Coast to coast, and back again

Inspired by Wainwright, we journeyed from coast to coast - substituting the North Sea for the Caribbean, the Irish for the Pacific and our feet for wheels. Ok, so not that similar, but you get the gist.

Click here to watch the film.

Central America

One of the problems of cycling the length of Africa is that it sets quite a high, or long, bar for subsequent endeavour. When we were plotting another long bike ride, we knew we wanted to do it unsupported, which means we can travel less far per day, whereas in Africa we had a support crew who pretty much did everything for us except ride our bikes and hand wash our unsightly and frankly horrifyingly pungent clothing. This therefore meant we were looking for something shorter - ruling out South America and the Silk Route. The conversation ran something like this:

Protagonist 1: “How about the US or Canada?”

Protagonist 2: “Not adventurous enough. We’d only have to speak English...unless we go West to East in Canada. How about Europe? It will be summer.”

P1: “Way too comfortable at this stage of our lives. Save it for when we appreciate the finer things in life. South East Asia?”

P2: “Way too gap yah. Australia & New Zealand?”

P1: “Cycle across the outback? We’re not nearly tough enough and I don’t think Paul Hogan would come with us. Central America?”

P2: [Looking at map] “It’s...it’s...well...it’s a bit...I don’t know...small?”

P1: “Throw in Colombia. And Mexico.”

P2: “Too big.”

P1: “Part of Mexico.”

P2: “Deal.”

And now here we are, several months, moodswings and kilometres later, having cycled across Central America. It doesn’t count as a continent as far as we can remember from our 1988 world atlas (Wikipedia tells us it’s the southernmost “isthmus” of North America, whatever an “isthmus” is…) but it’s the next best thing. And it’s been a serious, but spectacularly wonderful, challenge. 4,000km of challenge to be precise.

Start and the End

Part of the attraction of Central America was the huge variety in such a condensed space - we have got serious bang for our mileage buck. We have had mountains, volcanoes and valleys. We have had lakes, rivers and thermal springs. We have tasted tacos, jerk chicken, fijoles and maize (sweetcorn to us) in every imaginable form. We have seen capuchin monkeys, heard howler monkeys and been riveted by sloths lazing up in the trees. We have snorkeled through fantastical corals, cast magic spells with the phosphorescence in the sea at night, gazed at dolphins sweeping past our jetty and trod carefully around mounds of crabs. We have seen toucans sleeping and swooping, heard parrots squawking and been captivated by the colours of countless birds we couldn’t identify. We have been hypnotized by the sounds of the forests and jungles as we ride past, with cicadas and crickets on the percussion, monkeys on the bass and birds performing the solos.  We have met current or descendents of Mayans, Aztecs, Creoles, Spaniards, African and more recently Incan. We have yo-yo’d from ocean to ocean - the Caribbean in Belize, to the Pacific in Guatemala, El Salvador and Costa Rica, back across to the Caribbean in Costa Rica and Panama, back again to the Pacific in Panama and we even fitted in a final flirt with the Caribbean in San Blas. Whew.

Sunrise

Sunset

Frijoles

Pineapple Empanadas

Toucan

Sampling the many varieties of local beer has also been an important responsibility but one we have stepped up to with vigour and, we would like to think, with some distinguishment. All countries have at least one national beer - some have three or four but all brewed by the same company and tasting virtually identical. They lack much flavour but when drunk cool after a hot day’s riding are absolutely fabulous. From Guatemala on, we have also encountered an emerging micro/craft brewery scene, which have made some great red and golden ales, as well as stout. We look forward to tasting what Colombia has to offer.

Ode to Beer (in pictures)

One of the misfortunes of our timing is that we are here in the rainy season, and are missing summer in England, I'm not sure we were paying much attention when we worked out our dates. The rain started to trickle just as we left Guatemala, burst forth in El Salvador, demanded mercy in Honduras, abated in Nicaragua to give us a breather before striking back with vengeance and drenched us consistently every day in Costa Rica and Panama. At first we kind of enjoyed it. It made a nice change from the searing heat. We are far more used to cycling in rain than melting in 40° heat. On the whole it is a nice warm rain that cools us down as we ride. Although on occassions it is a brutal, all invasive assault and we have to stop as we struggle to keep our eyes open to see the traffic.  In those instances, the sky goes so black it feels like retribution is being delivered.   When it gets so heavy we can’t see the traffic, and are therefore assured that the traffic definitely cannot see us, we look for shelter to wait it out.  It does also make the surface more slippery, which Ali’s elbow and knee can testify to. 

