ON TO PUERTO VIEJO

HOTEL TRAVEL NOTE: We then spent another night in San Jose, in another Marriot.   Just so you know, if you join Marriot club and you stay in the Marriot, they offer as a member early and late check in and out, upgrades if available and sometimes free breakfast.   And if you stay for a number of days, have not found out how many as of yet, you will get a free night stay.   Marriot has many affiliated hotels under its belt so it is not only from the Marriot that you will get to use these perks or points.  Look it up, you will be amazed how many hotels are owned by the same company.  There are other hotel chains that you can join that basically offers the same perks.

We drove for close to six hours to the east cost of C.R..  The east coast is the Caribbean side of the Island.  We finally arrived in Puerto Viejo.  If I was to do it over again, I would not drive but fly.  There are three airlines, Sansa, Nature Air and Green Airways, that fly all around C.R. They are about a hundred dollars one way to various locations in the country.  But if you insist on driving, you should know that the road has one lane on each side and there are so many trucks going to and from the Port of Limon, which is only about 15 miles before Puerto Viejo.  It was a very slow, tedious drive. A trip that should have taken us 4 hours turned into 6. 

Now that we are here, Puerto Viejo is lovely.   Miles and miles of  under developed black beaches, beautiful water and plenty of sun shine. The population is more Rastafarian.  Many from Jamaica.  The hotel that we are staying in is Hotel Banana.  We have a small Villa with a full kitchen, (not that I am going to cook, but good for our morning coffee), small private pool, and an outside sitting area upstairs and downstairs.  It is real nice and secluded.  All the windows open up and you feel like you are outside in a small jungle.     

Town is a typical Caribbean town, restaurants, shops and bars.  Real good food to be found.  The surprising thing about this area, is that there is little to no surfing.  In order to surf you must get in your car and drive for about 20 minutes.  The other surprise is that there are not many animals.  I did not see any monkeys, colorful birds, or sloths.  Surprising due to this area being so underdeveloped. 

I knew that a very old friend of mine, Marcey, moved to C. R, and lives on the east coast of the country. I have known her for close to thirty years, but lost contact with her for almost ten years. I tried to email her to let her know that I was coming into her town and would love to see her. I even attempted to correspond with her through Facebook, which with my knowledge of Facebook may or may not have been accomplished. I never heard back from her. As I was reviewing Facebook, I saw a post from her regarding a sloth. I responded and told her that I am in Puerto Viejo. She asked me where I was staying and I told her where and she stated that she will be right over, she lives five minutes away. We met up and went to her home that she just built. After telling her that I have Stage 4 cancer, she stated that I do not look sick. I told her that I do not feel sick. I have a doctor in Miami, an ophthalmologist, whom I have known for years and he said to me the last time I saw him, which was about a month ago, that I am the healthiest sick person he has ever known. Back to Marcy; she built a beautiful home and created an envious life style for herself. We had dinner with her and talked most of the evening. I feel bad that we had not met up sooner. We are leaving for Santa Teresa in the morning. Life is strange, really strange, she lives five minutes from where I was staying in Puerto Viejo and she even hangs out in the hotel. It would have really been nice to have spent more time with her. I am hoping to see her when she comes into Miami the next time.