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It went with a bang…
I've missed out on a good few weeks blogging so unfortunately once again this will all just be on one page & I'll just bash out the boring information as my mind will probably combust in the next 20mins.
So I left you guys when I went to Little Corn Island in Nicaragua. I had high hopes for this place & on arriving I just felt a tad unsure about what I had got myself into…
Little corn is one of those places where to have the best time I think you have to choose the best spot & best accommodation, luckily for me I met a lovely lady named Suki on the boat as this meant we could cut costs & share a cabina (good news for me as it was $30 dollars & that was without electricity!). It was a well known place there called Elsie's & Elsie pretty much made us feel right at home instantly, even to the point I think Suki felt like she gained a new mum (even being told off a good few times for hanging about with a dodgy local haha). The beach our side was beautiful with a great wind but due to storms & rubbish from other areas this meant the beach was now littered with rubbish & seaweed which sadly really took away from its beauty.
Anywho, really didn't do too much apart from eat too much, spent too much (on food) & laze about for a while. Matt arrived 3 day's before we left & we both proceeded to get sick, lovely jubbly :)
On our last day we did manage to explore the island by trying to walk about it, we ended up attempting to climb a palm tree (failed miserably) & waded through some cr*p to reach some of the most special & lovely beaches on the Island, now if only we had found these earlier! Leaving Little Corn on a high we had an overnight stay on Big Corn (nothing to write about) & then got our flight to Managua.
Managua was pretty funny, we're both knackered, Matt is sick as a dog & we arrive at the Tica bus station for a bus to San Jose to find it's completely full. Determined to get out of Nicaragua the same day we walked through the streets to find the King Quality bus station & managed to purchase a ridiculously expensive ticket to San Jose leaving in a few hours. With time to kill I thought it would be a great idea to go find a falafel place (the cravings had started), walking about in midday heat with our bags, up a big hill, people attempting to help, we still had no luck in finding the damn place. Eventually after talking to a *dwarf, not listening to said dwarf & then having to walk past Mr Dwarf in embarrassment because he was in fact right about which way to go, we decided to settle on a dodgy looking Soda & some dodgy looking chicken.
Finally we're on the bus to Costa Rica!!! A long journey & we decide to pop off at Liberia as we want to head to La Fortuna & Monteverde. Unsure of our next steps or if it's even possible to get to those places from Liberia, we head to find a Hostel & I get a surprise by bumping into a guy called Josh who seems to pop up in pretty much every place I've been too. Matt's still not feeling to great & we're in a room like an old school building or something, with 3 rickety beds, a tv that doesn't work & paintings that make the place feel haunted, it's about 40 degrees in the room & the poor fan looks like it's even giving up but we crack on anyway & formulate a plan for the next day.
2 buses later & me leaving my phone behind, we make it to La Fortuna!!! I really like La Fortuna, there is something about the place I like, in fact there is something about Costa Rica I really really like. After talking to a guy about tours for a while we head to Arenal Backpackers, I totally recommend this place, we ended up in a dorm room but they had doubles & also these smart tents (see pics) you can stay in with a sweet double bed.The food here was good, people seemed friendly & to top it all they had a pool! After settling in we needed to make some fast decisions about what we were going to do tour wise, It all ultimately came down to funds & time available & we had little of both. After realizing we weren't coming to any conclusion at all we left it to chance to see what would happen in the coming days with only a rough idea & lucky for us it all worked out.
The first morning we end up doing an ATV Tour on Quads, driving through mud roads, over rocky areas & generally being thrown about on the uneven surfaces, such fun! We stopped at a couple of places but the most special was a kind of river with a couple of pools, one of which you could do a rope swing from. Matt pretty much got straight on it & went for it (I swear he landed on his face one time) & after telling him to stop pestering me so much I also got my kit off & pretty much shat myself as I landed on my thigh in the water. It was SO MUCH FUN though!!! I then decided to jump off the side & thanks to a friendly local who helped me avoid rocks, he also informed us that there had been quite a few deaths there as people would hit the rocks, not let go of the rope & either die or injure themselves bad. Glad I found out after :)
After this we hired out Mopeds to go & look at the lake behind the volcano..I just want to add here that while we were there pretty much every single cloud cleared from Arenal Volcano, apparently that's quite rare as its usually covered in them but we got to see it in all it's beauty & I have to say it was pretty special. Anyway, so we hire out these mopeds & the guy gets us to test them to see how we do…I've driven one a few times before so after a little unease I'm fine & dandy, Matt however has never been on one before & even though he apparently nearly stacks it the guy lets us on our way without so much as a twinge of concern (the fool).