These are surmountable problems and we wouldn’t have minded too much. What has worn us down is the constant challenge with keeping our kit...I won’t say ‘fresh’, just not stinking and damp. Once the day’s rain has passed, the sky stays cloudy and the air wet so nothing will dry until the following morning’s sunshine. One has to evolve to survive. We have done this, albeit somewhat tardily, by turning our bikes into glorified tumble dryers, stringing clothing on bungee cords on our panniers in elaborate setups. This does mean they get dusty, but it also means they dry - which saves both our noses and our bottoms (cycling repeatedly in wet shorts is not something we will elaborate on but its effect is not pretty). The other downside of the rainy season is it has robbed us of the treat of beautiful sunrises. This is one of the huge highlights of being let loose in the outdoors all day, every day. Early in the trip, as we had witnessed in Africa, we saw truly breathtaking sunrises, with a beauty that deeply moved us - with the rains, the clouds are only burnt off once the sun is high in the sky and the pinks, golds and purples are long gone. We’re hoping a change in land mass will yield a change in weather.

Eco Tumble Dryer

Our natural mindset upon arriving in Panama City was not to stop, pause and reflect on this milestone, as the adventure, in our minds and bodies, is the whole ride from Cancun to Quito; we are already, therefore, focusing on our flight to Cartagena and thinking about the myriad logistics the next week or two entail. However, having chatted about it we want to try to make Central America a distinct milestone and achievement for two reasons: a) it is; and b) if we don’t, we fear the Colombia section of the journey will feel like the twilight of the trip and we’ll start thinking prematurely about the end, diminishing our emotional presence and enjoyment in our surroundings - and Colombia will make an excellent surrounding.

Farewell Selfie

So this is Central America signing off. Our next adventure started three days ago. We’re taking five weeks to cycle the length of Colombia. We’ll keep you posted. 

Panama

Other than a canal and tax evasion, we were not too sure what Panama was going to offer us - we don’t earn enough to merit tax evasion and we’ve experienced our fair share of canals, both on them (in a kayak), in them (due to our lack of talent in a kayak) and next to them (walking, running etc), to sate our thirst. As it turns out, the riding in Panama has been stunning.

In some ways, our experience of Panama has been the opposite to that of the Yucatan, where the riding was dull but the stops were truly fantastic. Here, especially in the western half of the country, we have ridden along grinning inanely at each other whilst (other than the notable exceptions of the two archipelagos that bookended the country), the stops have been less exciting.

As we first entered, the landscape was much like that at the end of Costa Rica - lush banana plantations and hill-clinging cloud creating a mystical aura. As we climbed up and over the Talamanca Mountains, we had views of the Caribbean and the Pacific, practically seeing both shores of Panama in the same day. Bright birds continued to capture our attention, causing Ali to brake and Lizzie to almost crash into the back of him. We also had our first sloth sighting from the road, a grey furry lump up in the tree that elicited our squeals of excitement when it deigned to do something as interesting as scratch itself. From here we had the unexpected pleasure of the PanAmerican, which for a good stretch of Panama was being upgraded - this meant one side was practically complete but closed to traffic, allowing us to ride on wonderfully smooth, new asphalt with no cars to avoid. The risk here was uncleared debris - some of which speared Lizzie’s tyre (see picture) but fortuitously did not puncture it.

Superman Tyre

Empty Highway

We decided to detour off the PanAmerican for one stretch, in order to pass through some more hills (I think the slippery slope towards masochism is one-way only) and some much more quiet, lesser visited, Panamanian villages. The roads in these areas were flanked by fincas (small farms), growing mainly sugar cane, coconuts and maize. It seems that as people often find themselves waiting by the roadside for a bus, they’ve seen fit to build small shelters under which to do so, so each of these fincas had effectively built their own bus stop for themselves and their workers, often with a big bunch of bananas hanging in them; in our minds, this was a welcome snack whilst they waited for the bus but maybe it was just a convenient place to leave them to ripen.

