciate until you've ridden for six hours on a decrepit school bus, sitting in a broken seat, in the broiling heat with your only entertainment being the small chicken kept in a towel in the seat next to you and counting the places you can see light through the floor.

Anyway, we managed to miss our stop in Puerto Viejo through a series of unfortunate events (I don't believe I'm stepping on any copyrighted toes here...), finally got off the bus five kilometers out of town, grabbed a cab back in and we were good to go. We met up with our compatriots at the hostel of the weekend, Rocking J's. And yes, it did rock. Though, a good example of the flavor of the place: upon entering, I looked up to see a large, vividly painted and illustrated sign prohibiting the smoking of marijuana just as my nose informed me that, for the most part, it was just a pretty sign. This is also indicative of Puerto Viejo, in general. Anyway, we rented hammocks for the night ($4 a pop, I'm a fan...), stowed our gear in our lockers, got changed and hit the town to grab some food before heading for the beach.

Puerto Viejo is a small city, I would even dare to call it a town, on the southern Caribbean coast of Costa Rica. It owes what notoriety it has and the (almost) fully paved road to get there to the surfing scene which discovered that the coastline here has some of the best waves around. It is also, due to the presence of Costa Rica's only two reefs, home of some of the most brutal. Between the surfers and the relaxed, Caribbean, Rastafarian atmosphere, the whole place is just a lazy day on the beach. While it has a definite tourist vibe, many of them are people who come to further appreciate what's already there and, content with a hammock and a place to stow their board and watch the waves, rather than requiring an all-inclusive resort, it still retains its amazing laid-back feel.

I loved it. We got out, got some sun, got some waves, got some food, met some people... How do you go wrong? Oh, and I finally got back on a dance floor. After dinner Saturday night, we found a bar where a live band was playing all sorts of salsa, merengue, suin criollo and other good stuff. The whole place is full of great music after the sun goes down and I guess it's a good thing I'm not trying to study there because it just wouldn't happen. There's as much to do at night as there is during the day. After things calmed down at Bar Maritza, we headed over to Johnny's Place, the local discoteca, apparently considered the place to be. It was okay, but I'll take a live band over canned music almost any day, acoustics permitting.

I went home early, walking back to collapse in my hammock at about 12:30 (no, I wasn't alone; no, I wasn't being stupid) as I had gotten up before the sun (which is more impressive here, than it is up north, yet). The next day was just a lazy day at the beach before getting cleaned up and catching our bus back to San Jose at 4:00.

There is, of course, always more to tell, but for now, I'll send this out into the void and save the rest for the brave few who skype and email me and perhaps come back to it here later. However, the trip ended up being just what the doctor ordered and will help to get me through a week that looks to be horribly homework laden. I'm pretty sure I'm going to have to make it back to Puerto Viejo before my time here is up.