DON’T TRY THIS BACK HOME!
A Holiday Adventure, Tico Style
It didn’t start out to be an adventure.
It’s Christmas day in Costa Rica and our Tico pal Billy Vargas had invited my friend Brenda and me to his property in the mountains for a good old-fashioned barbecue with neighbors and family — a lovely blend of Ticos and Norteamericanos.
Here, like it or not, everything is an adventure:
ad·ven·ture | ədˈven(t)SHər |
noun — an unusual and exciting, typically hazardous, experience or activity
verb — engage in hazardous and exciting activity, especially the exploration of unknown territory
Some adventures turn out to be fun. Some don’t. Sometimes people get hurt, sometimes they don’t. Sometimes the entire neighborhood turns out to witness your misfortunes, and if you’re lucky, sometimes they actually lend you a hand.
And if you have a memorable adventure and live to tell it, that’s what it’s all about. This was one of those times…
Billy, long time friend, had invited about a dozen of us to a Christmas fiesta and barbecue. We brought potato salad, tossed green salad, chocolate caramel cake, wine, scotch, & rum (I mean, what more could one want?). Billy brought chicken and beef tenderloin — freshly butchered from his own stock.
All Brenda and I had to do was get there with the goods. We had the option of gathering at a meet-up place and following Billy up the mountain, or getting there ourselves using the map pin Billy had sent us.
I’ve been driving here for years, off and on, and with the help of Google maps and Waze, I can find anything. So off we go, Brenda and me, and my dog Cassie, in my Kia Sportage AWD — two smug Boomers and a puppy.
The roads were good much of the way, paved and well-maintained. But any location up in the hills is going to have dirt road access, and we were ready for it. My first mountain rental house here teetered at the end of the highway from hell, so I felt confident I could handle anything after that horror.
The higher we went, the more treacherous the road became — deeply rutted, barely wide enough for a single vehicle, pocked with SUV-eating craters, deep wash-outs… and then, a gate!
“You are forbidden to enter here!” said the sign, roughly translated. But our female logic told us that Billy probably had opened the gate for us. We pressed on, undaunted.
Another gate! This one was closed. I stopped the car and walked down the marginally drivable hill to see what might be awaiting us at the bottom. It could be trouble if there weren’t enough room to turn the car around. Backing up a blind hill with a deep ravine on one side is never a wise option.
Turns out Waze had led us astray. There was no road beyond that gate — only cow pasture. So, back down the rutty dirt path we bumped and rolled, ultimately to discover we had missed a turn! Waze had lied to us. It wouldn’t be the last time.
We were to cross a shallow river (no, there wasn’t a bridge) and continue up the hill on the other side. To make a long story shorter, here’s what happened next:
My Kia is a very strong, powerful vehicle, but it’s impossible for the driver to see what’s ahead on the passenger side. Extremely poor design, IMHO. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. I mean, the road on my side was fine!
Meanwhile, at this stage there was only one wheel touching the ground, and it was buried in a ditch. The rest of the car was held aloft by an enormous boulder directly under the drive train.
And then the crowd began to assemble, seemingly materializing out of thin jungle air. Turned out, some of the cars that now showed up had been following the same Waze directions we had, all of us on the way to Billy’s!
Before my car could be moved, the huge hole in front had to be filled. Why not take the rocks from the river! YES! A lot of strong backs heaved a ton of rock into place, and another band of muscled men pushed down, up, forward, literally seesawing my car up and over the boulder it was stuck on, across the newly placed bed of river rocks, and finally into the shallow river and across!
Fortunately, one of us remembered to go back and collect pup Cassie, poor thing, who had been patiently waiting in her crate by the side of the so-called road.
On the other side of the river, Brenda and I paused to get our breath and laugh about what had just transpired. We were all in one piece, even my car, and we had a good giggle about the stories we would tell when we got home! We neglected to mention that both our sets of knees hadn’t yet stopped shaking.
ONWARD! Up the hill we go, undaunted, impressed by our lack of hysteria, yet feeling an intense craving for a shot of whiskey. Up, up, up, we go! The road is shit, getting worse with every turn, washed out from the rainy season, utterly neglected for decades.
Um, Brenda, I’ve got a bad feeling about this.
At the next turn the hill became steeper and virtually impassible. Our Canadian friend Ken — feeling his machos in the car behind us — decided to give it a go. He made it past the first cavernous rut by driving on the shoulder, and egged us on from there.
Just then, as I pondered the possibilities — and the danger—an enormous turkey vulture flew down from the heavens, floated past us, circled back, and landed in front of my car with his wings spread, virtually shouting:
Do not come any closer! Danger, Danger, Will Robinson! Stop here or die! I will enjoy picking your bones!
I swear I am not making this up. Brenda saw and heard it too.
This was a moment.
We looked at each other again, in total astonished agreement. Back down the hill we go, not knowing if that other car ahead of us had survived, got stuck, fell off a cliff, or what.
If ever there had been an omen, a warning from The Force, a message from the Universal Consciousness, this had been it.
Switching over to trusty Google Maps, we trundled back down the hill, back across the little river, back to paved road, and started over, determined that Costa Rican “roads” were never going to defeat us. We had a Christmas cookout to attend, and by the gods we were going to get there.
That other car ahead of us? Well, they eventually were forced to turn back also. The good news is that everyone made it to the party, with Billy’s help to round up stragglers from roads that were never meant to be driven on. And a great time was had by all.
PS — I can’t remember the last time I ate beef, but this was the best I can recall ever tasting. Kind of like a last meal, potentially. I mean, we did have to get back down the mountain when the party was over.
Author’s note: I have fallen so much in love with these people, their kindnesses, eagerness to help, and cheerful manner. Presented with any problem, they can find a solution, and they do—joyfully. This is what “Pura Vida” is all about. It doesn’t exist anywhere else I have ever been.