The last stretch into Panama City after this was less pleasant - a few days of head down, get-on-with-it riding, as traffic increased, particularly freight bound for the large amount of traffic piling through the canal, and the hard shoulder worsened. We extended our route slightly to cross the canal at a quieter bridge, allowing us to take the obligatory selfies and then ride along the canal, seeing some astronomically enormous tankers pass through one of the canal’s three locks. A short brush with some spaghetti junctions and insane traffic later and we rolled into our hostel, weary but elated that we had ridden across the whole of Central America, unsupported. We drank to that.

Centennial Bridge

Massive Boat

As mentioned, our time in Panama was bookended by trips to two of its many archipelagos. The day we crossed the border from Costa Rica we caught the boat over to Bocas del Toro, a collection of islands with a distinctly Caribbean vibe (complete with pineapple empanadas and the like). We stayed on one of the quieter islands, on a little cabin stilted over the water and a diving board from the bedroom into the sea (I’m sad to say it was this gimmick that persuaded us to stay here). As we sat on the jetty both days, we saw dolphins swimming past and also an incredibly bizarre rolling wave that may have been a whale. Or just a wave. We were intoxicated by our proximity to nature and the pleasure of jumping off the dock in the dark to splash around in the phosphorescence and feel like we were casting spells out the end of our fingers.  

Gimmick Diving Board from Room

At the end of our time in Panama, we spent a few days camping and touring around the San Blas, a collection of hundreds of islands populated by the largely independent and autonomous Kuna people. This seemed an appropriate time to read Robinson Crusoe, which we both did and felt we were able to empathise so much more with Crusoe’s internment as we lay on some tiny 10m x 10m islands with just a few palm trees - a bit of immersive book reading!

Reading Robinson Crusoe

Pretending to be Robinson Crusoe

Sometimes, it’s not until you notice the appearance of something, that its prior absence becomes apparent.  For example, the few windy days at the end of Nicaragua made us appreciate how apparently windless our route in general has been.  Similarly, in Panama the sudden presence of beer halls or ‘jardins’ in every town, large or small, felt a striking appearance. Large, concrete monoliths, short on character but long on beer logo murals. It’s not that there hasn’t been plenty of beer being consumed elsewhere, but these buildings are so distinct, and often play loud music (even when they seem to be empty).  We haven’t necessarily noticed more drunken antics on the street, but if we were looking for a discotec we’d not have to stumble far to find them.

For some reason, cars in Panama
don't have front number plates which
allows space for innovation

As previously mentioned, everyone knows about the Panama Canal. It brings a lot of wealth into Panama, as evidenced by the huge metropolis of Panama City, although sadly this doesn’t seem to transfer much beyond the central belt of the country. Boats passing through the canal pay a toll based on weight - the largest payment being $829,000 in July this year (following the recent expansion of the canal, much larger boats can pass through). Entertainingly, the smallest payment was 36 cents by Richard Halliburton who swam the canal in 1928.

Unusually for two countries with a land border, there is no road connecting Panama and Colombia - the impassable area between them being known as the Darién Gap. This is an area of dense rainforest and jungle, untouched by development and so still full of the dangers that brings (dangerous wildlife, minimal habitation to stock up supplies etc) and, until recently, hideout for the FARC. Some suicidal maniacs have crossed this with their bikes in the past but we’re not that kind of masochist and so this leaves two options for sensible people - get a boat or fly. Not having the best sea legs, we have decided to fly to Cartagena in Colombia to resume our journey. The reasons that no road has been built are many - our cynical side thinks the Panamanian government has little interest in reducing the incentive, and thus the revenue, of passing through the canal, which a road link would bring. There is also a serious amount of drug trafficking from Colombia up through Central America to the US - a road would just give the cartels another route to try to exploit and potentially spread violence wider. Some of the other reasons include protecting the rainforest, containing the spread of tropical diseases and protecting the livelihood of indigenous peoples in the area. For whatever reason, it doesn’t look like there will be a road crossing anytime soon, and touring cyclists and overlanders will have to continue to break up their journey as they move from one country to the other. Oh well, that’s 500 fewer kilometres we have to cycle.

View from Panama

Bomberos

On this trip, we've met with some really heart-warming generosity; the kind that restores your faith in humanity, and utterly rejects the picture that the world is full of dangerous places and bad people (which anyone would be forgiven for thinking after just a week consuming a good dose of our national press).  Part of what has made this generosity so striking to us is that people aren’t reaching out to us because of who we are, that they’ve taken pity on us, or a shine to our good humour ;) it is just because we are fellow humans (albeit that come by recomendation because we are travelling by bike).

