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LOTTY'S TRAVELOGUE |
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I'm
sitting in a tiny little internet cafe in a place called Heredia (it's
6.20pm - must be the early hours of the morning for you!). The
flights seemed SOOOOOO long... met up with people on the way who were
obviously doing the same thing - looking lost and confused! We
arrived after it was dark - it was really daunting - arriving on
the other side of the world, dark, with no one you know + not a clue
what to expect!! We were met at the airport and driven to our hostel where
I had a freezing cold shower & then went to bed! The
hostel is called Mango Verde and is about a 20min bus ride from where
we have our Spanish lessons in a nearby town called Alahuala.
It's v basic but charming! The Ticans are really friendly and
welcoming + really seem interested to talk to you. I'm in the 2nd group
for Spanish (I survived the test!) which is not for complete beginners
but for those who knew some words and phrases... I'm pleased I got into
this group as it's much more interesting + faster moving than the
beginners group. We have lessons in the afternoon (2pm - 6pm).
Our 'classroom' is outside under cover of a sheet - rather windy + cold
as it gets later (& dark!) & noisy as planes go over very low
(worse than in Rushden!). However - it's really nice being
semi-outside. I'm beginning to
settle in here and get an idea of how to find my way around and getting
to know people. The other volunteers here seem really nice.
The food is... er... well... not that great... I'm treating it with caution
at the moment! On our placements we will be eating proper Costa
Rican food... rice and beans or beans and rice! Just as well I
like both! Although I've been told I won't after eating it 3
TIMES A DAY... yes, for BREAKFAST, LUNCH AND SUPPER for 5
months!!!! Think I might get just a little fed up of rice and
beans! The Ticans are
REALLY friendly and chatty... a group of us had lunch in a
restaurant yesterday and the waiter spoke pretty good English...
most Ticans don't seem to speak any English... which makes it rather
interesting when in shops, banks, buses etc! Anyway... he welcomed
us and told us good places to go etc. and sat and chatted with us while
we ate... he wouldn't even take the tip we offered him when we left!
A typical Tican! We also went to a tiny grocery store in our
Spanish lesson to learn the names of foods... a little boy whose father
owned the shop took us round and told us the names of all the foods and
how they were made... all in Spanish of course! We bought a few
things and the father gave us some coco snacks... free! Coco is
coconut by the way. That evening we saw both the waiter from the
cafe and the little boy, Carlos and both greeted us like long lost
friends and Carlos came up and gave us all a kiss on the cheek! There's a really
amazing atmosphere here... friendly, VERY laid back... they talk about
Tico Time... which basically means that no one is in a hurry to do
anything and everything is on a very relaxed time schedule... accept our
Spanish lessons! |
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Further instalment received Sunday 16 March 2003:
It's 5.50am here but am e-mailing as I set my alarm an hour too early as it's still on Panama time!! I'm at the Costa Rican Backpackers Hostel again as I (and another girl called Charlotte) are off to Cabo Blanco today. Charlotte and I have been on the last placement together, will be on the next one together and are planning to meet up during the Easter holidays to travel - she's 23 and much less dappy than me so a good travelling companion! As you will have gathered, I've been to Panama!! The turtle project at Gandoca is right next to the border to Panama so the 5 of us decided to go for a fleeting visit (a day and a night) before returning to San Jose. We went to the Bocas del Toro archipelago - just a little further down the Caribbean coast - a bit touristy but really nice + had my first warm shower since I've been here! Nice to see some white sand beaches too after the black sand beaches of Gandoca.
Ganodoca
was BRILLIANT!! REALLY hard work but also REALLY good fun.
Tiny little isolated community (nearest phone was 1.5 hrs walk away!)
with lots of volunteers (not so good for my Spanish!). Stayed
in a cabin in the garden of a local family with 4 others. Received
initial training on first day... about the work, the turtles and
practical training - we had to learn how to make a turtle nest for
relocation purposes and all had to construct one! Ugh... night
patrols!! Either 8 - 12pm (in which case you then had to
start work again at 8am... clearing the beaches of debris to make the
patrols a little less hazardous - no torch light allowed accept
occasionally with a red filter! + constructing hatcheries) or 12 - 4am (starting
work again at 2pm)... walked about 10kms every night... VERY tiring + no
time to sleep as people getting up and going to bed at all different
hours. Saw 2 turtles... really exciting (but unfortunately didn't
see any lay any eggs). The Leatherback turtles are HUGE! Oh,
so much to say and so little time to write... Tiny shop formed the
centre of the community (literally a hut with a couple of shelves
of food!)... music + salsa dancing (when we weren't so tired that
we were falling asleep whilst walking)! Really nice people
again too. Very different feel over the Caribbean side with a
strong Caribbean influence.
