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ATVs are the new black – Costa Rica, days 8 & 9 – the finale.

holly — Mon, 31 May 2010 16:18:17 +0000

So, I’ve discovered I like going fast and I drive like a madwoman. Plus, I’m capable of doing them both at the same time. On roads that are little more than goat paths and have ever expanding water features as the rivers roll over them. All the while giggling like a mental patient and hoping my thighs don’t stick to the seat. I’m totally okay with all of the above.

Got up bright and early and were picked up by Chino, our super sweet guide (who tried to broker a deal to have me as his fourth wife. I passed, but I did promise to hang out with him next time I’m in Quepos, although something tells me I’m going to “forget” this) and driven out to London, Costa Rica, population, like, 80. It was tiny, but cute, with chickens and dogs wandering the street more than people. We pulled into someone’s driveway (this seemed a little weird until we saw the fifteen ATVs parked there) and, after a quick training course in the fine art of not killing yourself on an ATV, we were off.

It was fantastic. The path was steep and rocky and wet in places, but that just let you really enjoy what an ATV could do. This was supposed to be off-roading, and it satisfied. I thought it had been purpose-built for the psycho tourists like us, but after the fact we learned that this actually was the public road in the area. Fourteen families had no other way in or out of their little isolated village. Wow. We had also brought a change of clothes in case we got muddy and messy as the website had warned, but I discovered quickly that if you went faster (and cheered, that was an important part) then teh water sprayed outwards and kept me all dry.

Midway through we stopped and had an hour walk through a beautiful forest and across a suspension bridge that was nothing more than a bunch of metal ladders trussed together a hundred feet up in the air to a waterfall. This is a perfect place to play and swim, but as it was just the two of us, we opted to just take lots of pictures and dip our feet instead of making the poor guide stand around awkwardly as we splashed in the falls. Then it was back onto the ATVs and retracing our route back to the start. On the way back he knew we were capable drivers, so the speeds were much higher, topping out about 50mph. Sweet. Only once, when I was trying to avoid some horseback tourists, did I confuse the break and the gas and nearly go shooting off into the jungle. Leave it to me to only make a mistake when there’s a crowd of people to see it!

Did not want to give that ATV back. I tried to just drive off, but it just would have taken me too long to drive it all the way back home, and it’s hard to find a good parking space for your ATV in downtown Vancouver, so I left it.

Spent the rest of the day hanging out at the hotel to escape the heat and avoid the torrential downpour that left me epically soaked even under my umbrella when I walked down to the local bodega for supplies. After that, we deserved a nice dinner, so we cabbed it to El Avion and we got to watch the lightning illuminate the sky from our table under a plane.

The last full day in Quepos started early, as we had a 6am pickup for our mangrove tour. They have to start super early to hit the tides at the right times. Luckily, since the sun rises and sets at 5:00 here, your body clock gets you up early anyway to greet the sun and puts you to sleep early, so that wake up call was not too bad. The tour group was us and a French family that spoke almost no English, and on our two and a half hour boat tour we saw a few monkeys, some vultures and a couple of skinny raccoons, but that was pretty much it. Three years ago I had taken the same tour and seen so many animals it was incredible, but today everyone was playing hide and seek from us and they won. It honestly felt like a colossal waste of time. And it finished at 9am, so we still had the whole day to fill.

Like every woman, we went shopping. We got a great deal on a taxi and headed right down to Playa Manuel Antonio, the beach paradise. I’m far too pale to be a beach bunny, and the sun here fries skin in the blink of an eye (half the people walking around are a painful red colour, and that had already happened to me once this trip, so there was no way I was going through that again), but there’s a few cute souvenir shops and a street market where you can get some good tacky tourist shit (I love this stuff!) as long as you barter for it. We got a great carved vase for half the price we would have paid in the stores in Quepos. Of course, today had to be the day it decided not to rain in the afternoon and we tried not to melt as we shopped, took the incredibly cheap public bus back to Quepos, shopped more, and then got all packed up and ready to depart the next morning.

The drive to San Jose was kind of anticlimactic compared to all our other Interbus transfers, as the roads were, well, actual roads the whole way, including an extended stint on a brand new highway. Our driver took advantage of this by driving super fast, which actually didn’t scare me as much as it should have, I loved the speed. Clearly the ATV ride has broken my common sense when it came to speeding in this country. Soon we were back at the Casa Conde, where we discovered our pickup time the next morning for our 10am flight was 515am. Great. So we dropped our bags, had some dinner, watched a tiny bit of TV and went to bed early to prep for our 430am wake up call.

Our airport transfer the next day was even early. He showed up at 5. Luckily, we were ready anyway, but that got us to the airport at 545. Cranky and tired and hungry we checked in for our flight, cleared security and hit the food court for a giant cinnabon breakfast. Normally I wouldn’t eat 1500 calories of sugary goodness for breakfast, but it just seemed to be a fitting send off for our time in Costa Rica. It had been a hot, sweet and sticky(with both sweat and rain) trip, and was thoroughly enjoyable.

