After almost 1000 kilometres on the Caribbean side and through the Costa Rican highlands, we rejoin the Panamericana. The road from Laguna Arenal was marked normally on the map. It takes us two and a half hours to drive the last 40 kilometres of steep gravel road down to the Pacific. Some local residents said it would be impassable with our car.
The Panamericana takes us another one and a half hours to the tourist centre of Jaco, 100 km to the south. The grubby surfer hostel right on the beach offers free surfboards, but waves without wind are just not my thing.
We melt away in the 36ºC hot and humid calm. In the evening, it’s time for the usual destruction parties. I get out early.
In the morning I find out that my laptop display has to be flown in from Germany, which leaves me unemployed for at least another three weeks until Managua/Nicaragua. My luggage remains lost. Condor impresses by minimising communication.
I knew that Costa Rica wouldn’t be cheap. But even in expensive New Zealand, I managed well on €1,750 a month, and we stayed in really posh accommodation there a few times. Here I need at least €2,400 a month, and we live modestly, sometimes close to vomit. The food prices are 1/3 above the German level – paying twice as much is child’s play. German terror tourists are happy to pay $20 for a Weisswurst with pretzels and wheat. I pay $4 for a bottle of water in the supermarket.
The fun programme is incredibly expensive everywhere, with another $100 to $200 for half a day of canopy, quad biking, guided tours and the like. We save everything, the mini-mobile already costs €40 a day. Today we use it again for a good five hours for 220 km on the Panamericana, 100 km of which are roadworks.
Panamericana, km 1,957: Costa Rica is killing me. Wanna go home. Amount of shit happening by far over-exhausted…
Frank Woelky, born in 1973. Kitesurfer since 1998. Since 2006, I have been combining kitesurfing and web design on trips lasting several months off the beaten track.