Caldera: Keep Walking

A couple of weeks ago almost everyone in our program decided to go on a very long weekend trip to Montezuma.  The beaches are white and the water is sparkling blue, it’s gorgeous….and the price tag proclaims that fact.   Being made of flesh and bone rather than green paper (or in this case bright blue) I elected to stay in Puntarenas.  Johnny also stayed behind, and so to placate ourselves we decided to take a Sunday afternoon day trip to Caldera, a nearby surfer’s paradise…or so we had heard.

Johnny is a consummate morning person; ergo his desired departure time was 7:00 a.m.  As a night owl I was of course diametrically opposed to this idea.  My idea of “sleeping in” does not include the letters “a” and “m”.  Functioning as mature adults we decided to arrive at a reasonable middle ground and take the first bus we could find that left after 10 a.m.  Johnny went to the bus station early to get an exact time:  11.  Perfect.  I left at 10:30 thinking I would make it to the bus station at around 10:45.  Great plan…except that I am very bad with estimations of magnitude and the distance from my house to the bus station was less like a hop skip and a jump and more like a marathon.  As soon as I began to realize this I started a race walking pace that could have won an Olympic medal and did win a lot of questioning looks from the locals.  It is not very Tico at all to be in a hurry.  I couldn’t help it.  This gringa had a bus to catch.  

Out of breath and drenched in sweat I ascended the steps onto the bus on quivering legs at 11:01.  Correction, I ascended the steps onto the WRONG bus on quivering legs at 11:01 and quickly rushed over to the next bus that the driver assured us could (although it normally didn’t) stop at Caldera.

Visual aide:  This is Johnny on the bus..in my shades

Fast forward fifteen minutes to Johnny and I running to the front of the bus which most certainly had not stopped at Caldera.  The bus driver gave an impish grin and dropped us off right there on the side of the road.  No worries it was only a 5 mile walk back to Caldera.

My legs almost fell off.  Johnny is 6’3’’ and walks MUCH faster than I do.  No amount of begging could get him to slow down for more than a few steps.  Speed walking must be in his blood.  Finally we reached the beach…at lunchtime, with nowhere to eat.  And it started to rain.  At this point you are probably green with envy.  Don’t worry, I understand.

We went into the ocean anyway, and this part went without a hitch…for a while.  

 The waves were a delightful intensity; enough to give you some good push and pull without feeling like you were in a washing machine.  About the time I was relaxing and thinking that maybe all of the walking had been worth it I heard a gasp of pain to my right.  I turned to see a white faced Johnny clutching his foot.  A telltale stream of scarlet said about as much as the unmistakable grimace of pain.  Something had sliced him clean open….time to leave Caldera.  Soaking wet we hopped onto a standing room only bus and…well, stood.  Back in Puntarenas we learned we were on a bus that stopped in El Centro….5 miles from my house.  More walking.  By this time my hips were meeting with my knees and arches to discuss a possible coup of my brain.

Silver lining time, Johnny and I stopped at Mus Anni, a local bakery and pampered ourselves with flaky golden goodness filled with cream.  I’ve got sunshine on a cloudy day.

So that was our adventure.  At least when everyone asked the fated “what did you do this weekend” question, I had something to say.