Liberia to Alajuela

Oh hi! After Isla de Omepete we got straight on the case, and on our way to Costa Rica! We negotiated a good deal for a collectivo taxi that gave us a chilled journey (with only one other person) to the Nicaragua border. Naturally we were accosted the moment we set foot from the taxi by men with massive wads of money, but fortunately this was much, much less aggresive than the Honduras - Nica border.

We were kindly guided by a very smartly dressed young man from the bus company, who directed us through the paperwork formalities and walked us through the lorry park area that was the no mans land before the Costa Rica immigration check point . We nearly missed getting our passports stamped on entry to Costa Rica, because there simply were no signs, it just looked like a bus terminal. But we hunted down immigration and got all that stuff sorted. We even got our cordobas changed by a Costa Rican Version of Kelston, no less! Your doppelganger was very cherpy, didn't try to rip us off with the exchange rate, and waved us off! Nice.

We caught a bus direct to Liberia, this took about 2 hours and was really chilled. Liberia came as quite a surprise with its surf brand shops and American food chains. We arrived just in time to see an amazing pink fluffy rococo sunset. We vegged out with cable TV. and found that our hostel bathroom was a mosquito haven, quite difficult to shower when trying not to get bitten! We decided to head off the next day as this was just a stop over for us, so we caught a bus to Alajuela.

Some epic views on the journey of lush, green Costa Rica.






After a sweaty, but uneventful journey we made it to Alajuela and secured a non descript, but adequate room. We went for a wander...

Finding ourselves at the start of the rainy season we were greated with some huge rolling clouds and thunder, then fortunately only a modest down pour.


We soon realised that it was May 1st. Of course, a bank holiday! This fully explained the weather and naturally most places were shut, and some of the main roads were being dug up...this all seemed sooo familiar, it felt like a wet dreary sunday! We nipped off and found a cake shop to cheer us up!

A bronze statue of Juan Santamaria, the drummer boy martyred while torching William Walker's stronghold in the war of 1856. Good on him!


We didn't actually check what they were selling... This pretty much captures Alajuela's street style though. In the Lonely Planet it is described as 'ordinary Alajuela', we thought workaday was also fitting.


Parque Central. Lined with huge mango trees and filled with noisy parakeets. This was really pretty. It was here that we sheltered from another downpour and watched a dog repeatedly chase moving cars. Interesting.


On our wander we checked out the alabaster cathedral. It had a corrigated iron dome that was under renovation and some very new age music being piped out. Could have been a chill out zone at an afterparty. Odd.


Even though I don't like the subject matter this hand made ceramic mural was really striking. It reminded me of when I did Adult Ed classes for the RNIB. We had the same ready mix glazes!The mural had a really pleasing hand made quality to it, and some lovely textures.


Sadly not open, quite unique though.


We frequented an echo-y chinese restaurant that only had meat dishes on the menu. Fortunately they were happy to provide me with a veggie meal, even though nothing else seemed to have veg with it. It was pretty much multiple meat options that you could have with an assortment of ketchup, mayo and bread. It was great value though.