The cool wind in our hair (haha) we're riding around some spectacular scenery, up & down massive hills & end up at the Dam. The view is amazing & as the sun is starting to set we decide to try & find a road we missed earlier before heading back, not before my bike decides it doesn't like being propped up by its little leg, & it wants to have a rest on the floor, the swine! BOSH goes my bike.
Thankfully it's got a few scratches but nothing I don't think they will notice as the bikes not in great shape as it is, after Matt laughs for a while we head off again & end up turning down a dirt road with rocks everywhere. Matt seems to be enjoying this part for some unknown reason but to me this is hell, my bikes going everywhere, there's dust everywhere & I'm getting stressed as we need to head back. I motion for us to head back & we hop of our bikes to turn them around, I do a little bunny hop with the bike & laugh as it's really easy to pull the accelerator when also holding the break…I forgot to mention this to Matt & before I know it his front wheel of his bike is 5 foot up in the air & he let's go the bike accelerating as it crashes, twisted, into a ditch :0
I'm pretty much convinced the bikes totaled but determined to not be met with a hefty fine, we pull it up & out of the ditch to inspect it. It isn't pretty & there's a few cracks in the body work as well as the plastic but as luck would have it the bike turns on & is ok, hallelujah!!We head back off carefully trying to figure out ways we can get away with this & not being very successful in our ideas.
It's getting dark & we're heading back into town, Matt's lights won't stay on & as we're coming up to traffic police we're pulled over. I don't worry too much as we got pulled on our way out and as soon as we mention we're hiring the bikes they let us go. This time however the guys not having any of it, he wants to see our driving license, our passport, our vehicle documentation etc etc. I have nothing on me & Matt's license just gets us a further b******ing as we shouldn't be driving bikes on it, they won't let us go & we were due to give the bikes back 10 mins ago. To cut a long story short as I'm boring myself now, we have to leave our bikes & walk to the Hostel to get our passports, walk to the rent shop to tell them (bearing in mind we walk across to them without their bikes they we're pretty worried to begin with) & then the owner drove us to the traffic cops in his flash Merc, noice. Nothing really gets sorted, one of the bikes is apparently unroad worthy so the owner gets in trouble, then they hand us a fine for not having our documents (reduced from $500 to about $150 gee thanks) & I refuse to sign or pay it as, in my opinion, it was the shops responsibility to inform us of this & give us a copy of the vehicle paperwork. The police officers are slightly tired of us by now but I think also laughing slightly for my complete lack of compromising over the fee, I win & we don't pay & apparently because we're from overseas even if we took it & didn't pay it they couldn't do a thing anyway baaahahaha.
So yeah eventful day & to top it all off the boss drives us back to check the bikes over. Eh oh.
Matt gets smacked with 100,000 colones fine for his damages , which they proceed to look at ME for…like he's covering my back or something because women can't drive Grrr, but he takes it on the chin & we decide to head out & get drunk with some American lads from our room as its Festival time in La Fortuna!
We get pretty spangled..the festival is really, well, odd. We turn up & it's like a fair, really quiet with no one really about but we head to the main tent to see what's happening and low & behold it's full of people dancing. Not just normal dancing but these kids are gyrating like their lives depend on it, we also notice a trend for the kids…the trend is for one boy to have two girls all over him at all times. Fair play, I mean what bloke wouldn't like this but what made it weirder is the boys looked about 13 & the girls about 16 & you would have this baby faced kid sandwiched between two girls! Haha, maybe the girls have control & are abusing their innocent minds, who knows! But it was funny to watch.
I'm pretty spent when I spot a guy from the tour shop so go have a chat, he's pretty friendly & I get the gist he fancies me so on letting Matt know this information he marches over & in his slightly drunk state demands a good deal on Rappelling & Water Rafting on level 5, job done we get a bargain deal for 9.30am the next day…ouch. Very little sleep later & it's time to wake up, still drunk…hanging…for our fun adventure day. YAY! :S
Actually this turned out to be one of the highlights of my trip, I never thought I would be interested in White Water Rafting but it was SO much fun. People were going out of the boat, water was everywhere, my knuckles hurt from clinging on then on the hardest part the whole boat tipped & we all went flying!! Haha so funny, although at the time it was scary as hell as I kept going under & I smashed myself up over a few rocks (still have a scar to prove it!). We then rappelled down a massive waterfall!! Jesus H Christ I was shaking, not only from being freezing but I was so so scared, but I made it down & the feeling was immense. Overall an absolutely fantastic day, La Fortuna had been good to us & we left on a happy high :)
*Disclaimer: It really was an actual dwarf, I am not merely taking the piss out of a short mans height. He was Dwarfied, a Costa Rican Dwarf.
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