Link to the previous page Costa Rica – 3-e 
To the Caribbean coast…
13 January 2026 First stop: Herradura
We found another acceptable flat near Jaco in Herradura with a washing machine that took some getting used to, but we somehow managed to get it working. The water had to be filled in by hand for washing and rinsing, and for spinning it went into a drum next to it. So you always had to be nearby to fill it up and empty it. In the meantime, however, we have discovered that this type is widely used here and is not a post-war model.
We went on a wonderful hike through one of the national parks, marvelled at the incredible variety of plants, leaves and trees, and were left breathless by this wonderland. We were so preoccupied with the flora and the trail that we didn't look out for animals, which are not easy to spot in these forests unless you are there just before sunrise. The trees here are incredibly tall and the animals, especially birds, sit very high up. But there are also some people who, armed with huge telescopes, wait for hours somewhere or stand by certain trees until they get something in front of their lens.
This area just above Herradura is known for three wonderful, fairly secluded beaches that are popular even with those who fear waves, like me, as they have unusually little surf.
20 January 2026 To San Jose
The journey there was a bit annoying, winding its way through the mountains in a very circuitous manner, sometimes going down very steep hills and then up very steep hills. But we still managed to return the car on time.
The accommodation was very ‘hmm’ at first, with “hostel” on one side and ‘hotel’ on the other, but inside it was the same and turned out to be a very bright, very clean and new place. Our room is very large and bright, with huge windows.
And we were lucky: the embassy was listed on the internet as not responsible for driving licences, but with a lot of persuasion I got Gerhard to go there as a German citizen who needed help. And lo and behold, they were very helpful and even gave Gerhard a form for the driving licence office in Berlin for express processing. The express-processed new driving licence was then to be sent to the embassy by the fastest means possible.
That was the theory, at least.
After spending a lot of time dealing with driving licences, banks and other paperwork, we watch from our window as the trees are buffeted by the storm that has been raging since we arrived here and caused me to chase after my hat as soon as I got out of the car.
It's just as cold, actually even colder than when we arrived in Costa Rica a good two months ago, except that it's not raining. (At least not quite as much.) Once again, I'm glad I didn't get around to throwing away those few warm clothes. I never wanted to be cold again, just sun and warmth. But no, neither one nor the other. And the storm hasn't let up yet. The accommodation is as cold as our house in winter, except that we had nice warm clothes there. I finally found out when it will get warmer in San Jose: it never gets warmer! In the middle of Costa Rica, the average daytime temperature is 24°C and the night-time temperature is 14°! Since the sun, when it shines, only does so for 6 hours, the night is very long. I was almost struck dumb. I feel most comfortable at 35°C during the day and 26°C at night, with lots of sunshine. We came into the room here, great: air conditioning AND a large fan. That looks like warmth. Think again! It's not needed all year round! They hardly ever have it in the hot coastal region! But they do have a hot shower here, which is also not common. Most showers have a water heater in the shower head and when you turn it on
We’re sitting here in our loft,
The sun doesn’t shine here very often.
We hadn’t thought about
what grey weather would do to us:
we’re now pale instead of tanned,
we’ve never known ourselves like this.
PTB
And Berlin? Berlin isn't budging. An express driving licence should be ready in 48 hours. It only takes a few days to send it here, or is everything at a standstill in Berlin because of the weather? The internet says that if your driving licence is stolen in Costa Rica, you have to leave the car immediately and hire a tow truck to take it back to the car rental company. Fortunately, Gerhard didn't do that, and with a lot of persuasion, I got Gerhard to go to the police here in San Jose (it wasn't easy, as the three different police officers didn't mention anything about it, they just didn't know?). So, off we went, and everything was fine with a telephone number to call in case there was any trouble.
Almost two and a half weeks have now passed, and Gerhard has contacted a citizens' office in Berlin and sent the next application to the driving licence office (an email he sent to the office was returned as undeliverable). And suddenly the driving licence office got back to him: they can't find any applications!!! But they also have so much to do because of expired driving licences that need to be renewed at the beginning of the year!!!!!
Anyway, things are finally moving forward and the supposedly non-existent email address is now working after all; it was probably turned off due to overload.