Pura Vida!

Paris – They put their money in the left bank.

holly — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 20:33:14 +0000

Last year a friend and I were able to experience Paris when it sizzles as part of a Globus week in London and Paris package. Our hotel was on the left bank of the Seine, steps from the spectacular Eiffel Tower and numerous metro lines.

While our leader (who delighted in pointing out pickpockets and the exact spot where Princess Diana died) warned that the Metro was a confusing, potentially dangerous way to travel, we found it cheap, fast and easy, as well as being a great source of entertainment. Buskers perform right on the trains, playing guitars or wheeling around Karaoke machines, complete with large amplifiers and microphones.

Within hours of arriving in Paris we had ascended the Arc de Triomphe (shorter than expected, but halfway up the stairs you begin to think it’s huge), strolled the Champs Elysses and people watched at a charming little sidewalk bistro.

A half day bus tour was included in the package the next morning and it was great, complete with a guided tour through the dirt-stained glory of Notre Dame, and a ride up to the first floor of the Eiffel Tower.

The tour dropped us off at a perfumerie near the Opera House (of Phantom of the Opera fame) for an optional shopping trip, but we chose to break away from the pack and take the RER rapid train to Disneyland Paris so we could compare it with the one in California. When the tour leader found out where we were going, he actually turned up his nose at us and refused to speak with either of us for the remainder of the trip.

Paris was in the middle of an unseasonable October heat wave and I was thankful for the pair of shorts I had packed at the last minute. It felt, though, as if I was the only person in the country wearing them, as I got lots of stares and a street vendor followed me down the Rue de Rivoli making unsettling kissing sounds. The Louvre heated up quickly, it’s only source of air-conditioning being large grates in the floor, and groups of tourists battled to stand on top to escape the oppressive heat.

Our finale in Paris was enjoying a lunch of baguettes and cheese on the banks of the Seine, followed by a nighttime boat tour of the City of Lights. The Eiffel Tower literally sparkled, a surreal sight that just makes you smile and realize “this is Paris.”

A city of history leaning up against a modern world, I still see that glittering tower when I close my eyes – awesome enough to make dealing with the snooty tour leader worth it.

Originally published in the Vancouver Province

Las Vegas Baby!

holly — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 02:15:54 +0000

“What the heck are we doing here? It’s nothing but sand” was my first impression as the pilot announced final approach into Las Vegas this past fourth of July. Then suddenly there she was, rising out of the heat waves like a miniature Egypt…no, Paris…no, Italy…no, Camelot. The hotels should give passport stamps to go with their wonderfully tacky souvenirs. As a Vegas beginner, the city comes at you like an adult Disneyland, all bright and flashy and promising to make dreams come true.

We were staying at the Excalibur, and were lucky enough to get one of the newly renovated rooms (read: tasteful décor and a massive flatscreen TV – that we never figured out how to operate, but it wasn’t like we were in the room long enough anyhow). Already we had learned the first rule of Vegas: everyone’s looking to get rich, including all the taxi drivers who delight in taking the “fast way” which happens to cost double.

For two Canadian girls, the heat hit us like a blanket you can’t shrug off. Mid-afternoon we prayed for the wind to stop as it was hotter than the ambient air temp, and the sun setting didn’t provide much relief, because then the baked pavement released it’s stored heat, turning the whole Strip into a shoe-softening hot plate. On the 6th we were lucky enough to get the hottest day of the year, a blistering 125 degrees (according to our Gondolier at the Venetian) that would have been unbearable had there been any humidity.

And the hotels lived up to their reputations. Our favorite was the spectacular Venetian and the Paris flowed close behind, both in terms of great themes and overall photogenic-ness. The Bellagio and Cesar’s Palace are beautifully over the top, and the Luxor’s playful Egyptian carnival was a lot of fun. We managed to talk our way up the inclinators (diagonal elevators) ascending the walls of the giant pyramid and get memorable views over the casino and mock ancient city below.

If you’re not lucky enough to win the jackpot (as we were), you learn rule #2: Vegas is expensive. Between the $4 bottles of water, $10 average fast food meal and souvenirs, our money went faster than if a slot machine had eaten it. But there is hope, as the free dancing fountains at the Bellagio were spectacular, the volcano eruption at the Mirage was cool and the cheesy Pussycat Dolls-meets-Chippendales Sirens of TI show was fun to laugh at. At both the Showcase Mall and Hawaiian Marketplace there were also half price ticket booths where you could snag great same-day tickets to many of the big-name shows for a steal.

All told, Vegas wasn’t the “adult playground” I’d expected, much more tongue-in-cheek, a city that seemed to go out of it’s way to make fun of itself. No matter how much you see, you will always leave with a list of things you missed or, as I like to put it, “saved for the next trip”.

- As originally published in the Vancouver Province