Costa Rica
Costa Rica has a very special place in my heart - it's home to some of the most spectacular rainforest in the world, my first real adventure destination, the palate for a glorious "road trip" with my girlfriends and our young ones, and the romantic backdrop for my honeymoon.
As of 2015, I'm sure travelers can find comfortable and familiar resort-like accommodations in spectacular locations. But my intrigue with Costa Rica was always it's ability to offer complete "other-worldliness", far removed from the norm.
Our honeymoon begins with this landing strip, south of the spectacularly remote Corcovado National Park, where the rainforest meets the sea. Upon landing, our bags were tossed into a horse-drawn cart which took off up the beach. We were told to simply walk north along the beach until we found the tent camp.
At the Corcovado Tent camp, when we asked our bartender to make us a coconut rum drink, he excused himself, ran down the hill, shimmied 50 feet up to the top of these coconut palms and returned with fresh coconuts. He put a hole in the coconuts, poured in the rum and handed them to us with straws. Now that's a honeymoon drink.
Every hike was captivating and not without danger, as we learned the symbiotic relationship of rainforest flora and fauna. Pairs of Scarlet Macaws, toucans, howler monkeys peeing on us and throwing things to voice their disapproval, trees that spout fire ants at the slightest touch, bullet ants, coral snakes, smelly peccary, poison arrow frogs, Jesus Christ lizards, sloth and so much more to see and experience.
After Corcovado, we headed to the cloud forests of Monteverde, via the Arenal volcano. Central Costa Rica is lush and beautiful.
The roads in Costa Rica are something to behold. After an hour or two of swerving left to right to avoid pot holes, John decided to see how it felt if we just drove straight through them. Amusingly, we felt no difference.
When I returned to Silicon Valley from Costa Rica in 2001, I was struck by the harsh contrast between the wild, untamed and intrinsically breathtaking world of Corcovado, Oso Peninsula, Costa Rica, and the man-made constructs and evidence of our societal progress - highways, cars, skyscrapers, traffic jams, technology, busy, busy people. My trips to Costa Rica helped me define myself in the context of the full natural world and not to delude myself about the import of my own ambitions. I live happily and comfortably in a modern, 1st World society, but hope to always cherish the splendor of the earth's raw beauty.