When
we crossed back over the border from Panama we discovered that there was
a bus strike and we were stranded!! Taxi driver said we could
chase the bus that had left earlier from Panama heading to San Jose
(probably the only one for the next few days)... and sure enough we
caught it up, he beeped the horn and then cut in front of it to
make it stop!!! Can you imagine that happening in England!
So... we got the bus ok ( although the tyre did
burst half way to SJ...). So many really funny incidences...
Went to a shopping mall last night, shops, bars, cinema etc... nice to see some civilisation for a bit... went to see Catch Me If You Can... quite good! We are finding that when we re-enter civilisation and go to a restaurant for a meal we can only eat a little of it because the food is so rich after eating rice and beans the whole time!!
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I'm in San Jose now (on my own as the other volunteers I travelled here with from Cabo Blanco left for Panama this morning)... but I have had a nice day with a Tico friend in the centre of town. Am staying in a really nice hostel too... its so chilled out and friendly + other backpackers here are very friendly... only 2,275 colones a night (thats just over 4 pounds!)... domitory room, clean, nice sitting area, tv, hammocks, kitchen, free internet, HOT SHOWERS!! Luxury! Off to Turrialba tomorrow! SOOOOOOOOOOO cold here in San Jose + windy and rainy... feels just like English weather! |
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10 April 2003 Had a phone call from Lotty on Sunday evening. She is now living in a small town called Turrialba which sits on the side of a volcano in central Costa Rica. She has just finished her first week of teaching at a small private primary school close to where she is staying. She says that her 'home-stay' family, who she will lodge with for the rest of her time in Costa Rica, are a lovely middle-aged couple, called Carlos and Anna, and their 29 year old son Marlon. Also staying is an American medical student who will be there just for a month. The family speak no English so her Spanish is being tested to the full.
My understanding is that the school (called Escuela Interamericana) is in a complex owned by a large American company. On site there is a library (with free internet access - very useful), swimming pool and gym. For the princely sum of £3 per month Lotty has unlimited access to all of these facilities. Apparently, she keeps being told that she was very lucky to be placed in this school.
Today (Thursday, 10/4), the school breaks up for Easter and Lotty and a friend will set off tomorrow to spend the next 11 days backpacking in Nicaragua. So, we're unlikely to get any news now until she's back in Costa Rica. |
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15 April 2003
Charlotte, Sina and I have now been in
Nicaragua for 2 days... it's really different to Costa Rica but also
amazing! The border crossing was a complete nightmare... so
chaotic + disorganised... lots of people trying to take money off you
and pretending to be official passport control people! Really
needed our wits about us!
Spent two nights in San Juan del Sur...
beach + festivities as it's Semana Santa. Now on our way to Isla
Ometepe in Lake Nicaragua (largest fresh water lake in the world,
supposedly! + has sharks). Will spend a few nights there and then
go to Granada (historic city)... everything here is even cheaper than in
Costa Rica... another currency to deal with... have got pounds, dollars,
colones and now cordobas in my wallet! Converting between them the
whole time is making my head ache!
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17 April 2003 Still in Nicaragua... have been to Isla Ometepe in Lake Nicaragua.... SO nice! Went kayaking lots on the lake - the lake is so big you think it's the sea... waves, sand etc! Stayed in a really nice hostel (very basic, but lovely!). Today we left Ometepe for Granada (I'm now staying in a hostel in Granada... really good + luxury compared to what we have been used to... free internet, DVDs, swimming pool (tiny), CLEAN bathroom and in a dorm with 14 others ($6 per night)!! We're staying here for 3 nights before returning to San Jose (had to leave Ometepe early as nothing runs on the Thursday and Friday before Easter and need to get back in time to teach on Monday morning!)... shame we had to leave Ometepe early becuase it was just so nice + I could have happily kayaked every day for the next year... beautiful lake, with volcano in the background and islands you can kayak to... I was the kayaking instructor for the others as they hadn't done much before!