Today is Saturday, 14 February 2026, and on Monday the office wants to send out the new driving licence. Hopefully they won't forget over the weekend. No, they haven't, but he wants to send the receipt first to show that everything has been paid for. He already has! That doesn't help, so here we go again.
Today, we want to find a place on the Pacific coast that can be reached by bus, at least for the week. At the moment, all prices are justified by the high season, and the good price that the boss here promised us for his car rental was $ 80 per day for 28 days! We hope that we can possibly leave our suitcases here for the duration.
So we got on the bus and travelled three and a half hours to the Caribbean coast, to Limon, a port city.
Christopher Columbus landed in this bay in 1502 on his fourth voyage.
The city isn't particularly appealing, but we were grateful for the sun and warmth it provided us. It was also very strange: a woman who actually looked very nice pointed out two sloths in a tree to us, but then she wanted $ 5 for it, and two cute little boys annoyed us for a while, as did some drug addicts. But we had a nice end to the day at a soda recommended in our guidebook, where we had excellent food and a large glass of freshly made mango juice. Sodas are originally local kitchens where they cook like mum does, and that's still how it was here. We had a lot of fun because there was no menu and we're not very familiar with the local cuisine. A Swiss woman at the next table came to our aid.
Until a few years ago, there was a train connection between San Jose and Puerto Limon. Originally built to transport bananas to the port, it was ultimately used exclusively for cruise ships. The line was neglected and had to be shut down for safety reasons. Today, a huge number of lorries and buses wind their way through the narrow road between San Jose and Limon. The railway would be the perfect solution today. There are plans to reactivate the line, but this would be very expensive and require lengthy construction work. In Limon, part of the line is still used as an industrial railway. ...-G.)
Journey through the cloud forest to the Caribbean coast
After realising that cars were too expensive at this point and refusing to stay in San Jose another day, we found accommodation on the coast, booked the bus (I convinced Gerhard that others were also travelling by bus) and travelled to the Caribbean with one change and a six-hour journey through beautiful countryside. We got to know the cloud forest, and the whole area up to the Caribbean is very different from the western side.
Arrival in Manzanillo
And arriving in the little village was a delight: sea, palm trees, even a white beach and warmth into the night.
After prior contact with the owner, we were welcomed punctually at the entrance gate and given a choice between two accommodations. We opted for the one on the ground floor with a large terrace and open kitchen, and we have not regretted it. After investing some time, which we have, even the kitchen is sparkling and we were able to get rid of the damp smell after some work. We also opened the door to the second room, which also leads to the terrace (the lock went in the opposite direction to usual). Gerhard has his workspace there (yes, great, he needed a holiday too ;-) ), I prefer the terrace, and since we had already bought an extension cord for our previous accommodation, the socket problem is solved here too. There are also a surprising number of electrical appliances here, but they have probably been used little or not at all due to the lack of sockets and so still look quite appealing.
We spend the whole day on the large terrace. And half the night.
On the first Saturday, we drove to the nearest town to go to the farmers' market (or rather swam, because it rained incessantly – but it was warm rain ...-G.) and do some other shopping, as Manzarillo is a bit dull in that respect. But half an hour by bus isn't that far when you think about Berlin.
Manzanillo is a small town in the middle of nowhere, or about 40 km from the border with Panama. The restaurant across the street marks the end of civilisation before the jungle. Shortly after that, you can only continue on foot into the national park. The ‘village street’ is very manageable and there are two mini supermarkets and a few small restaurants. But it is very quiet and relaxing after San Jose.
On the journey from San Jose, the bus driver wasn't exactly gentle when stowing the luggage, and one of the two suitcases got damaged – Gerhard's favourite piece of luggage, of all things. We didn't notice it right away, and the journey to our accommodation probably finished it off. So we took the bus back to Limon, which took 1 1/2 hours, and spent the whole day in Limon looking for accessories to repair it.
Today we set off to explore the route to the national park, which was beautiful in itself. One small beach followed another, the sea raged and spat waves towards the shore without pause. When we arrived at the entrance to the national park, we didn't stop, but instead set off after passing through the entrance checkpoint. Surprisingly, admission was voluntary, with only bag checks, mainly for food or plastic. Otherwise, they are world champions in plastic here and even advertise PVC.
