Day 33: San Jose, Costa Rica

Two chicken buses ($3 total/person), a border crossing that was not even close to as bad as everyone warned us, and 8 miles past the Costa Rican border, we were sweating our brains out and Lin was mad as hell. 

In a region of the world where chicken buses are the way to travel and people driving cars never hesitate to pick up a hitch hiker, we had walked from the border for the first 8 miles or so into Costa Rica where not one single, blasted chicken bus came by and so few cars that you would have thought we were out in the middle of the jungle instead of a main highway.  It was surely reaching 100 degrees and the air felt thick and wet. We weren´t sweating droplets so much as liters.

There were two things everyone told us about the Costa Rican border: 1) there will be huge long lines and it will take you at least a couple of hours to get across, and (2) there will be lots of chicken buses on the other side so you don´t need to buy the expensive Tica bus ticket. So, we had planned to catch one of the supposed many chicken buses on the other side of the border but there wasn´t a single one in sight. Hoping that if we walked a little further beyond all the border hooplah we might find a bus, we trudged up the hill toward a gas station, panting under the weight of our backpacks that had never before seemed so heavy. We asked the gas station attendant if a bus picked up there. “Every hour, on the hour.“ Great! It was almost on the hour now so we went over to the bus stop and politely took a seat on a randomly placed boulder and waited. And waited. And waited some more. Then waited a bit more…then a taxi pulled up and offered to take us into the next town where we were headed for double the price it should have been. So we waited some more and decided it was ridiculous to keep waiting by the road instead of trying to make a little forward progress. We pulled our packs on and trudged up the next hill. All the while we walked we kept seeing men and young boys on bicycles with the enormous 50 lb bags that were probably nuts or maybe coffee. OK, if they´re riding bikes with those things up and down these hills, surely the town can´t be that much farther, right? Then, we saw it. A farm gate and a string of men slowly embarking from its depths carrying nuts or maybe coffee and heading down the hill. Ohhhh, why? Why?! How much farther can it be? There was nothing but highway in sight, curvey and hilly until we could see no further. Why aren´t there any buses? Why won´t anyone pick us up? Can´t they see our desperate thumbs pleading for a ride to town, to anywhere?!

After several more miserable miles, sweating more than we have ever so far in our lives, we saw a glorious beaming bus stop just ahead! Old and much used, we plopped down and waited for a bus that the neighbor man said would be there in just a few minutes. And with a mixture of delight and disbelief, we saw it pull up: a big, air conditioned bus! And it stopped, right there, right by us! We leaped up from the bench and ran toward the open door which had just spit out another passenger. Then, within 3 feet of the door, the bus quickly closed it´s door and sped away, leaving us with terrible, defeated, disbelieving expressions on our sweaty faces.

Not having any idea what to do now, we just sat back down and tried, for no reason, to figure out what had gone wrong. We waited in the bus stop, we waved wildly when the bus came closer, made eye contact with the driver, and then ran to the door. Why did we get left behind? We want to go to town too! No more whining, we´ve got to get to town before it gets dark. We were about to step away from the bus stop just when a taxi pulls up and offers us a much cheaper fare(probably because we had already covered 8 miles or so) to take us into town. Without any objection we hopped in and discovered the walk that would have been ahead of us. It was 20 more minutes by car around curve after curve up and down hill after hill. We wouldn´t have made it. Surely we would have just died from frustration or heat or, or…something!

The driver dropped us by the bus station where we tried to buy the fare to San Jose but discovered we didn´t have enough money. The bus was due to leave in 5 minutes and we had to hunt down an ATM and then get back in time to buy the ticket and board. After 3 attempts for directions to the ATM, we stumbled upon it and quickly withdrew some money before realizing that it had been at least 15 minutes and the bus was surely gone by now. We strolled back toward the station, still tired under the weight of our unnaturally heavy backpacks when we saw the bus pulling out from the terminal. We ran toward it and flagged the driver who begrudgingly screeched to a halt, ever so briefly, to let us on and take our money for the fare. After a ridiculous day, we couldn´t have been happier to have been on that stupid bus going to San Jose. Three police checkpoints (a common practice in Costa Rica so be sure to keep your passport with you while traveling by bus), a snack-and-bathroom stop, and 5 hours later, we made it to our destination. Dazed and exhausted, we grabbed the first taxi we saw outside the bus station, opting to take a ride since it was several hours past dark and we had no sense of how safe the city is. At Galileo Hostel we dropped our bags and took the first recommendation for food the owners gave us. After a wonderful, huge dinner at a Mexican restaurant just down the street, we headed back for some much needed sleep in our tiny private room with bunkbeds.