The warm showers community, which we’ve mentioned before, as a network of people that host cyclists, is a good example of this, but there have also been so many from the road.  Just the other day we stopped to ask an old lady if there was somewhere we could get something to eat in the village as we passed through.  She sat us down, pulled up a couple of chairs and in 3 minutes we had a full steaming plate of food in front of us.  When she rejected payment, we were left unsure of how to thank her for this kindness (why is it that money is our go to way to show value for something?)

But nowhere has this kindness been more in evidence, and basically institutionalised, than with the ‘Bomberos’ (firefighters) throughout Central America. For some reason, which we are yet to really understand, they have a tradition of letting cycle tourists stay with them.  This is definitely about firefighters rather than emergency services in general (we once found ourselves asking for shelter at a police station and they certainly weren’t going to let us camp in their porch) but extends through all the countries in Central America, despite there being no real link between the organisations.

Our lovely captain ('El Jefe') in Santa Cruz

This was something we only really discovered by word-of-mouth from other cycle tourists we have met - it is almost like an unwritten law, an omertá, a secret pact - and a wonderful one.

On all bar one occasion, they have let us stay with them. And, on all bar one occasion when we’ve turned up it has been absolutely chucking it down with rain. Staying with them might mean just allowing us to camp safely behind their gates or under some form of cover from the elements. It has usually meant having use of a shower and their kitchen. Sometimes we can use their WiFi. Once it even meant sleeping in an air-conditioned room. All with no charge, and not ever accepting an offer of a donation. 

The bomberos vary in size, structure and frequency across the countries we have cycled. In some places, such as Nicaragua, they are entirely staffed by volunteers - society-minded individuals, keen to help others. Elsewhere, they are better funded, for example, the Costa Rican Bomberos were a particularly interesting bunch - spun off from the government, they are now self-funded, with a long and very proud history. The vast majority of their funds come from an additional premium on insurance policies which has funded some pretty impressive and modern looking fortresses.

A Bomberos 'Fortress' in Costa Rica

Used, as they are, to cyclists, on the whole we’ll have a good/confusing chat on arrival in stilted Spanish, where they’ll ask where we’ve come from and we won’t understand if they mean that day, or life in general (the constant existential crisis!); we’ll try and remember where on earth we are and the name of the town we slept in the night before, which invariably is lost to us in the large pile of not quite remembered place names that litter our minds.  They’ll ask where we are going, we’ll earnestly say we are going all the way to Ecuador, and they’ll dismissively tell us about all the other cyclists who’ve come through who have gone to Argentina. It’s all done with big smiles. Then they tend to leave us to the important business of cleaning, eating and sleeping, and we leave them to, well, fighting fires.

Whilst we yearned to try it on, we didn't think they needed
two children charging round their station in fancy dress

A donation from Canada

The one place this experience was so entirely different, and an incredible experience of kindness was in the small town of Sarapiqui (see - I remembered it!) in Costa Rica. We had just endured one of the toughest days on the trip. There had been torrential rain all day and we were cold and drenched. We turned up with Ali bleeding profusely from a hole in his elbow, having skidded and crashed on a muddy section of road on his old, bald tyres; Lizzie had cycled the last 40km with only two gears, her rear gear shifter having totally gone AWOL. Having checked with 'El Jefe' (the Boss) the two bomberos on duty, Johnny and ‘Mambo’ set to work on us.

Johnny working on Ali

Johnny’s first responder instinct clearly kicked in, and he was treating Ali in no time.  Whilst Mambo’s inner mechanic was quite taken by the problem with Lizzie’s gears. Thus ensued a full diagnosis of the bike and several hours of tinkering, attempted welding and various bodge jobs to deal with the broken shifter. After a number of failed attempts to find a workable fix, Johnny went home and cut his own shifters off his mountain bike, rendering it completely unusable, and fitted these to Lizzie’s bike, allowing her to use 18 of her 20 gears. We couldn’t believe the sacrifice and tried to give Johnny some money (again, the obvious but totally insubstantial mechanism for thanks); but he insisted he wanted new shifters and that we were doing him a favour!

