San Jose and a Real Filibuster

I joined most of our group on a tour of Costa Rica's capital city, San Jose, but Julie stuck with her decision to relax at the hotel.

An expert on San Jose and Costa Rica's history joined our group for the short bus ride to the historic downtown, where we proceed to walk between sites.

He did a great job describing the historic significance of buildings.  I took many photos, most of which I will not share because months later, as I write this, the specifics are vague.

I don't feel like looking up random details based on unidentified photos, which otherwise would be rather non-descript.  I will just say there is a good mix of old and new on what proved to be a pleasant walk through lovely areas with interesting descriptions. 

In addition, I'm never 100% sure of what I heard.  For example, we walked past a blue building that came with a story about the coffee plantation owners building this first opera house to attract world class cultural entertainment.

Our guide's story as I remember it was that an internationally famous opera diva refused to sing in such a shabby place, which was a terrible insult, so the plantation owners built a better one.

Reading online, however, it says the first theater burned down.  So, what was that blue building?  Perhaps built on the site of the original theater?  I could find nothing about the snobby singer snub leading to the new theater being built, though I didn't dig that deeply.

In any case, San Jose's new opera house, Teatro Nacional, is a gorgeous, world-class structure.  Trump will have trouble beating it with his Whitehouse Ballroom, but my guess is that he will, unless the project is stymied by political opposition.

I think the underlying truth, regardless of the details, is that coffee plantation owners became extremely wealthy in the 19th century and wanted to enjoy the finer things in life closer to home.  Cheap labor helped make this extravagance possible.

The practice of bringing in Nicaraguans to work in the fields seasonally for lower pay helps maintain the coffee industry.

As you may recall if you've followed my blog posts, Costa Ricans are very proud of the fact that they haven't had a military since 1948.  Essentially, Costa Rica has relied on the United States Monroe Doctrine to deter invading militaries.

However, we were told about Costa Rica's only war, a victory over William Walker's "filibuster."  Not the kind of filibuster where a Senator talks nonsense for hours upon hours to delay voting on a bill.  This was an attempt to take over the country of Nicaragua, which Julie and I initially learned about on our Panama Canal cruise a few years ago.

I don't recall Costa Rica being prominent in that Nicaragua-centered telling of the story, but Costa Rica's military joined Honduras, Nicaragua, Guatemala, El Salvador and Cornelius Vanderbilt's Accessory Transport Company to oust William Walker, a Tennessee doctor-turned-journalist-turned-mercenary.

Walker was like a nemesis James West might face in the old TV show Wild, Wild West.  Obviously brilliant but a bit off, Walker graduated Summa Cum Laude from the University of Nashville at age 14, then earned a medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania at 19, continuing his medical studies in Heidelberg and Edinburgh. He also studied the law.

He taught himself sign language when he fell in love with a deaf woman. Upon her death, he became recklessly ambitious in defiance of the fickleness of fate.

In the telling of the story by our guide, Costa Rica's military had a great victory over Walker.  So, I'd say they retired from wars undefeated, with a record of 1-0.

As an aside, the Monroe Doctrine was established in 1823, so the American Walker went against his own country's policy in the 1850s.  This led to condemnation by the U.S. and most of the world.  Then again, Vanderbilt, whose company stood against Walker's filibuster, was also a U.S. citizen, and significantly Vanderbilt was the richest American of his era.

A highlight of our tour was a visit to the Pre-Columbian Gold Museum, Museo del Banco Central, where we spent an hour exploring exhibits, both guided and on our own.  This is one of several large museums in San Jose.

Perhaps the focus on pre-Columbian gold is primarily a marketing ploy among museum choices, but there are great examples of gold jewelry and artifacts, with amazing, intricate workmanship from pre-historic people. 

In most ways, I would call it a museum of history or anthropology.

There's also a special exhibit by a modern sculptor that's a surprising counterpoint.

At the end of our tour of San Jose, we boarded the bus and headed for dinner at the other Hilton in La Sabana (not the Hilton Garden Inn La Sabana), where our driver had initially taken us from the airport when we first arrived in Costa Ria.

Julie walked over from our hotel and was there to meet us for dinner.

We proceeded up the elevator to the The Cloud, a beautiful restaurant with panoramic views on the 18th floor.  This time, not wanting to miss the views, Julie and I grabbed seats at a long table looking out the window.

The other folks at the table were part of the California contingent, which I mentioned previously happened to all have been born in China.  By this point in the tour, their numbers had thinned, just as the similarly sized Pennsylvania contingent had when travelers on shorter tours had departed.

All but one couple were born in Shanghai.  We discussed how much we enjoyed our vacation there, and the story of the kindness of the storekeeper who helped us find our hotel when we wandered around that huge Chinese city one night.  They were delighted that we enjoyed our stay in what they seemed to still very much consider to be their home country.

Dinner was delicious, a final exclamation mark on the culinary delights of farm-to-table found in Costa Rica.

I had the Catch of the Day, which was outstanding.

Julie's Chicken Caprese was also good, but the Tiramisu dessert was her favorite part of her meal.

It was a festive evening to close out our Costa Rica tour.

With a 6:30 AM flight the next morning, we got in the elevator extremely early to meet our taxi.  It was too early to eat, so we turned down the boxed breakfasts rather than discarding them at the airport.

Leo was waiting outside the elevator to make sure the early departure folks like us made it safely on our way.  We told him that wasn't necessary, especially considering it had been his birthday the day before.  Nonetheless, it is good to know that tour companies take care of their clients.

We enjoyed our terrific vacation in Costa Rica.

Hasta la Vista, Manuel Antonio

In the afternoon after visiting Manuel Antonio National Park, we walked to the top of the side street beside our hotel, Villas Lirio, to a private nature park.

