San Francisco to Montezuma Beach, and Bioluminescence
I've been noticing a trend recently. Maybe its just coincidence, but whenever I have a real hard day of cycling, the bike gods seem to reward me with a commensurate good rest of the day - maybe a good hotel, dinner, or something like that. Today was the hardest cycling day of my life. And the rest of the day was the best day of the trip, if not my life (as far as nature scenery/activity goes). But let's start with cycling.
Alan from yesterday was right about the roads continuing to get worse the further south I went. It was simply a horrible riding day - a cycling day from hell (but certainly memorable). It took about 6 hours to cycle about 30 miles. Except for the last few miles of my day, it was all dirt, gravel, rocks, steep hills, and water crossings. Lots of water crossings! It was to the point where nearly every hill up had a water crossing on the other side at the bottom. I had to change from my shoes to my flip-flops several times (so glad I bought a pair yesterday). So, one time I thought I would just stay in my flip-flops, but I couldn't quite cycle uphill in them - I really needed the clips for these steep, rocky uphills, so I got off the bike to try to walk it up, and I broke a strap on one. So there I was, in the middle of a nowhere jungle with a broken flip-flop, running out of water, super hot, very few vehicles (or any civilization) around, and not a whole lot of upside to look forward to, just more of the same. It was one of those moments that one would almost cry about if it was not so funny. At one point, I was kind of looking forward to some pick up truck coming up from behind me and I would see if I could pay him to ride into town, but there was no pick up truck. Just Subarus and Toyota RAV Fours and the like, and motorcycles. I must have gone through half a dozen water crossings and pushed my bike up a dozen hills. After the first big water crossing, I looked on the map and noticed there was one more water crossing coming up to that look the same size. I just kept hoping there was a bridge over that one. As I got closer, doing all of the other water crossings, I kept hoping and praying. Well, sure enough, there was a bridge there! Things were starting to look brighter again. Then I came in a town called Cobano, where it was blacktop. And it was blacktop from there all the way down to Montezuma, so that made me happy. This trip has made me grateful for a lot of things, and blacktop is now one of them! I mean, think about the highways we drive on and if they weren't there. We take for granted so many things just because we're used to them. Cobano also had a store that I stopped to get a couple of Gatorades, and then I also had some chips from my bag for a break.
These roads were meant for 4x4s and motorcycles only. And this is the dry season. I honestly don't know how some of these people in these remote towns and homes survive throughout the year. I mean physically just getting supplies or trying to make it out somehow.
As I was waiting to check into my hotel, I talked to a couple of other tourists in town from the USA (everyone sees my GoPro on my helmet with the giant brim and then wants to hear my story), and they said that the road from here to Paquera is all paved, so I'm looking forward to that tomorrow. I'm sure it will be steep, but I don't care as long as I can pedal up and brake down hill without the bike sliding out from underneath me like today. I'm so done cycling the Nicoya Peninsula. And my bike is too. It really withstood some beatings. I'm surprised the brakes are not completely shot yet. I do need to adjust them though.
I made a reservation for a bioluminescence tour for tonight. Apparently, Tambor Bay, Costa Rica is one of the few places in the world where you can see this phenomena, especially with such intensity. The bioluminescence tour left from Montezuma Beach in a pretty big tour boat. It had 30 seats on it, but there was only me and one other couple from Germany on there. We traveled to Tambor bay, which took about 20 minutes or so. At one point, we were going super fast, certainly faster than I’ve ever gone on any boat before! I’m not sure why, because when we got there we had to wait an hour and 20 minutes before we got back on the boat to see the sparkles in the water, but it was fine. We got off on this gorgeous beach at this little restaurant that was playing music and serving drinks. It was just a really beautiful setting. I just kind of walked through along the beach in some very warm water - the warmest ocean water I have ever been in, and took some sunset pics. There is no sunset at Montezuma Beach - it kind-of faces south and a bit east, as I have made the corner of the Peninsula now. Our guide cut up some pineapple for us, and it was the sweetest pineapple I ever had. It was really small so super concentrated sweet. Finally it got dark, so we got back out on the boat and went out in the middle of the bay. As we were moving, you could see on the side of the boat where the wake was it just looked like tons of little lights and sparkles. Unfortunately, none of my three cameras were able to capture it. I guess you have to have some pretty specific equipment, but you can look on YouTube and see some pretty incredible videos of this as well. Our guide stopped he boat in the water for us to go for a swim. That was simply the most incredible thing I have ever experienced in my life! As you moved your arms back-and-forth, it just created lights all around you! It was like the scene in Avatar, you know when they run in the forest and everything they touch and step on lights up? It was like that. It was absolutely angelic. Magical. Supernatural. Then, the sky was super clear as well, so as you were swimming with lights all round you, you could look up and see so many stars too. Our guide said this was a perfect night that does not happen very often. Such a perfect way to end such a hard day!
I have some videos that I'll get caught up on tomorrow or the next day.
The road started off nice, but it then took a terrible turn for the worst road you could possible imagine.
