Walking the streets by day...

because I was told that it was too dangerous to go out tonight as a single woman, I am now settled in my hotel, having shared my bottle of cheap sparkling cider and chips with my friends who are stuck here until midnight,with my books, my computer and myself. I was told today that I couldn't possibly walk the distance I went - it seems women must not walk more than a block here; perhaps that is why many women look like this babe. I love this statue with the local guys leaning on her on Avenue Central.

It was a gray day, but I walked as far as Avenue Central would take me and found a shabby park where people were actually running, holding hands and having picnics. I found this statue that seems to have had a hole shot in its head,but then saw another that made my heart race.

I walked back to the hotel and then went for my New Year's Eve meal at Tin Jo, an Asian restaurant where I drank a beer, ate Pad Thai, chocolate mousse and a black coffee. Then I took off down Avenue Central the other way towards the university. The sky looked ominous, but I kept on trekking and found some wonderful houses, all surrounded by circles of barbed wire fences.

Let us not get smug about our existence on this planet; Costa Rica is not without its problems of trash and homelessness, and I believe that there are fewer and fewer animals than we think. This is not the paradise that the eco-travel lore depicts. There is poverty and there are drugs,both of which drive the rising crime level so that taxi drivers have warned me, receptionists in the hotel have cautioned me, and I'm just as happy to stay put tonight although I DID really have my heart set on some sushi. Sigh.

I leave forPlaya Esterillos Oeste tomorrow and there will be no internet unless I hang at the bar on the beach which may be a real possibility if I get antsy; however, I'm bringing two and a half books, probably finishing the half tonight, and I'm planning total R&R - after my own fashion, of course.

And so, I wish everyone a joyful New Year; may you party your fill, hug and kiss old and new friends andremember all those resolutions in the morning with your aspirin... I yearn to be with close friends to bring in the new year, but this was an experiment that I will assess once I'm home.

Joy andLOVE!

to

Back to San Jose

It was an uneventful 4 and a half hour journey on the $5 bus where Peter, a dancer, sat next to me and told me about his exhausting schedule. This was the moon rising as the sun was orangely and pinkly setting behind the cloud forest, turning the earth and its flora that golden hue of late afternoon, early evening. I realized that New Year's Eve will be a romantic evening with a full moon and glorious sky, but when I asked my cab driver from the "dangerous" bus station what would be fun and safe to do on New Year's Eve, he assured me that NOTHING was safe!

When I got back to my hotel, I zipped out for a beer and some chips to share with Rafael who has been very helpful to me in lining up my reservations and seeing that my car is ready, etc... We were chatting, and a guy staying here came in with an overly perfumed, tight jeaned woman, both of whom disappeared. Then a family from New Jersey came in, and we started chatting, I asking their 5th grader what she was reading... Suddenly, the overly perfumed woman came tearing out of the man's room, screaming and naked. Words were exchanged between her and Rafael, who works at the desk, and once she got dressed and left, the guy came out and began yelling. Meanwhile, I suggested to the mom of the 5th graderthat perhaps it was bedtime... Rafael has called his manager, and I am TOTALLY creeped by the whole thing. Tomorrow night I shall stay in my little room, huddled on my bed perhaps with the covers over my head. These are NOT my people!!!

Too windy and cold in Monteverde

but beautiful

- even the scenery today like this fabulous sign that suggests a Garrison Keillor fan!

Yesterday when I took the bus to the Monteverde Preserve, I saw this sign on the bus and still wonder exactly who the bullies are and whom are their targets - neat segue into the Frog and Butterfly pond where I saw killer frogs and spectacular butterflies: First this wee green and black froggie hiding in thebowels of the plant. Then these flaming red fellows with blue jeans on their leggies - also poison dart frogs, which means that in "the olden days" the hunters used to shoot them out of their blow guns to paralyze their victims. Then there were these jelly frogs that seem to have no skin, and their inner workings are visible to the human eye.

And the butterflies! Ah... I give only two samples, but I could have stayed all afternoon just tryingto position my camera to capture the light and color. I give only two examples here, but when you go, spend the time to linger.

They say...

that you will "feel better"

when you spend time in these hot springs, but I remain unconvinced that it was the springs themselves that created that feel-good aura; it may just have been the Imperial! After this large beer, sliding down this luge (sp?) like slide was cake except I lost my glasses in the poolat the bottomwhen Icame flying along the sides of the slide and crashed into the water with a squeal and a splash, but nice Mr. Derrick from New Jersey found them at the bottom of the pool, causing him to grow at least inches in pride.

I think I mentioned that after we left these springs, the bus was supposed to drop me at the Vagabondo, which had n0 room for me despite my reservation - onto theChinese run Pura Vida and the next day the jeep-boat-jeep to Fortuna where I felt my oats enough at arriving at Cabinas Eddy's to find a dear little room in the trees with two windows that I headed off to do X-treme ziplining, which included the Superman - aka flying through the air bird-style. But not before we did the tarzan swing which entailed stepping,jumping or being pushed off a high platform and free falling until the rope caught and I went swinging through the deep forest and up to the sky in the most enormous, heart-throbbing loop of my life. I think I've already gushed about my awesome courage, but I probably didn't tell you that I shrieked the whole time thatit was the WORST nightmare of my life, all along loving every excrutiating minute of the swoops and tummy-tumbling swings so high thatI was sure I'd die.

