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Welcome To The Jungle

Welcome to the jungle
It gets worse here everyday
Ya learn to live like an animal
In the jungle where we play

Once we had crossed the Costa Rican border, we decided to skip San Jose and to stop at a big town a few hours before the capital: San Isidro Del General. From there, we were planning to take another bus to go to Quepos, on the Pacific coast.

It took us a good three hours to reach San Isidro, and we feared we had missed our bus to Quepos. But the schedule had changed we had just had time to make it.

When we saw the bus pulling in the station, Feng turned to me and asked: “where do we store our bags?“. Indeed, the bus was very old and it did not seem to have any room underneath. The driver told us to carry our bakpacks on board and we just left them at the back of the bus. The seats and the windows were covered by a thick layer of dust and dirt, and I guess we should have asked ourselves why…

Nonetheless, we jumped on the bus, already tired and sweaty. The first part of the trip was really nice, although the bus was packed. We climbed in the mountains, crossed rivers on tiny suspension bridges and hold our breath every time, went down the mountain again and plunged to a sea of green.

At sunset, we arrived to the small coast town of Dominical. Most people got off there and the bus was almost empty. We were the only foreigners there, for sure. From there, the road isn´t paved and our bus just reversed and started the difficult drive in the jungle.

It was crazy. The road was bumpy and extremely narrow, we were surrounded by the rain forest. We passed other trucks and there were barely enough room for both the bus and them, one of us had to stop each time and we were inches apart.

All the windows were open in the bus and we were soon covered in dust, our backpacks, our clothes, our faces… we put on our sunglasses in a desperate attempt to block it… didn´t really work. There were signs here and there, “despacio” (slow down) with pictures of animals, such as monkeys and jaguars. Didn´t see any, but we were deep in the wood.

All in all, it took us about two hours to make the 47 kilometers to Quepos. It was pitch black when we arrived and all we could think of was to take a shower to wash the dirt and the dust.

Crazy ride… and many more to come, I´m sure. Meanwhile, we checked in a hospedaje and fell asleep watching the tiny TV in our room.

Waiting For The Bus In San Isidro
Waiting For The Bus In San Isidro
San Isidro Del General, In Between Buses
San Isidro Del General, In Between Buses
In The Bus
In The Bus
In The Jungle
In The Jungle
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Zhu

French woman in English Canada.

Exploring the world with my camera since 1999, translating sentences for a living, writing stories that may or may not get attention.

Firm believer that nobody is normal... and it’s better this way.

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