La Fortuna

(23 – 25 Jan)

We left early for La Fortuna in order to catch the 9am ferry. Again we were unable to book our tickets for the ferry online, so we had to get there early to try and secure a spot.

To our surprise we ended up first in line! Only to realize that the ticket office wasn’t even open yet. There is a small cafe in the same building as the ticket sales so we decided to grab a bite to eat.

While we were eating the ticketing office opened and people managed to get their cars ahead of ours! Felt a little bit like the middle eastern queuing systems… Fortunately it wasn’t busy so we still stayed near enough to the front and got our tickets.

On the ferry ride, we looked at Google maps and decided to take the slightly longer but more scenic route to La Fortuna, which went around Arenal lake and a volcano.

While the guest house we’d booked could be located on Google maps, it wouldn’t give directions for some strange reason. However, the owner had provided an alternative location to head towards which was just down the road – a thermal springs resort, so at least it was a significant pin point.

The three hour drive was quite scenic, especially once we got to the lake which was really beautiful. The landscape had now changed to proper rainforest with tall trees, lush green ferns and grasses almost encroaching onto the road. We even saw some Pizotes (Coatis) on the side of the road!

After traveling a few hours along this scenic route Google finally instructed us to turn off the road to head to the Springs Resort. We looked ahead doubtfully… It was barely a road that lay ahead of us, rather a gap in the trees. The road looked like a single ‘lane’, although there were hardly any wheel tracks as they had all been covered by a bed of leaves. Google seemed determined though, and we ventured in with our trusty Jimny. As we drove along it looked deserted and started to feel a little eery.

Five minutes down the road, we faced a tree that had fallen across the ‘path’. WTF?!

Fair enough, Google can’t know if a tree falls down, but we were still a bit confused about how it even picked this up as a road.

And yet according to the map, we were still on the right course, with no alternative route options.

We decided that instead of turning around we’d put ol’ Jimny to the test and go for broke. It looked makeable. So we cleared a few branches off the tree that could potentially damage the tyres and slotted ol’ Jimny into 4wd.

We approached the tree cautiously and slowly eased the first wheel over the tree, followed by the rest.

Success!! Turned out that was the easy part.

The road to that point, while covered in leaves, was pretty smooth and level. After the tree crossing it got a bit worse – the roads got narrower, steeper and were a lot more rocky.

We spent the next 20min proceeding slowly, sweating and praying that we’d get out – it was not the sort of place you’d want to turn around. The video below does does not do the road justice.

We had no idea where we were, but we kept to the path on the map.

Eventually we came across some kind of settlement – there was a random shed with a toilet, an old rusted school bus that must have been there for a few years already, another wooden building, and a car. The place looked pretty abandoned except for the car, which was a fairly modern Hyundai Accent or something like that (no idea how it got down here after our ordeal)

It was honestly one of the creepiest situations we have been in.

Having seen the movies Wrong Turn and Deliverance Dylan knew what could happen here. Fortunately, Alika has not seen either.

We saw movement at the one building, so Dylan approached to ask for directions, not knowing what to expect. A man came out and fortunately he seemed nice enough (aka not wielding an axe, chainsaw or a banjo), and to top it off he could speak a bit of English! He explained where to go, and said we should definitely not go back the way we came.

It was at this point that Google decided that we were in fact not on the right road (really!?), with zero suggestion of how to proceed.

We followed the guy’s directions and soon we were on tarred road again – relief! And beyond impressed with Jimny.

We managed to find the guesthouse fairly easily after that thankfully.

It turns out that there is another road a few hundred meters after we turned off, that is paved for most of the way, but google maps didn’t pick that option up!?

Go to sleep Google, you’re wasted (but also don’t because then we might get more lost).

We had a little wooden bungalow on stilts to ourselves, with a nice balcony with amazing view and no immediate neighbours, which was good as the walls were single ply wood panels with little gaps, so we would have been able to partake in each other’s conversations quite easily.

We had booked two experiences for La Fortuna, the first one being a sloth encounter.

A local family in town have rescued a sloth that had been kept in captivity and are rehabilitating it in a tree outside their house. ‘Flash’ has been living with them for a few months and they know his movements down to the tee.

