Flying over Quepos Bay

Tuesday morning, we had breakfast at the hotel and then packed up to leave. After two nights of poor sleep, I was ready to check out. A bus picked us up and we started making our way to the coast. Initially, we were on gravel roads and Ro had the driver stop at one point along Road 606 near San Luis with scenic views of the mountains around Monteverde.

Monteverde means green mountain and the reason for the name was clear from this view point.

After a couple pictures, we continued on, eventually reaching paved roads by the coast. It was still several hours to Quepos, so we stopped at a rather touristy gift shop for a break. Everything was overpriced, so we didn’t get any souvenirs. A little further on, we made another stop at Río Grande de Tárcoles. From the bridge over the river, we could see a number of large American crocodiles basking in the warm sun along the river bank.

Ro jokingly said this was a good river to learn to swim - you'll pick it up quickly. Fortunately, I already know how to swim, so stayed safely up on the bridge.

We then finished up the drive to Quepos, stopping at our hotel just outside of town. We were staying at Pacific Paradise Resort. All of our rooms weren’t ready yet, but they let us have a couple rooms so we could drop our luggage. Then we headed into town and had lunch at Gemelas right on the beach. After lunch, we headed out to the beautiful beach.

It was incredibly hot in Quepos so the water felt really great, perhaps a little too warm. We played in the water for a while and then I headed down the beach to the end. There was a river here and across was Manuel Antonio National Park. A sign indicated not to cross the river due to crocodiles in the water. I didn’t see any, but stayed out of the water anyway. There were some cool volcanic rocks sticking out of the water here that I could wade out to and climb around on. As the sun was getting ready to set, Sandy and I decided to try parasailing. The operators were booked, but Ro was able to get us in.

We took off from the beach and soon were flying high above. The views of the beach and surrounding mountains were just fabulous from the sky.

We could also get a nice view of the small volcanic islands just offshore.

The speedboat took us out past the bay and then turned back around towards shore.

As we approached the shore, the boat slowed down and we began to descend until we hit the water. We got out of our harnesses and a guy in a jet ski picked us up and brought us back to shore. It was our first time parasailing and we really enjoyed it. The views of the beach and sea at Quepos were stunning. Back on land, we packed up our stuff and took a public bus to El Avion bar. The bar was built around an old bomber jet that had been abandoned during the Iran-Contra scandal.

Guests could go into the old plane and there was even a bar in here.

The restaurant was perched up on a cliff overlooking the sea, we had wonderful views of the sunset.

Ro indicated this place was a little expensive, so we just had drinks here and would wait for dinner. We then caught a bus back to the hotel and checked into our room, then made a short trip to have seafood for dinner. I’m not a big fan of seafood, so I got chicken. Sandy greatly enjoyed her crab legs, however. After dinner, we swung by town to hit the ATM and give Ro money for our entrance tickets to Manuel Antonio National Park. It was the peak of tourist season and the park was turning away visitors after they reached the quota. Ro was going to leave very early in the morning to secure our tickets.