So we went in and started walking, luckily with our hiking boots on. We chose a route that was too big, got lost, and what was supposed to be a short trial walk turned into 3½ hours through undergrowth, slippery, soggy clay soil and routes up and down mountains. Shortly before starving to death, we finally reached our accommodation, after remembering just in time that we still needed something for coffee time. But it worked out quite well and we were able to tuck in, happy and satisfied with ourselves.
I waited until it was quite warm during the day and there was no rain at night so that the paths through the rainforest would dry out a little, but they didn't. Then I set off through the jungle to Punto Mona. The route is about 6 km long and leads partly uphill and downhill, some of it on very muddy paths. Petra sensibly spared herself this effort. But the trail reaches its destination after just under 3 hours. You had to pay close attention to the trail, so you couldn't look at the small wildlife on the right and left. Unfortunately, the monkeys I saw along the way are no longer visible in the photo I took with my phone. They were simply too high up in the trees. However, I was able to take a photo of the only ‘wild animal’ I encountered in peace and quiet ;-). Punta Mona is not a particularly spectacular place, apart from the natural surroundings. A resort there has fallen into disrepair and is not a pleasant place to take a break. But after six hours, just before nightfall, I was back, still standing on my own two feet and wearing muddy brown hiking boots, feeling satisfied. ...-G.)
Upon arrival, we were immediately warned not to leave any food out on the terrace. At night, I sometimes heard noises, and in the morning, we would find footprints across the kitchen counter or the rubbish bin knocked over. One evening, I left a thick-walled bottle of sugar cane syrup (delicious and also very healthy due to its valuable nutrients, such as vitamins, minerals and antioxidants, which are also found in the very dark sugar we have been using for a long time, but which is quite expensive in Germany) in the kitchen. And raccoons know what's good too. They swung themselves into the far corner, over the cutlery and crockery, and grabbed the bottle, which was now lying on the floor in a sweet, sticky puddle when I ventured out of bed because of the loud noises. Gerhard stopped me from cleaning the floor as well, and rightly so, because they came back and the next morning the floor was extremely clean. Maybe we should keep a raccoon? The next morning, it turned out that there was a second hole in the bottle and now almost all the syrup had run into the sink.
It's astonishing. The next morning, we saw from the footprints that someone had apparently been searching for the bottle in the corner again. We then discovered that there was a motion detector here that just needed to be plugged into the socket. Then we had two days of peace. On the third day, I was sitting at the large table on the terrace working on my computer when I heard noises coming from the kitchen corner. Thinking it was Gerhard, I didn't look up until the noise got louder. A scream escaped my throat and I jumped up to find a full-grown raccoon staring back at me, just as frightened as I was, from the corner where the syrup had been standing. It was gone before Gerhard came running. The raccoon knew exactly where the bottle had been, because it had to get past several kitchen utensils. Fortunately, the overturned olive oil bottle hadn't fallen over yet, because the raccoon definitely wouldn't have licked up the oil.
We had a few days of peace until the raccoons found a way to bypass the motion detector. It's unbelievable how clever they are. Yesterday evening, another little one came to visit, even with the lights on, but it didn't see us and was very startled when Gerhard came around the corner. The sweet stuff must have been very addictive for them, because at some point they were so angry that they knocked everything over, took the rubbish bag out of the cupboard and scattered it all over the kitchen, and that was after I had just scrubbed the entire terrace.
When Gerhard sits at the computer
and sweats over Petra’s blog,
then reads everything again,
he says: I’ve never been there!
A man sees things with different eyes,
a woman absorbs them inwardly.
Then the whole thing is artfully
enhanced with Gerhard’s photos,
because once the photos are in,
the whole thing makes sense.
PTB
3. March 2026
Two weeks have already passed, and in another week we will have found something on the outskirts of Puerto Viejo for another 14 days. Yesterday we received notification that the driving licence had arrived at the embassy. Our visa is also about to expire. Gerhard did a great job repairing our suitcases, because my Samsonite (!) was also broken in one place on the flight to Costa Rica. We noticed it too late.
Yesterday we were very lucky to see two of the rare largest toucans high up in a tree and, in the early evening, three of the largest parrots, about 60 cm long. And Gerhard doesn't have a camera, which was terrible for him, because you can forget about taking pictures with a mobile phone.
The inserted travel routes were created with Google Maps.
Translated with DeepL.com