It was incredible to be able to be so close and to see an actual sloth! He was so cute and so slow! At first he was hesitant to come down and eat because of some dogs making a noise nearby, but eventually our host coaxed him out and we watched as he enjoyed his food. No one besides the host may touch Flash, even though he used to live with people. They want him to be free – and if he wanted to he could easily leave at any time. They had helped one other sloth before, and after two or so years she actually did move on of her own accord.

During the experience, we met another couple and after chatting for a while decided to go for dinner together. We had a great evening and enjoyed new conversation! They told us about a coffee plantation that they had visited on their way from San José, which they highly recommended. So we thought it might be a good stop on our way back to San José .

Funnily enough we hadn’t noticed much about coffee, even though Costa Rica is known for it. This particular one belongs to Starbucks, and our friends said it was very interesting.

Day 2 arrived and it was time to go zip lining! We selected to do the 12 lines instead of 7, hoping it would be fun and that neither of us would be too afraid of the heights. It was awesome!!

The longest zip line was about 920m long and sees you crossing the valley below at dizzying heights.

After finishing the zip lining course they did a small presentation about the indigenous people of Costa Rica. Possibly the most interesting fact is that when older family members pass away, they like to bury them in the kitchen so that their ancestors are always close by.

La Fortuna, in addition to the forests and volcano, is also well known for its natural hot springs. There are a number of resorts that offer day passes for around USD 15 and up. The lady that we met at the car rental had mentioned that there is an area were you can visit the springs for free.

As it turns out, it’s on Google maps called “free natural hot springs” so we chose that option. It involved climbing over a wall and then walking through some large storm water drains, but it was interesting. Not as hot as we’d hoped, but alright to sit in for about 25min.

We decided to head off by about 7:30am the next morning, to allow enough time at the coffee plantation before getting to the airport. We woke up to discover that our internet data had run out!

Luckily, Dylan had downloaded offline maps, and it picked up the starbucks plantation too. So we said goodbye to La Fortuna and headed off.

Soon enough, we ended up off the beaten track again, but having learnt our lesson, when we got to a strange looking private farm road, we turned around and headed into a little town to buy data! Back online, Google maps said we had gone off in the wrong direction, so thankfully we discovered that early enough and got back on the right track… Or so we thought.

After another hour we found ourselves on another dirt road, but Google again said it was correct.

We drove over a dodgy looking wooden bridge and faced the worst road we’d come across yet. It was steep, leaning to one side with a deep ditch on the side and had pieces of the wheel track fallen away.

Seriously?!

At that point Alika called the coffee plantation but they seemed confused and weren’t sure if we’d accidentally taken a private road or not. They had a tour starting in 15min and Google maps said we were only 2km/8min away.

So we decided to brave the hill and see what lay ahead around the next corner. It was the most intense piece of road of the trip, but the Jimmy handled it. Now, after all the Jimmy had been through, we just laughed at the thought of attempting this trip in a normal car. The 4wd was an absolute necessity.

Once we had covered the 2km and got to the point on the map where the plantation should be, we realised that Google was completely wrong, again. And we totally lost faith in Google maps. Expletives.

We eventually saw a farmer and so tried to communicate in broken Spanish to figure out how to get back to San José to get to the airport. He tried explaining and pointed us in the general direction but eventually jumped in his car and indicated for us to follow him.

He took us to his daughter’s house, about 10min drive away, because she can speak a bit of English! Her husband and kids all came out and we all found the situation quite amusing.

They showed us the correct route and we headed off onto the long and winding (seriously winding) road back to San José. No Starbucks for us.

Turns out that the actual plantation is a lot closer to San José than what our maps had said – about 2 hours away! (Warning for future travelers: make sure you have the right one. It’s on a main road, you should not have to traverse any dirt roads.)

And just like that, it was time to say ‘hasta luego’ (see you later) to Costa Rica. We had a great time and could definitely have spent a few more days/weeks seeing all that CR has to offer.

Reluctantly, we parted with our faithful Jimny and headed off to our next destination, and to finally set foot on South American soil – Peru!