Cahuita

Having frustrated the rental car guys all morning with indecision where we wanted to return their car to, we opted for the convenience of driving all the way out of the central highlands through miles of banana plantations and along the coast to Cahuita. Right off the beaten path, deep south on the Caribbean coast and essentially our last stop in Costa Rica.

The backpacker makes the journey to this more indigenous and unspoiled corner (which is very much a comparative term in this country) for its laid back Caribbean vibe, surfing, snorkelling and one of CR’s most popular national parks.

It’s free to enter Cahuita national park from the town, but a friendly ranger ensures you’re not carrying any loose plastic bags, for those opportunistic capuchin monkeys will relieve you of them and their contents before you can say, oh a monkey and get your camera out…

An 8km loop takes us along the jungle clad beach, sloth and great green macaw spotting as we go.

‘This looks like a good spot for lunch’, we dust off the bench and ‘ahh’ forget white faced monkey, we have scarface monkey within a metre staring at our back packs ready to pounce! This fella was clearly one seasoned scoundrel lunch box raider ready to scare the wits out of the next unsuspecting tourist. Perhaps not here then… who does he take me for?

A bit further we seem clear of scarface and merrily photo some forest racoons, who were then joined by a mother white faced monkey with baby on her back all scrapping over a coconut.

I cleverly backed off as I still had a plastic pot in hand that needed hiding. Too late, cute mum had already seen what I was up to and pounced, teeth showing and on to my backpack ready to mug me. In my panic I dropped the pot (which as it turned out was a genius plan as I could now zip my pack back up as she broke into the pot). I now looked like that numpty of a tourist as the monkeys now devoured our darn biscuits and covered their faces in strawberry jam! I now have a local and two boys berating me albeit for different reasons.

Down the road a bit further you get to Puerto Viejo Talamanca where the Caribbean vistas stop you in your sandy tracks that bit more often and life sets a bit more of a laid back pace to nigh on horizontal!

Being out of season we found a bargain pad with swimming pool (3m deep and perfect to practice some scuba skills with the boys) and a few mins walk from the beach. That’ll do for a few days whilst we practice freestyle hammocking and plan for the road ahead. At least that was the plan - the beaches were far too beautiful to sit and read so we kicked the planning bit down the street again. The beach photos will speak for themselves, but no below surface explorations again due to the swell and rain run off made it too rough and cloudy to snorkel. The boys are a little disappointed again that conditions have not allowed them to see incredible reef life - one more chance in Bocas Del Toro, Panama.