The Crazy Long Drive

Costa Rica is notorious for poorly paved, rough, roads, which wind and are pretty scary. That’s why, instead of renting a car and driving between destinations, I opted to take various bus companies. For my ride from Monteverde to Manual Antonio it was the first time they didn’t put our bags in the bus. Nope, instead all our bags were strapped to the top of a van for the 6-hour bus ride. Each new passenger looked up at the man strapping their luggage, wondering whether or not their bags would make it.

I think my favorite part, however, was when they made five of us get off the bus to ride in another one because the roads were so bad (unpaved, steep, windy, you know, the fun stuff!) that they needed less weight on the bus. I was one of the people asked to move and figured if my bag fell off the bus I’d just have less to carry.

About two hours later, our bus pulled over, with no explanation, and waited. Then at long last, the van with our luggage on top pulled up, and we got back onto it. Unfortunately, our seats had been taken so I got to ride up front on a very hard seat which, let’s just say, left my ah, glutes, in some pain. 😮

I seemed to be the only Spanish speaker on the bus, so got talking with the bus driver. He said there are a lot of deaths from driving in Costa Rica because people speed and don’t pay attention. He also explained our options for rest stops and food and I got to inform everyone else on the bus what they were, and lead a majority rules set of voting which left me having to wait an extra hour for the rest stop.

I ended up meeting a lovely Dutch woman who had also left her life to see what else is out there, and planned to work in Costa Rica for a while. And, I met an English man who had worked at many of the same companies as I have. And, even better, my luggage made it all the way to my destination.