My initial plan in getting to Puerto Jimenez was to take a bus down and around the upper part of the Peninsula through Rincon to Golfito. However on the way down, as usually has been the case during my bus rides, I struck up a conversation with a local. He was a very friendly older gentleman who is a local Costa Rican but who now lives in Panama. He was in Costa Rica just checking on some properties of his that he rents out to tourists and such.
Again most of our conversation was a mix of Spanglish and charades. It was great to chat with him and to pick his brain concerning the best route for me to get to Puerto Jimenez. My original route was to go to Chacarita, then to Rincon and down to Puerto Jimenez. I was strongly discouraged to take to this route however as it would have taken over 8 hours since the terrain in this path was mountainous and rough. Instead, I was instructed to go to Golfito and take the ferry across. This route would save my 4-5 hours of travel, and upon hearing this I was definitely most grateful to my chatting partner for the information. Once we got to Chacarita, he instructed me to get off the bus and told me where to find the bus for Golfito.
Once in Chacarita we said our good-byes and thanks and parted ways. Now as a traveler, even though I was engaged in conversation with another person, my observations of my surroundings never stop. It was on the bus down to Chacarita that I noticed two younger men consistently looking back to see me on the bus. When I departed the bus for the bus to Golfito, I noticed the two men also depart and after I got on the Golfito bus, so did they. They sat next to me and tried to talk me up. I wasn’t going to be rude, but also I don’t have a lot of patience for people who make me uncomfortable. So mainly I ignored them and feigned ignorance for the Spanish language. Luckily they didn’t know a whole lot of English so ignoring them was easier to show them my disinterest. My instincts told me to stay on the bus until they got off at their stops and I did so. While this action did make me feel better, it also took about an hour to backtrack to get to where I needed to be.
I had completely missed my stop for the ferry to Golfito but was thankfully guided by a very nice older tica on which bus to take and where to get off. Of course the stop I should have gotten off on in the first place was one of the stops that the men I was getting away from got off at. Luckily however enough time had passed that they were nowhere in sight and I continued on my way to the ferry. This little detour however did cost me to miss they ferry by about 10 minutes and thus I was left to wait a few hours for the next one.
It was while I was hanging out near the dock enjoying a soda that I met two guys traveling Costa Rica together. Though they didn’t know each other prior to a few weeks ago, they evidently had enough of a bong that made them decide to travel together for the rest of their time in Costa Rica. One guy was from Austria and had an unbelievable amount of energy, and the other was from England but looked as if from India. These two travelers (whose names have totally escaped me) were trying to get a group of people organized to take a whale watching boat tour. Despite my better judgement on this occasion, as I really am not the biggest fan of boating around for the sole purpose of trying to catch a glimpse of a whale or dolphin, I agreed to be part of the crew.
The boat was to take off from Golfito the next morning which meant that I would have to stay the night there. The two guys knew of a good place where they were staying right along the main road called El Toucan (honestly it seems every town has a place called El Toucan) so I went along with them so I could also get a room and settle in.
At this point it was about 5pm, so we opted to take a small boat ride to another part of the gulf area and do a hike that the boys had heard about. Golfito has almost a gulf within a gulf as there is a large vast area of ocean at the town, but to actually get into the Golfo de Dulce, you have to cross the mouth of the smaller gulf into the larger. On this boat ride we stayed within the smaller gulf area and crossed to a more secluded and foresty area. Only a few tico homes were lined along this beach area and in fact, the man who boated us out there lived in one of the homes. Once we arrived the very energetic Austrian and his friend found the hiking path they heard about and started on their way. I opted to just hang about the coast area and simply take pictures of my surroundings close by. I opted to do this for two reasons: first, because I honestly needed a break from the overly energetic duo, and second I knew that it would be getting dark pretty soon and didn’t want to get stuck walking along hiking paths as it got darker when the threat of potential snakes on the trail was possible.
As I was hanging about, I was fortunate to hear and see a troop of Capuchin monkeys come by. I indulged in taking several photos of them as well as photos of the many crabs hanging along the beach. And just as I had predicted, about a half hour after the two guys headed out on the trail, they returned because they heard some noises that they couldn’t identify from some large-sounding animal and got frightened back down the trail. A little while later we made our way back to Golfito and went shopping for dinner. The Austrian whipped up some pasta for us along with some carrots, onions and mushrooms. He was quite upset however when he left the watch of the food to his friend who then ended up burning all the veggies. It was by far the most interesting meal I had had as the pasta sauce he chose to use was ketchup! I almost opted to just skip the meal altogether, but in not wanting to be rude, I ate it and it surprisingly wasn’t as terrible as I had thought it would be.
The next day we headed out early for our boat ride and not to my surprise but to the great disappointment of the guys, we didn’t see any whales or dolphins out in the vast and large Golfo de Dulce. The Golfo de Dulce (sweet gulf) is one of the deepest gulfs and due to the calm and protected waters in this area, it is a very popular location for many whale species to come to during birthing season. We drove around the gulf for several hours and while nothing was spotted, I still enjoyed just being on the water. My two companions were not at all content on not having seen anything and were becoming increasingly annoying as they kept trying to get our tour to go here and there for potential whale spotting. Needless to say I was probably more happy when the ride was over with and I was able to part ways with the energetic duo. Once back on land I boarded the 1pm 40 minute ferry across the Golfo de Dulce (which if I had been smarter, I should have just asked to be dropped of there during our whale tour) to Puerto Jimenez.
Ramblintraveler 