Puntarenas

Costa Rica will forever be linked in my mind with The Bike ride.
When we signed up for the biking excursion, we thought they were E-Bikes. We found out that they were not E-Bikes, Bob decided not to join what would end up being a torturous ride. I was not so intelligent.
I donned my biking gear along with a cooling scarf and fan as the forecast was that the temperature would be low 90's with very high humidity and headed to the bus at 7:45 AM. We took a van ride for about an hour. We were assigned helmets and gulp...mountain bikes. My thought was...really??? I thought we would be riding beach cruisers on a flat, paved trail. Do they not know that we are a bunch of old people?
We were given very brief introduction to the bikes and how to shift gears. They could have just skipped how to shift because the bikes had a mind of their own and would, or would not, shift totally randomly.
Ultimately, off we went. Our journey began with a couple of gradual inclines. We then began a descent on roads with huge potholes and loose gravel. My thought at this point was: Well, I can handle this. They were brilliant in planning this ride. Having transported us to an elevated beginning with only a slight incline and then all we would have to do is ride down to the ocean.
Hmmm...this was only wishful thinking. We then began climbing mountain after mountain after mountain on bikes that would not shift. At this point, my heart is beating at 170 BPM, I am sweating like a pig, and I am gasping for breath. I am wondering how others being me are fairing and trying to remember my CPR training because as much as I was suffering, I was sure someone in our group was going to have a heart attack. I finally called uncle and got off my bike before I came to a complete standstill, fell off my bike and end up rolling in the dirt. Upon looking behind me, there was not one person still on their bike.
This process continued summit after summit.
We were so thrilled for the guide to have spotted some monkey in trees so we could all have a chance to catch our breath. We all pretended to be enthralled with the monkeys until our breathing normalized and we were now melting because it was so hot that we jumped back on our bikes just to get some breeze and cool off a bit...at least until we hit the next mountain that we would have to summit.
My thought was, where is Chris Abbey right now? I need to be in his slipstream before I die.
We finally made it to the beach. I desperately wanted to jump into the water but there was so much trash on the beach that I feared for my health if I got into the water. We had some fruit and we all were lining up our bikes to have them loaded on the trailer only to be told that we had to get back in our bikes and ride back up the hill that we had just rode down. Come to find out, this was only so we could ride to a place where there were restrooms which were quite questionable. I passed on the restroom break.
Finally, we all hauled our sweat, exhausted carcasses into the van. We were so thankful that the air conditioner was actually working.
We made the journey back to the ship.
I promptly jumped in the shower and collapsed in bed.
Meanwhile, Bob went to a town square and watched children dance. His and Dale's impression of Costa Rica was a clean country with very little graffiti.
My impression was that of a hot, filthy country with a lot of graffiti. I am surprised that a country that a country is dependent on Eco-tourism doesn't concentrate more on garbage removal.
Bob came back to the room to find me passed out on the bed with exhaustion.
He aroused me from my stupor to notify me that I had about 15 minutes to get ready for dinner. I flew out of bed, threw some makeup on, hair went up in a clip and I made it out the door in less than the 15 minutes he had granted me.
This will not be the last time that we go from a dead stop to a full sprint. My time management is proving to be very faulty.
We had our first dinner at Manfredi's.
Unbeknownst to us because we were having such a lovely dinner and conversations with Dale and Jenni, the ship had turned around and headed back to Puntarenas. We stopped in the harbor. One.of the tenders was dispatched, went ashore, and returned to the ship an hour later.
We discovered that there was a medical emergency. I later heard from one of the patient's friends that the person was to spend a week in the hospital. No further information was given.
This is the explanation for the return sailing to Costa Rica.Read more