Pura Vida - Costa Rica pt. 2
La Pura Vida - The good life.
Costa Ricans use this phrase to mean any number of things: Hello, yes, OK, no, goodbye & things are going great. It's a lot like the 'Insh'allah' of muslim countries in that respect.
And, in many ways it is the pure life. Costa Rica is one of the top destinations for nature buffs, attracting people from all over the world from places like Israel, Germany, Holland, the USA, France, Australia and Finland for any number of outdoor activities - whether it be white-water rafting down class IV+ rivers, surfing world class left hand breaks, hiking your tail off in incredible natural parks or witnessing an active volcano belch magma into the air and then down its sides while relaxing in a 5 star hot springs.
I've done all of this in the last 3 weeks (except the surfing), and it's been pretty darn good so far. Got rained out of a volcano today, but that's alright - today's volcano doesn't belch lava.
Other than that - there's some things that are just scary as F***! Take this thing for example:
Jesus Christ! That´s a friggin' electrocution waiting to happen! Look how you can see the wires from the wall supplying 120VAC to the top of the shower head which acts as the hot water heater heating the, hopefully clean, H2O as it comes in from the wall. In some places, if you get your hand too close to the shower head while showering you can actually feel a little voltage in the spray. And it´s like that all over Latin America - not just CR.
Tell me, somebody, WHAT were these people thinking???
And that´s been Costa Rica. The highlights for me DEFINITELY were seeing Vulcan Arenal do it´s lava thing from the comfort of Baldi Hot Springs and white-water rafting the Pacuare river (class IV+).
I leave you with this quote from the Lonely Planet guidebook
"If you are a highly experienced rafter, going to Costa Rica and not rafting is like giong to New York City or Paris and not getting insulted."
Costa Ricans use this phrase to mean any number of things: Hello, yes, OK, no, goodbye & things are going great. It's a lot like the 'Insh'allah' of muslim countries in that respect.
And, in many ways it is the pure life. Costa Rica is one of the top destinations for nature buffs, attracting people from all over the world from places like Israel, Germany, Holland, the USA, France, Australia and Finland for any number of outdoor activities - whether it be white-water rafting down class IV+ rivers, surfing world class left hand breaks, hiking your tail off in incredible natural parks or witnessing an active volcano belch magma into the air and then down its sides while relaxing in a 5 star hot springs.
I've done all of this in the last 3 weeks (except the surfing), and it's been pretty darn good so far. Got rained out of a volcano today, but that's alright - today's volcano doesn't belch lava.
Other than that - there's some things that are just scary as F***! Take this thing for example:
Jesus Christ! That´s a friggin' electrocution waiting to happen! Look how you can see the wires from the wall supplying 120VAC to the top of the shower head which acts as the hot water heater heating the, hopefully clean, H2O as it comes in from the wall. In some places, if you get your hand too close to the shower head while showering you can actually feel a little voltage in the spray. And it´s like that all over Latin America - not just CR.
Tell me, somebody, WHAT were these people thinking???
And that´s been Costa Rica. The highlights for me DEFINITELY were seeing Vulcan Arenal do it´s lava thing from the comfort of Baldi Hot Springs and white-water rafting the Pacuare river (class IV+).
I leave you with this quote from the Lonely Planet guidebook
"If you are a highly experienced rafter, going to Costa Rica and not rafting is like giong to New York City or Paris and not getting insulted."
posted by Aeon at 4:40 PM
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