TRAVEL STORIES 2

Last november,me and my girlfriend went on a backpacktrip to Costa Rica,central America.
We flew from Brussels to Newark,and then switched planes to fly on to our final destination,
CR, San Jose.
We left with a lot of dreams,enthousiasm and a backpack, 500 US Dollars a head and no place to stay.
We can assure you now that we came back with such an experience,no written storie can explane, we had so much fun .
Before we left we had been searching on the net for a bed to sleep in for the first night.We wanted to get the most out of our 500 dollar ticket,so we decided to stay in New York for three days, same price,more to see.
We accidentaly met someone who knew someone,who seemed to know us because of the bikeracing, so the world opens up if you’re racing ? ! ! !
It did for us.
When we arrived in NY we phoned the guy and hey,we had a bed for three nights,for free.Imagine what money we had already saved,with just a surftrip on the net ! !
We stayed there for three days and loved it immensly.
My girl already was in NY before,but it wasn’t the same city. Maybe because of the good relationship we have.
We spend as little as possible,because this was an extra three days and we didn’t want to add any bucks to our planned budget.
We saw about all we wanted to see, and maybe because of the small budget we saw NY in a whole different way.
We highly recommend this to anyone with a little bit of adventure in him.
If you would like to know more about NY, you can always leave your questions on my site .
We’ll be glad to help you out !
So,next.We took the flight to CR,which we nearly missed, and landed in San José at about 9 pm.
Again with no bed to sleep in yet.As if we were blessed,a nice young lady suggested a bed in her
husbands hotel.They drove us there for free and for 30 dollars we had a shower ;a toilet, a bed and a terrific breakfast !
We slept like babies and in the morning,the sun came telling us Hey you’re on a holliday so get out of that lazy bed. !
After the meal we planned where we were going to and left some unneccessary luggage behind, booking this hotel for our last night,so our last holliday bed was already safe.
The reason why we were so unprepared,is that we didn’t know untill three weeks before the take off where  we were going to.
So I think we did pretty well.
So much for now.
Check our site later and you will be able to learn more about this great trip ! ! !

TRAVEL STORIES 2      Top

Before I continue about our trip to Costa Rica,I would like to give a good moneysaving tip for New York.
The guys whom we were staying with gave us a four dollar tip on how to travel a whole day for that small amount of money.
When you don’t mind using the public traffic,you can buy a ticket(metro card at any station) for
4 dollars. With this small card you can use the bus, metro, trains for a whole 24 hours. 
You can go anywhere, anytime, and if you took a wrong stop, you just hop on the next one coming.
New york offers expensive tourist busrides,but you can see the same on a local bus, plus you get to know some real Big Apple people.Funny sometimes!!

Now where were we in CR?
During breakfast we overlooked a map of the country, asking other travelling youngsters where to go to.We thought it would be easy to see every corner of the country because it’s not all that big, but…
We soon learned from our talk with a surfguy, that it wasn’t as easy as it looked.
Costa Rica is a narrow country with a point where it’s said you can see the paccific coast as well as the carribean.
But there is a big but about this small country that shortens up your holliday quite fast.
Because of the mountains and the earthquakes,there are no tunnels, and so there are also no trains.
So how do you get from A to B?
By bus, unless you’re rich enough to take a small plane, well it’s not that expensive, but it was for us.
So it was the bus.This also has an advantage; you see a lot!
There are two sorts of buses, the express bus and the local bus.
The local bus is very cheap,and ok for short distances, but for a four/five hours busride you’d
better pick the express, they’re better, newer, quiker.And they rarily stop.
The other buses stop for even a cat on the road LOL .
Another thing about the buses in CR is that you should take spare underwear with you because you will shit your pants when you see the way they drive around.
Sometimes we even saw a bus or truck who went down the ravine.l
Anyhow,we made it back home alive,so it shouldn’t stop you to visit this little backpack paradise.
CR is an easy country to visit whitout booking things in advance,there are cabinas(rooms with
bed, toilet, shower) for rent everywhere.They come to meet you at the busstops and you always have to bargain, on vereything, exept taxis and restaurants.
The cabinas we slept in were very comfortable and clean,and lowpriced. We mostly slept for about 5 to 7 dollar a person.
Food is quite cheap to and you surely should try the local pure fruitdrink mixed with milk or ice.
I didn’t have troubles with the water over there, but my girlfriend was sick a few times,so watch out.
Another thing about the country is that you get up and go to bed with the sun.
If hollidays for you mean laying in your bed for hours till noon, forget this trip.
We were up at seven and a few times at 4.30 or 5 am to catch an early bus.
It’s always dark at six,and after 10 you won’t find food anymore.
Bars are no problem, but don’t forget your getuptime for the next morning.
Believe me , I adore sleeping out, but you’ll change your mind after a couple of days.
If ever you really need to stay in bed for once, just for the fun of it, do it on a rainy morning, because once in a while you’ ll have such one, just turn around and refall asleep and before you know,the sun will rewake you !!
About the busstops; never,never leave your stuff unatended or alone.
There are a lot of pour youngsters over there, who sure would like your things, even clothing!
Leaving money or cameras or personal things in the cabinas never caused problems.
The first town we went to was Puerto Viejo, on the Carribean Coast.
A four hours busdrive took us to what seemed the end of the world. Because we slept long that morning, it was dark when we arrived there!!
Again no bed to sleep in yet.We went along with some guy who picked us up at the busstop, but we thought it was to expensive.You should always take the time to find the best place to stay, even when you’re tired.
We always did and it got us the best places for very good prices.
Because it was not a big place, we soon had seen everything. If you should ever go there ask for casa di rolando, beautifull cabinas in the forest, completely handmade out of wood.Terrific.
The first day we took a hike on the beach,a swim and a good meal in the local pizzeria.The local food is excellent, I tried some stuff, but my girl was not to keen on that so she ate pizzas, burgers, chicken and fries the whole holliday.
So they have whatever you want. The local beer is also very good (imperial serveza)
The second day we rented some bikes (great word here for two wheels)
The gears weren’t that excellent,but we had the most fun that day.
We biked even further towards the end of the world and found a great restaurant on a beach, and guess what,it was fullcrowded.
Not what you would expect when you just drove 20km without meeting a single soul. Except for some monkeys.
We returned after dinner because it was going to be dark in 1.5 hour, now with a racebike you get back in like 40 minutes,l ike I said ,bikes was a big word here.
In the evening we went looking for a bar, the day before we found one with three men and a horsehead, but this time we found one loaded, just like the people in it.
We chose to go to bed early because the next day we would make a trip to Tortuguero, 
turtle beach.
So much for now.
We’ll continue real soon
Again, if you have comment or questions,just shoot!!

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