Day 10 - Bike Ride to Manzanillo

We rented bikes again and rode all the way to Manzanillo. Past Punta Uva there are two small hills to climb. You have to be careful when coming back down the hills as the bikes dont have the greatest beakes and at the base of one of the hllls there is a bridge and the pavement changes. When we finally got to Manzanillo it was super windy with sand blowing all over. We went into Maxi's but the music was blaring so L-O-U-D with a lot of distortion we decided to turn around and rode back, stopping at Punta Uva for a beer. On the way back we saw a large tour group of out of shape europeans hufffing and puffing along on the bike ride. Following them was a truck containing the bakiek and people who were too out of shape to make the ride (I havent riden a bike in years and thought it was pretty easy). We stopped at Punta Uva for a beer and then rode back to return the bikes and eat some lunch at Rockin' J's. We had some delicious chicken skewers with a really good thai peanut dipping sauce. The tacos al pastor were also good but needed some salsa or something as they were a bit dry.


Tacos al Pastor at Rockin' J's

We then headed to Playa Cocles where we almost had the entire beach to ourselves. The water was warm and more gentle than of previous days making for good swimming. We then headed cack to the house to clean up and rest for a bit before going out for dinner.



We went to our usual pre-dinner hang out at El Dorado and got to watch a parade of school children playing drums and in costume slowly march down the main street. Halloween isn't really observed here but the Costa Rican children seemed to be catching on as far as wearing costumes. One guy was even dressed up as Santa Claus! We then had a good dinner at Amimodo - yummy pizza!

Day 8 - Bike Ride to Punta Uva

After waking up and having coffee in the house we rented bicycles from the guy who lives next door and rode to Punta Uva. When renting a bicycle make sure that the tires are well inflated, chain is greased, and ask if someone will pick you up if there is a problem with the bike. It was a nice ride that took about 30 minutes. Most of the road is in the shade and is mostly paved with a few stretches of gravel. We went to the postcard perfect beaches east of Punta Uva (look for the Arrecife sign and turn left). It was really windy and also high tide so there wasnt much beach to lay on. My wife went in to take a swim and bashed her chin on an underwater rock. It was bleeding but nothing too serious. This put a damper on the rest of our beach time there so after hanging out for another hour or so we road our bikes back to the house.





That night we decided to go for some Mexican food at the Lizard King. We ordered chips and guacamole, tacos, and enchiladas. The chips and guacamole took a loooong time to arrive (30 minutes) and then we didn't get our main courses for another 20 minutes after that. The food was all really tasty but I wouldn't recommend it based on the slow service.

Day 4 - Punta Uva

Again, I woke up early and took a walk into town - I had some really GOOD coffee at Cafe Rico. While there I was approached by some crazy guy who gave me a flyer saying that the planes in 9/11 were flown by robots along with some other crazy conspiracy theories. I told him that I didn’t believe in that and he then told me tat he was a "real patriot". I wanted to ask him what he was doing living in Costa Rica but decided I'd rather not engage him in further conversation (a wise decision based on what others have told me). After returning to the house we called a taxi to take us to Punta Uva were we were dropped off at Restaurante Punta Uva (used to be El Ranchito). Since we didn't have any breakfast we decided to have a bite to eat and ended up sharing a plate of was was advertised as chicken fajitas but in reality were deep fried chicken strips with thousand island dressing on top. I guess the ticos have their own version :(



The beach was nice but we had wished that we had gone a bit further south to the beach we visited last time which was much nicer. After a few hours the say was turning darker and we heard some thunder. Fearing rain we walked up to Hotel Pachamama to visit someone I had been in contact through TripAdvisor. Bill and his wife had purchased the hotel earlier this year and we living the good life as hotel keepers in paradise. After sharing beers and chatting for a few hours they called us a taxi to take us back into town. The ride back was only 3500 while the ride there was 5000. I guess next time we should ask for the price when we call so we can negotiate a better price. After cleaning up at home we walked into town and had some drinks at El Dorado it started to rain so we passed the time by playing cards and watched the baseball game on TV. Coconut man joined us for a bit. After the rain stopped, we decided to get some dinner. We wanted to eat dinner at Chili Rojo but since it was all you can eat sushi night the place was packed. We walked around for a bit and then decided to eat at Stanford's. We were promptly brought our drinks along with guacamole and chips. The guacamole was good but the chips were pretty soggy with the oil used to fry them. We then waited for a really long time for our arroz con pollo. It was almost as if they had to wait for the rice to grow and the chicken to hatch and mature so they could make our meal. I don’t know if the cook forgot or was taking along break or what. We saw other dinners waiting quite some time as well. I guess when the tips are included in the bill there isn’t much incentive for fast service. We won’t be going back to Stanford's.