Beautiful Beach, Bad Weather

Trip Start Nov 20, 2009

103

106

Trip End Nov 02, 2010

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Flag of Costa Rica Zancudo, Puntarenas, Costa Rica
Tuesday, October 26, 2010

A long and complicated journey to get to Zancudo, just across the Costa Rican border but on the other coast. Left Bocas at 6am and had a half hour ferry ride back to the mainland (despite the early hour the ride was cool, water was glassy smooth and the boat skimmed along with barely a bump). Next we got a taxi from the ferry jetty to Changuinola where we got on a small bus for a 4 hr ride to David. Then straight on another bus to the border which took another hour and a half. Painless border crossing then we had to do a bit of looking and asking around to find out how to get the rest of the way (we were told a number of different things before finding out what we needed). Sooo next bus took us to a small town called Ciudad Nielly where we had to wait for 2 hours for the final bus which took us to Zancudo. This final leg was also the most interesting and eventful but frustrating (we had had enough by this time!). We travelled on an uncomfortable chicken bus (luckily not crowded) and had to go via bumpy/muddy dirt roads the majority of the way

Zancudo Beach

. It was very slow going because of the horrendous pot holes, big puddles etc and we seemed to stop at every conceivable place along the way. It was made worse because we were both very tired and wanted to sleep, even though we could spread out over empty seats, this was impossible because of the bumpy ride. The final kick in the teeth came just after passing a sign announcing we had only 15km to go. The bus stopped and a guy got on, talked to the driver, and it turned out the road ahead was flooded and impassable! We had to get off and walk, with all our luggage through a soggy field in the pitch black and rain. I thought that we had to walk those final 15km to get there!!! But what actually happened was we walked for about 15mins to get round the flood and were led back to the road where thankfully, another bus was waiting to take us the rest of the way.
We finally arrived at Zancudo where the bus let us off outside some cabinas where we asked for a room. We were there completely out of season and we immediately got the impression the locals were wondering what the hell we were doing there! Ha! It was fine getting a room but had to wait while it was prepared, and so went out and got food. We went to an Italian restaurant and again the owners were very surprised to have customers! We talked to the owner and he informed us the reason it is the 'off season' for visitors is that it has been raining practically non-stop for the last 3 weeks.

Road Conditions

Great. After eating we went back and crashed out straight away - bloody knackered!
Next day we woke up and found that our luck with the whether seemed to be with us. It was a beautiful sunny day! After b'fast we got ourselves straight to the beach we had come to see. Zancudo beach is black sand, stretches as far as you can see, is wide and shallow. If it wasn't for a strong lateral current it would have perfectly fitted its description in the guide book of a 'picture perfect swimming beach'. Because of the season we also had it completely to ourselves. We spent the whole morning on the beach until just after midday when the clouds gathered and began to roll in bringing a bit of rain. Spent the rest of the day lazing around, had some lunch, talked to the owner of our cabinas (a Spanish expat) who was a very nice bloke and very accommodating. In the evening we went for a night time walk along the beach but it was so dark we had to come back after a short time. Love the noises of the tropical frogs that were out enjoying the wet whether.
Following day turned out to be almost identical. Whether was not as good as the prev. day but still bright and warm so we spent the morning on the beach again, and then at exactly the same time the clouds rolled in. We walked in the rain under our umbrellas and explored Zancudo town for a while (its just one road with a couple of grocery stores and the rest were homes, guest houses and cabinas) then spent the rest of the day relaxing.
We left on the 29th for San Jose (Alajuela) and on the whole were glad to have come here. We both agreed that is was worth it just for the first morning on the beach! Had to suffer the same long, slow journey back from Zancudo (its at the end of a dead end road) and encountered fallen branches bringing down power lines and a bad road accident on the road to San Jose.

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