A few from our group had visited to Mountain Top Park and returned with rave reviews and terrific photos of sloths, toucans and macaws.

Sloth photo by group member with telescopic lens.

Toucans captured with telescopic lens.

Despite our new friend Barry saying that ziplining had been much better than the hanging bridges tour at Selvatura Park in Monte Verde, I still regretted not doing that.  This was a chance to redeem that omission.  

While I knew a photographer wielding a spy-quality, telescopic-lens camera had taken the photos, I nonetheless harbored high hopes of being able to get better views of wildlife from the canopy level atop hanging bridges.

Told that it was a 10-minute walk up the hill, it was more of a 30-minute paved hike in 90-degree heat.  Fortunately, friendly locals pointed us in the right direction at unmarked turns, because signage before reaching our destination was non-existent once we left the main street by our hotel.

Julie and I were able to hire Jose, the naturalist guide the others said had done an outstanding job describing wildlife and flora.

He was indeed quite knowledgeable.

The park itself was not the pristine setting we hoped private ownership might have made almost too Disney-perfect by any means.

Jose did a good job showing us plants and pointing out wildlife throughout our tour.  

The park was a bit rundown, and the animals were once again elusive, but Jose did his best to keep it interesting.

He revealed toucans, a sloth and other animals through his telescope.  That was considerably easier with than sharing a telescope with two dozen others as we had with our full group earlier in the day.

From ground level, the animals still seemed far away (short video linked here).

As expected, the best part of the excursion was walking on the hanging bridges and getting treetop views.

I must admit that the apparent need for maintenance added to the excitement, making it a real jungle adventure wondering if the bridge or stairs would collapse, leaving Julie and me clinging to the remnants still intact, hoping to swing to a safe ledge.

Our guide started at the bottom and took us to the mountain top, but we heard later that Barry's tour had started at the top and went down.  That made for less climbing up rickety stairs...though climbing down might have felt more perilous.

At the peak, we found beautiful panoramic views on this sunny day.

At the top is a resort, for anyone who might want to stay in this nature park.  From what we could see, it was not nearly as nice as the hotels we enjoyed during our Gate 1 Tour.  However, there was an open-air lounge with free, ice-cold water.

We arrived as parched as the large iguana we found nearby, so we sipped water (being more adventurous, I drank the free water from the pitcher, while Julie had some from the decorative aluminum bottle we bought earlier in the day, adhering to the "no plastic bottles" rule for national park entry.

Back at the hotel, we bathed and dressed for our sunset dinner at El Lagarto, hosted by Gate 1.

This time, we didn't board a bus.

We walked to the handsome restaurant with incredible sunset views.

Our table companions for the evening were our new friends Harriet and Barry, who had survived the hanging bridges hike at Mountain Top Park. 

Barry reviewed his M.T.P. excursion as, "Meh..."

I don't regret having done Mountain Top Park as a private guided excursion, but I don't want to build up your expectations should you decide to go to Costa Rica.

El Lagarto, on the other hand, I would recommend for a scenic sunset meal.

Beyond the outside views, the huge open pit barbecue oven was quite a sight to see. 

We enjoyed our dining experience in this restaurant, which was a short walk from our hotel, made a bit treacherous by crossing the busy avenue.  After dinner, our bus was outside the restaurant to take us on the short drive back, when the street became more perilous in the dark of night.

The dinners were delicious, though I must say we liked the actual meal better at Villas Lirio Hotel's dining room.

From a menu provided on our drive from Jaco, I had selected the Baby Back Ribs.

Julie went with the Beef Tenderloin.

As frequently seems to be the case, I think she made the better choice.  Having seen only a description of the beef without designation of "Filet Mignon" to which we'd become accustomed in Costa Rica probably impacted my decision to some degree.

I also simply felt like having barbecue ribs, an entree that I rarely order because of where that choice usually falls on my healthy, value and taste scale.  I always enjoy ribs when I make the splurge.

I was taken aback when the ribs turned out to be a dry rub variety rather saucy.  With a pit barbecue, I suppose that is a logical choice.  The ribs were tasty, but I do like barbecue sauce cooked into ribs, making them juicier.  These ribs were very lean.

Harriet also ordered ribs, and she thought they didn't have enough meat on them.  I've seen bigger servings, but they seemed meaty enough to me.  I thought the juicy grilled tomato was the highlight dish, as did Harriet and Barry.  Julie gave me her tomato.

The next morning, we enjoyed another wonderful buffet breakfast at Villas Lirio, before hitting the road back to San Jose to conclude our vacation.

We would stop at another gigantic souvenir stand as a rest stop on our way.

Delicious smells wafted from restaurant, but we arrived mid-morning.  I wondered why we hadn't stayed in Manuel Antonio until what would be a standard check-out time like 11 AM.  That would have allowed us time to relax poolside or maybe venture down to the beach rather than leaving so early.

Leo said we would have lunch in San Jose, which would have a wider selection of eateries.  Perhaps in response to requests by past guests? 

In any case, we arrived at the Hilton Garden Inn well before late afternoon check-in time.

It was a picture-perfect day in San Jose, so Julie and I requested a pass to the upstairs pool when we couldn't get room keys.  The rooftop pool has nice views, but we found it too windy to remain outside.

We took the McDonald's meals I'd picked up across the street and went back inside, eating our meals at a coffee table with similar views of the city. 

Not long after finishing our meal, Julie and I were granted early check-in, giving us time to take a nap.  This room on the 18th floor didn't have a mattress as good as we had during our first stay, when our room was on the 16th floor.  That might have been just the luck of the room lottery.

In any case, we had a chance for an afternoon nap before our afternoon guided tour of San Jose was slated.