Mambo working on Lizzie's bike

Lizzie's dashboard, replete with 90s thumb shifter

Whilst all this was going on, they noticed that Lizzie's rear mud flap was attached with string; this had been the case since losing a part on Day 2 and has no affect whatsoever on performance, but soon some metal tubing was being sawed, bent, drilled and fitted, fixing it better than it had been when we first installed it.

As the bike was entirely stripped down and utterly immobilised, we stood by a little nervous that the alarm would go and they’d have to rush off leaving us with an entirely unusable bike.  But they worked away for the entire afternoon, and everything was being put back together by the time they had to suit up and shoot off to fight a fire (or rescue a cat).

We honestly cannot put into words quite how wonderful this experience was.  We had turned up worried that Lizzie's bike was not going to allow us to complete our journey and Ali's elbow could get infected and cause problems. We left with a wonderfully functioning bike, a clean and well bandaged elbow and a wonderful warm and fuzzy feeling inside.

Mural from Panamanian Bomberos

Ode to my bicycle

No-one can deny the pleasing simplicity of a bicycle,

The wheel alone revolutionised society.

But in taking two, the bicycle has given it grace,

Throw in a slender seat post and a fine handlebar,

And now you have an instrument ready to inspire.

Use it as you will; for dawdling to the shops or a Sunday excursion,

For commuting to the office, or a lifetime of adventure.

Whilst you conform to this stereotype, you are not just any bike;

You are my knight in shining armour and my adolescent daughter,

You are a daily protagonist in my unrelenting journey.

I use you like a pack-mule (‘yes, your bum does look big in this’)

Whilst at this, at least, you do not moan,

I see you sneer when I can barely lift you,

You lean in and make yourself all heavy,

I grunt and groan just trying to shift you.

But when you're feeling frisky,

You fuss and screech, demanding that I love you more,

And that is probably a fair request.

For its true that when I turn you over, strip you down and leave you all exposed

If I can't find a simple fix,

it's not long before I'm declaring you ‘done for’, ‘broken’, ‘a pile of S!”t’

When all you really need is basic expertise,

Some attention and redressing, in short, patience!

And when we are working well, foot in pedal,

I couldn't thank you more for the pleasure

You magnify my every stroke with such ease

Convincing me that this is the best partnership in town.

And then on to the next town we go,

Nothing disrupting our flow

Through these growing pains we become closer

You become an extension of my body

When a shard pierced your tyre I winced in pain,

As if I were myself impaled. Your wheel, my flesh.

And when I regularly flag, you urge me on, using your momentum to will me forward

Promising me a pace that is unattainable without your elegant two wheels at work.

But sometimes we don't agree

I'm over here, working hard, and I can't feel you here with me

A rising hill demands both of our attention

But you don't seem to be pulling your weight,

I ask you nicely to change gear and help me out,

And yes, perhaps it is an over reaction when I shout,

But it's really steep and you are damn heavy

My legs are tired and the sun is strong,

So please just play nicely and help me along.

We have come so far together, but on we must go.

And after this, who knows what we might do

But I wouldn't rest on my laurels if I were you

For in truth, there's always the threat of a lighter faster model.

Hanging out with your best friend

'Ouch!' (How did that not cause a puncture!!)

In our flow

x2

Not working together

Me pushing you

Omnipotent Ali vs The Muppet

Cancun to Quito. It rolls rather wonderfully off the tongue (that’s alliteration for you). Mexico to Ecuador. A to B. The bookends of this trip are a succinct and pithy way of articulating our journey quickly - however, what really matters is the stuff in between and that means plotting a route to take us through all the intermediate destinations, adding kilometres where the riding may in itself be stimulating or stunning and generally minimising them where it isn’t. This particularly focuses on avoiding the Panamerican Highway, a brute of an arterial road that runs all the way from Mexico through to Panama City, is home to a plethora of articulated lorries and is often too narrow for them and us. Sadly, in many places it is the only paved option and is often far more direct than any alternatives.

We typically start by thinking where in a country we would like to visit. We then use our 1:300,000 paper maps (how quaint!) to work out a rough route (meaning a vague route - we endeavour for it to be as un-rough as possible) that stitches these places together and takes in some of the potentially more scenic and quiet roads. However, these two qualities are rarely discernible from a map, which often fails to give much of a clue as to where a road is a dirt track or a paved duel carriageway, and so a good deal of guesswork and a growing sense of intuition and experience are also heaped in.