Back to CR on Sunday eve. |
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Had a good weekend... didn't go to San Jose as planned but had fun in Turrialba instead... went to a foam party! Sunday was 'Dia del Deportes' (Sports Day) at the school... nice atmosphere... lots of families there etc. A girl in first grade told me that her Mum is a Spanish teacher and she wants to know if I could give her English lessons and she could give me Spanish lessons in return ... sounds like a good arrangement... will have to see how it works out. Carlos (my homestay 'father') is helping me find a bike to rent.... would be really useful here but it's expensive to do it for 2 months! However, I think he's going to try and use his contacts... so I'll have to wait and see. |
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6 May 2003 I have now been on my teaching placement in a small junior school in Turrialba since just before Easter. It's located in the beautiful grounds of CATIE (a biological & agricultural research centre). The children are aged between 6 & 12yrs, with about 10 in each class. I've been helping with English and Science classes (its supposed to be a bilingual school so science and maths are taught in English from 4th grade upwards... but its a challenge as some of them speak very little English). They also learn American English so I've had to adapt my spelling, vocab and accent in order to be understood! The school is struggling due to lack of resources but compared to many other schools in Costa Rica its doing pretty well. At the moment I'm helping to start a reading programme at the school and create some kind of library... books are really expensive in Costa Rica and few of the kids read out of school at all. The school also has a problem with discipline - the kids are inattentive to say the least!
There are now 5 other volunteers in Turrialba and so we take the opportunity to travel when we get time off and at the weekends... there is so much of Costa Rica I still really want to see! We had Thursday off as it was May Day but also asked for Friday off so that we would have 4 days free to travel... the six of us here went to Puerto Viejo (southern Caribbean coast)... really nice + good to see the sun again!
Got to go... I'll be late for school!
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15 May 2003 Things are still going well... . I´ve given my first English lesson to the mother of a girl at school and she has given me a Spanish lesson...
We've been having SO MUCH rain here (it makes English rain look really tame). It's so loud when it rains that it's almost impossible to hear anything in the classrooms. The rainy season has officially started!
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21 May 2003 I went White Water Rafting on Saturday with about 10 other volunteers... it was fantastic! Beautiful scenery (through forest) and really good fun... it was raining though and we were all freezing cold by the end of the day!
Spent a really nice evening at Theresa's house yesterday... as I'm always complaining to her about the food at my homestay she decided that we should cook dinner at her house... we went out and bought the stuff... guess what we had?? Pasta with tomato sauce and some red wine! Proper home food.... and it tasted SOOOOOOO good... not a single grain of rice or a single bean in sight!! We also watched TV programmes that we get at home (everyone who lives in CATIE has sky)... gave me a breather from Costa Rican lifestyle! |
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27 May 2003 Have just got back from La Fortuna which is where Volcan Arenal is. Had a brilliant time - a group of 13 of us went - saw the volcano erupting at night whilst sitting in some hot springs!! Spectacular + unbelievable view! The school gave us Friday off (we got a 6am bus to San Jose and then the bus to La Fortuna... arrived there at about 1pm). There's just one main high street at the end of which... is the volcano!
We are also collecting our bikes tomorrow when we get back to Turrialba... will be so nice to not be dependent on the buses anymore + might help to burn off some of the rice and beans!
I've finally got the opportunity to do a diving course and (hopefully!) get a PADI certificate which would qualify me to dive anywhere in the world!! I'm really excited about this as it's something I've really wanted to do for ages...hope to do the 4 day course in Bocas del Toro, Panama. I've been to Bocas before and it's a really nice group of islands off the north Pacific coast of Panama. It's much cheaper to do the course out here than in England + much warmer and much more to see underwater. |
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3 June 2003 Went white water rafting again on Saturday!! Had a brilliant time + v nice group of people... went down the Pacuare river which is meant to be one of the most beautiful in Costa Rica and is a well known white water rafting place for Central America. SOOOOOOO beautiful.... river runs through virgin rainforest.... waterfalls etc.... stunning!! The rapids were also wilder (class 3 and 4.... last time we just went down class 3 rapids... classes rated from 1 (easiest) to 5 (hardest). So much fun... I got to swim in the water in the calm bits... pulled downstream by the currents.... so good! I also very nearly fell out when we went through one lot of rapids! |
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10 June 2003 Went to Quepos and Manuel Antonio this weekend... Manuel Antonio is a National Park on the central pacific coast (not far from Ballena, my first conservation placement... that seems a long time ago)!... really nice park + beaches but pretty touristy... good to back on the Pacific coast though, I prefer it to the Caribean coast. Just there for one night but seemed to pack a lot in (as usual!). Journey there on the bus involved crossing some of the dodgiest bridges I've ever seen... you just had to close your eyes and hope the bus made it across!! I also saw a caiman in the river below whilst crossing one of these bridges (so it was just as well I didn't have my eyes closed). So... back in Turrialba now for my final two weeks of teaching!
Really looking forward to the remainder of
my time here but also to coming HOME having been away for so long!!
I hope to have done all the things I wanted to do before I leave, and if
things go according to plan, I should do. Will be really sad to
leave this amazing place having been here so long + really feel settled
in here, but I know I will be ready + am really excited to be coming
home!!