Then, I felt I really could fly, and I COULD! I know I told you that they took my glasses off for fear that they would fall off, never to be found, so I actually flew BLIND, but I know that is generally the way most people think I live anyway, so I was pretty used to it until I had to crash into the trees with no reference point and no assurance that anyone was actually there to catch me. (I am at a local restaurant where a stock broker is standing next to me literally and juggling..,) Finally, this is my attempt to capture an image of my friend Andy with whom I ziplined because it was SOwindy and we were too light. He is just coming in for a landing and going so fast that it's way too fuzzy, but it gives the sense of frenzy at the end. Ah, photos.

I will leave rest about the wind storm and the rains when I want to the Monteverde for another post, but our guide helped me take this shot through his binoculars; it IS the great, the magnificent quetzel!!!! And now off tothe frog pond. More another time. Stay in touch!!

Zip lines and other absurdities...

I have no photos today or tomorrow because I am in Monteverde with no computer wifi, but I found a little cabina with a bathroom for $25.. I will stay two nights. Today I rode on 14 ziplines and the last two were the scariest of my life - one entailed jumping off a huge platform and then swinging like tarzan through the jungle - the jumping was like the worst dreams of falling and swinging SO high that my stomach was in my mouth. The last one was Superman where we were rigged up to the line as though we were birds and then flew across a valley and then into the trees. Because they worried that I would lose my glasses, I gave my glasses to one of the young guys who hooked us onto the lines and flew blind, as it were, not being able to see where I was flying into the trees where the landing platform was. It was thrilling but because of the high winds, around the middle of the valley, I slowed down, the winds whipping around my head and making me wobble as though I were done for. I wasn´t. Not soon enough, I came crashing to a landing at the platform and walked rather unsteadily back to the office. Again, I was surrounded by young kids, and one of the rigging guys asked the guy with whom I´d been chatting if I was his mom... Damn, just when I thought I was hip, I was exposed as the interloper that I am - blessedly a mom in what son Jack refers to as my ¨mom haircut.¨

Tomorrow I hope to go to the Monteverde preserve to hike with a guide, assuming I can get one tonight. The place is hopping with thrill seekers and even newly weds. I hear from other travellers that many ¨baby boomers¨are here checking out CR for retirement. I can see why even though I am really cold and my shower spouts luke warm water, not good enough for this chickie!

I promise a ton of photos once I return to San Jose day after tomorrow when I will gear myself up for spending New Year´s Eve in the sleeze-ball city...

Ciao for now.

Jack Kerouac slept here...

I am in the Jack Kerouac room at the Hemingway Bed andBreakfast, where I even have my own bathroom and rice and beans breakfast. Can't beat THAT!

This morning I walked around and found THE museum, which included a numismatic section, gorgeous gold carvings of birds and other creatures and a contemporary museum with a show on an artist who is into synethesia like Kandinsky and Mondrian. It felt very familiar, probably becauseI had given a paper at the Algonquin on Kandinsky and relationship with music... I illegally took a photo of this creature who is meant to be a pelican, and I took it,like the photo of

this purple flower, an evocative image forthose of us who grew up in Florida and watched our father gently tend this vine that grew gloriously over part of the back terrace.

Spent much of the afternoon waiting for these frothing, jittery horses to come clippitying along at dancing paces, making mincing little cloppity clip steps to the side and back, prancing as if their lives depended on it. The crowds grew and grew, as men strutted through the sidewalks, carrying open bottles of beer, half dressed bosoms at their sides and big cowboy hats on everybody's heads. I stood with a nice group and we all took photos and chatted, they methodically performing the ritual of salt aboutthe top two inches on their Coronas and this very carefully squeezing lemon juice into them beforedrinking. I suppose this is one way to continue drinking all day long! Santa was even onhis horse, and men on stilts teetered around the high-strung, snorting horses, all clumped together, banginginto each other,clippety-clappeting for the judges, and the heat beat down on all thosecowboy hads, sparing only those who carried umbrellas. I was not one of them...

Tomorrow I am offto the Arenal Volcano and will spend the night in Fortuna, taking the jeep-boat-jeep to St. Elena where I will stay and walk around Monteverdi. Maybe I will stay up there for one night, maybe for two. Only time wll tell, but suffice it to say, I AM getting rooms with bathrooms and even passed a couple of dives tonight thatI wouldn't even haveconsidered... I'm getting spoiled, I think, but I still have difficulty spending much money on sleeping situations becauseit seems so wasteful...

More tomorrow...

Shadow would like visitors...

Shadow was

howling when I left,and I know he would love to see some of his friends while I'm gone;you know where the key is and you KNOW he'll be watching for you, so go on over and give him a pat, maybe even a treat.

It is warm, sunny and breezy, but I'm moving very slowly after arriving at 1 am, WAAAAY past MY bedtime. XOXOX