Omnipotent Ali with the map

In order to make life easier, we can then use a Garmin SatNav with which we pre-plot a route on the internet and load it on for the specifics; although this has been increasingly challenging as our electronics are slowly but surely falling victim to sun, sand and sea salt. As well as this challenge, our internet connection has generally been slow and frustrating and so we do the plotting at quite a zoomed out level, tapping on the map every 10km or so to create a waypoint and the website/Google/internet-pixies do the rest, filling in the route in between. Occasionally my big fingers don’t quite tap exactly on the highway, creating a little detour off the main road and back onto it. This manifests itself a few days later when we are following the pre-planned route and the Garmin tells me to take a right into someone’s chicken coop. I feel the presence of a big, omnipotent Ali who has preordained our fate, casually and lazily tapping on a screen, defining 10km of our lives in a matter of seconds with a couple of presses of his finger. Then there is the little marionette Ali, following this purple line on the Garmin screen, where 10km takes thirty minutes of his life, wondering if big, omnipotent Ali really meant for him to take a detour to collect those eggs or was just being errant with his fat finger. The fact there can be as much as two weeks between the plotting and the execution can create a real sense of Master and Puppet. Or Muppet. I’m not sure which.

Little Ali, the muppet

Whilst most of the navigation is straightforward, literally, the Garmin and Google Maps are especially helpful in towns and cities, where the sudden glut of left and rights can overwhelm our one-dimensional sense of direction. As we mentioned in a previous post, Google Maps rarely ceases to amaze us with its level of detail. We were chatting to a software engineer the other day who told us one element of how it works - if someone walks a route with their phone on, and Google Maps installed, it is logged. If ten (or so) people do this, it automatically assumes there is a path there, which is then marked onto Google Maps for all to see. This also means that in places with lots of smartphone users (such as Vietnam) the intricacies of the little paths marked is phenomenal. It has been a mixed bag here - Guatemala had no detail whatsoever; Costa Rica had loads. Not much of a surprise there. This distance mapping is one explanation as to why the algorithm does not necessarily determine what state or form this path is in, meaning we sometimes find ourselves in situations such as “Crocodile River-gate”, simulatenously yearning for Google Street View to have reached this far, thus avoiding such potential peril, and conversely loving the fact this helps us know we are on an actual adventure.

Costa Rica

Expectations were high when we entered Costa Rica. We've heard so much about what an amazing country it is and having made ourselves dizzy speeding through the last few, we wanted to take a bit more time here.  We planned a route that would wiggle around, taking us from the Pacific coast to the Caribbean via the cloud forest in the mountains (actually the phrase 'taking us' is a bit passive - we do all the taking!).

Drinking cold beer in some hot springs - Costa Rica has 
lots of volcanoes and we basked in the warming effect of 
one of them in La Fortuna

Going bananas for bananas - we loved seeing all the banana trees

What we've found has been a mixed bag.  There have been some really beautiful sections, in particular coming through the banana plantations, where hundreds and thousands of banana trees stretched out beside us.  Costa Rican bananas account for a significant amount of the bananas that we eat in the UK, and so we found ourselves constantly accompanied by the familiar looking logos of Chiquita, Del Monte and Dole on the lorries that thundered by as we rode along the main route to the Caribbean port of Limon.  There is something about the leaves of the trees that make the plantations really unique and whilst we were full of generous superlatives about their beauty, we can't say the same for the traffic which we muttered and grumbled about as we braced ourselves against the drag of each lorry passing uncomfortably close.  Ali swears he will remember those lorries every time he eats a Chiquita banana - Lizzie is pretty sure that once the divine combination of banana and peanut butter melts in his mouth he'll be transported to a higher place and have no space for anguish.

A full complement of lorries - for all of your potassium needs

Loading up - possibly for a transatlantic
voyage to a Waitrose near you

Bananas are not the only fruit they grow here, and we've loved the freshness of the pineapples in particular.  We stayed with one wonderful Warm Showers host who took us to his plantation where he was growing more than 90 different fruits.  As usual, we felt like philistine city dwellers, unable to identify the plants growing staples that we know and love, but we also saw and tasted all sorts of new fruit.  Raphael (our host) plucked a few ripe pieces off the various trees and we went back to the house for a feast of fresh juicy fruits. This included one 'magic berry', a small red fruit that you suck; not only does it have a wonderful sweet flavour but it means that everything you eat in the next half hour or so is also sweet - we were lapping up citric lemon juice like it was apple juice. 