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17 June 2003 I have had a brilliant weekend. I arranged (using my now numerous contacts in Turrialba!!) for us to go horseback riding up Volcan Turrialba (Tessa, Sarah and two friends of Sarah's). It was a stunningly beautiful drive up to the lodge where the horses were (also a pretty bumpy one as there's no road!)... superb views... lots of little dairy farms on the way up (each with about 10 cows)... they make the Queso Turrialba (cheese) up there. The horseback riding was really good fun and it was (unusually for Turrialba) really sunny to start with, but as we got further up it turned misty... had quite an eire atmoshere + so quiet! After about 2 hours we reached the top... and it started to rain! We left the horses tied up and walked down into the crater (the volcano's dormant although it is apparently due to errupt again soon...!). Amazing to walk in the crater, steam coming out + loads of strange flowers and really misty! Trekked back down in the pouring rain... REALLY cold! Arrived back at the lodge drenched but they had a nice hot fire and lunch waiting (I even had hot chocolate!!!). The guy who came with us got us the Tico price for the trip instead of the tourist price as we've been here so long + are working!
Saturday evening we had a leaving
party as it's our final weekend... really good fun. Everyone
I've got to know here in Turrialba came... I'll really miss them all
when I leave.
It's going to be a hectic final week at
school... we've got just 3 days to finish the library before the
opening day!
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21 June 2003 I'm so sad to be leaving Turrialba today. Have been working like crazy in the library... official opening was yesterday and we just got it finished in time... really pleased with it + the Principal is delighted, especially with the big mural we painted on the wall... large tree + background... kids will stick a paper leaf onto the tree when they finish a book with the name and title etc. Somehow we got it finished in just 2 hrs!! They also had a leaving presentation for us... gave us a goodie bag + the kids gave little thank you speeches... it was so sweet! Later... while we were finishing off the library, the 4th grade kids came in & showered us with flowers and cards etc!
Don't want to leave! : (
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26 June 2003
Have just arrived in David City,
Panama... left Covcorvado this morning having been there for three
nights... had a brilliant time... really isolated location... lots of
buses + 1.5hr boat ride (in a little speed boat) to reach Drake Bay,
Osa Penisula. It was just Tessa and I, and we stayed in a really
basic little lodge up in the forest overlooking the bay (hardly
anyone else there, very few tourists)... met a Spanish couple who were
staying at our lodge... first time I've spoken Spanish to people from
Spain... difficult to understand their accent + they speak even faster
than Ticos! Really friendly woman who owned and ran the lodge +
she cooked us the most fantastic meals! Went kayaking on the sea
(Tess fell in... I turned around to help her and also fell in!!
BIG waves!!). Paddled to the mouth of a river and went a little
way up through rainforest (no guide... it was certainly an
adventure!)... reached some rapids... Tess fell out of her kayak... I
was laughing until I realised she hadn't reappeared... then I was
panicking.... fortunately she popped up eventually... but she had
taken her life jacket off as it had been rubbing and she was being
swept downstream... + the river had crocodiles!! Managed to get
her back into her kayak before she became lunch for a hungry
crocodile. Then the water level suddenly rose... we had been
warned that this can happen if there's a lot of rain up in the hills
and can lead to a huge wall of water coming down the river... VERY
dangerous... so we got out of there pretty quickly!! Tess
managed to fall out AGAIN as we got back to the beach... she certainly
knows how to provide entertainment!!
The following day we went on a tour of
Corcovado National Park... really isolated + untouched. Boat
trip to and from + hiked through the rainforest... saw agoutis and
coatis + tapir prints. Part (well actually a pretty significant
part) of my reason for wanting to go to Corcovado was to see the
Scarlet Macaws... they are endangered + only found in Costa Rica...
most of them are in Corcovado (just 300 pairs remaining!). Our
guide searched really hard to find them but we couldn't... I was
disappointed... but just as we arrived back at the ranger station she
suddenly turned to me (I think she knew how desperate I was to
see them) and told me to run over to a group of trees because she
could hear them there... I ran ahead and.... sure enough.... there
were two!! I was so excited to see them... absolutely stunning
colouring... they really don't look natural!! Had a superb view
and I watched them for ages (Tessa didn't seem able to see what I was
so excited about.. 'they're just big red parrots aren't they?'!
Off to Bocas tomorrow... hopefully to
organise the diving course.
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29 June 2003 The last dispatch!
We've just finished our diving course... and passed! I'm now a certified PADI Open Water Diver (Starfleet Eco Aventures, Bocas del Toro, Panama)!! The course was brilliant... hard work... many hours both in the classroom and underwater, but really worth it... learnt so much in the last 3 days... I'm so pleased I did the course! Back to San Jose tomorrow...and then home in just over 2 weeks time! |
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