I can’t believe that it’s only 9.10 and I’ve been up for 6 hours although I didn’t sleep much last night at all. I wasn’t cold, but I had nothing for my head, so my shoulders started to hurt. The other team were still asleep, so we got ready mainly in the dark. It didn’t take long though, as I had slept in my clothes. As were loading up the minibus, Katy’s Platypus split and half her bag got soaked.
At the airport, check-in took ages, and we ended up with our row consisting of: Jane, Me, Kate, Helen, Jennie, and Cheryl. Selina is in the row in front, and poor Katy ended up by herself, a few rows in front, but luckily not too far from the lads + Geoff and Liz.
We boarded at about 7am and took off at about 7.45. Kate (very sweet, having never been on a plane that she can remember) thought that that the no-smoking sign was for seatbelts, and couldn’t work out why there were two separate signals for the same thing!
Day 3 San José Tuesday 9th July 2002
It’s now about 8.00 in the morning, and I’m in the hotel in San José.
The food on the plane was awful and I tried to sleep but couldn’t, although I almost managed to drop off a couple of times, I was woken up by an involuntary muscle ‘spasm’ in my arm which made my left arm jerk about a foot into the air. I was wrapped up in an Iberia blanket which I duly ‘borrowed’ from the plane as it was so great! On the way home, I’m taking the pillow!
It was chaos in Miami. We had to walk for ages after getting off the plane to go though Immigration, even though we had to walk all the way back to the Transit lounge which was right by the plane we got off. Nobody seemed to know exactly what was happening, and we were having instructions yelled at us as though we were cattle in some sort of market by a man speaking Spanish. I coul
We were then transferred onto a really small plane, on which we were force fed our fourth Plane Meal of the day. This time, it was a kind of ‘supper’, made up of sandwiches of a suspicious nature, half of which I attempted to donate to Katy, on the seat behind, with little success.
By the time we landed, it was after midnight in Britain, but only 6.15 in San José. Kate, Helen and I were all gripping each other’s hands as we landed, and I took photos out of the window of the greenest thing I could find. I’m not ashamed to admit that I was nearly in tears as we flew lower and lower over the countryside. -After working for 18 months to raise the money to get here, I think I’m entitled to a little private cry now I’m finally here.
I didn't feel half as tired after we landed as I had on the plane. The Arrivals area and Passport Control at San José airport was really nice because they had this huge picture of the rainforest on the wall. It did actually fill the entire right-hand wall where we were waiting, and it was reassuring, having flown all that way, to know that the rainforestisn't just something made up by geography teachers, and that it looked much as I expected it to!
To get to our hotel, we hired two 6-seater minibuses, costing $32. -Cheaper than we expected it to be. That’s another thing I have to get used to. -Everything is charged either in Colonés or dollars. Our hotel room is basic but fine, and clean and each room has its own bathroom with toilet and shower. -The hotel is called the Gran Hotel de Centroamericano. I am in a room with Helen and Kate, as planned. It is room 37. Katy and Selina are with Jennie and Cheryl, down the corridor, and Mark, Simon and Geoff are sharing a room somewhere between ours. Jane and Liz are downstairs.
In 15 minutes, (8.45), we are meeting downstairs to wait for Carlos, our in-country agent, and we have to sort out what to do about our tent poles. -They were attached to Helen’s sleeping mat, which inexplicably fell off on the plane, complete with tent poles! So, now we can’t pitch our tent anywhere!
Today, I’m the food officer, so I have to sort out a supermarket to buy breakfast. -However, we can’t eat breakfast until we’ve been to the bank to change some dollars into Colonés, or we won’t have any money to buy breakfast with!
Day 3 (Cont’d later!)
We spent the daygetting organised, and I think we did quite well. Carlos arrived just after 9am, and we all sat in the area by the TV, which seems to be for everybody’s use. He went through most of the expedition, telling us the people we’d be meeting as our contacts in each place. There is a woman we should see up in Santa Elena, and a man called Ricardo when we go down to Corcovado, and another man when we get to Puerto Jiménez. It’s all a bit confusing in a way.
We then went to sort out lunch. I was following the group, and I’m not entirely sure how we found the supermarket, or how we knew it was there. -Did somebody ask??? Anyway, when we got there, we split into two groups, one of which went to the Embassy, and the rest of us stayed at the supermarket to buy the food. By this time, we’d already changed money at the bank. -A bit of our own, and most of the group money.
As ‘cook’ for the day, I was in charge of buying rations for the rest of today and for tomorrow’s breakfast and lunch. I shopped with Jennie, Mark, Simon, Katy, Mrs L and Jane. We did really well on the budget, choosing melon for tomorrow’s breakfast and we bought bread for sandwiches along with jam, some cheese, and a tin of tuna. We made the sandwiches in the biggest room. That was shared by Jennie, Cheryl, Selina and Katy.
After buying rations, we waited for the others to come back from the Embassy. I went back in to buy a drink, and Mark came in with me, at first thinking I was looking for Katy, but then just to make sure I was ok. When the others came back, it turns out that they were ages in finding the British Embassy, because it was on the eleventh floor of an unmarked building, of which the bottom half looked like a shopping centre. They walked past it many, many times before somebody pointed out to them where it was.
After shopping, I went with Simon, Katy and Jennie to find the bus to Santa Elena tomorrow. We thought it would be the station just down the road from the hotel, but we were sent on to the next one and the next, until finally, we were walking through the poorest part of town, where people sat on the pavement and talked, and a really small boy lay on the floor in dirty clothes. He must have been about 8 really, although he looked about 5. His clothes were ripped and his face was filthy. I wanted to take him home and give him a hot bath and a big meal. Some middle aged men (looking older perhaps than they were) sat in front of a building, next to a huge pile of wood, maybe building materials, or maybe a house that had been knocked down. On the way back from the bus station, we were on the same side of the road as them, and one of them shouted “Hellooooo, hello, my Darlings”. The pronunciation was more like ‘dar-leang’. It’s weird how vulnerable I was made to feel, because I was walking at the back. I couldn’t help thinking that Simon should have walked at the back, especially as I was the smallest. If someone had grabbed my bag, no one could have done anything. But, we got there, and booked the bus for 6.30am tomorrow morning at the final bus stop we were directed to. All we have to do now is find the damn place again!!
I spoke to Mark for the first time properly today. When we got back after finding La Coca Cola, he was complaining to Jane that his money belt had a huge hole in it which his money was falling out of. I offered to lend him my sewing kit, but, being a typical guy, he confessed to being unable to sew, so I did it for him.
Because we couldn’t cook in the hotel, we decided to go out to eat. It took longer than I thought to find somewhere, considering that we are in the capital, and there seemed to be lots of suitable places. But, there’s the budget to think about -$5 a day for food while in San José (although $7 for today according to Katy), and we needed a good veggie option for Jennie and Jane. In the end, we found a small American place which offered a ‘meal deal’, including a starter, main course, coffee/ice cream and a fresh fruit juice for $6. We could afford that quite well because we were so far under budget at the supermarket.
After asparagus soup, I chose spaghetti Bolognese, and coffee because we’d been warned off ice cream because of it being made with tap water). The juice offered was pineapple, which was so fresh that it came with a thick froth on the top.
We went back to the hotel and had a meeting in the biggest room again, where we decided what time to get up (early), and what time we’d meet for breakfast. We gave half and hour to walk to the bus stop and decided to be there half an hour before the bus to make sure that our tickets were all ok and to ensure that we’d get seats!