Rambutans modelling a relaxing decking

Staying with Raphael, and a number of nights we have had in the Bomberos (firefighters), have been such a treat, as they are a moment to understand more about Costa Rica.  In the extensive tourist areas we have found this much less possible - in those places it's hard not to fall into the rhythm of activities on offer that are made so easy and accessible.  Fun as they might be, they've felt like a step away from our journey and discovery; in these places we find ourselves speaking less Spanish and generally feeling a bit flat.  So sitting with Raphael in his kitchen, with an entire wall missing so that we were effectively sat in his garden, next to the amazing birds hopping around, talking about the politics in Costa Rica, was a real highlight of the country.  It has given Lizzie loads of ideas as to how we can live in a house that has the comforts of a mattress and running water that Ali extravagantly demands, but that also lets in the fresh air and nature that Lizzie has an unfounded belief is possible in a country with a climate like the UK. The feasibility of slinging a hammock or growing a pineapple when we're back home is in some doubt.

In a bamboo clearing known as the 'Cathedral' with
Raphael on his plantation 

Costa Rica makes an interesting comparison with its near neighbours.  Unlike much of Central America, the second half of the previous century was not characterised by civil war, and so its development has been continuous and effective.  In fact, at the end of their last war in 1948, the new constitution brought in disbanded the army. The budget that had been used for it was redirected towards security, education and culture.  There are just a handful of countries in the world with no army, and its interesting that from a Western perspective we tend to wonder what that means about their ability to protect themselves, thinking of an army as a body that traditionally engages in protection of the borders etc. (no comment on its more recent uses with Chilcott so hot off the press) but in Latin America the army is thought of as an instrument of the state to suppress the masses; its disbandonment (is this a word?!) therefore represents something quite different to that, for example, of Iceland.

Costa Rica is famed for its amazing wildlife, and we've not been disappointed. We did a night walk in the cloud forest where we saw all sorts of creepy crawlies (tarantulas, snakes, scorpions and salamanders) and visited a rescue sanctuary that was rehabilitating wounded animals (sloths, monkeys, caymans, more snakes - they've been somewhat of a theme here) but we've also been so lucky to see fantastic wildlife on the road.  For example, comparing the amazing bright orange shelled and purple legged crabs from the Pacific Coast with the blue crabs on the Caribbean Coast.  We've spotted a few toucans sailing past us and a particular brilliantly bright red chested bird that had a good swing at both of us as we pedaled past, clearly too close to his nest that he'd built in a road sign (I hope he wasn't taking the same approach to the lorries as I'm pretty sure I know who would win).

A sizeable guest that dropped in to reception in our hostel

A fast moving crab that we inadvertently
camped on in Nicoya

No fault of Costa Rica's but our time here has also been plagued by issues with our bikes. Having cavalierly decided that our tyres were fine (after a good 10,000kms use) their tread has really worn down. We knew that they needed replacing but before we've been able to (the legendary Schwalbe Marathon Pluses are not that simple to source in Central America) Ali met with an accident. The combination of rain, (there has been a lot of late) mud (splattered along the road from construction sites) and bald tyres resulted in him skidding and coming down in the road. Luckily no serious damage was done, but it contributed to the sense of vulnerability we can feel on the road.  Whilst it can be a weighty tension to carry (which neither of us will really relax about until this journey is complete), we use this to our advantage to make sure we are careful and don't take the risk of the traffic lightly.

Don King vs Ross Kemp

As soon as we entered the country Lizzie started to have a problem with shifting her gears and we had a couple of emergency stops on the road to try and rectify this; each of which involves the obligatory moment of, having taken everything apart, finding that something won't go back in as it should, and spending up to 20 minutes wondering if the bike will ever be rideable again. No IKEA instructions here to help out...

We've got new tyres to greet us in Colombia and, having found a professional to help sort out Lizzie's gears, ride on into Panama (more or less) fully serviced, and ready for a long slog on the Panamerican Highway in search of a fabled canal.

Inspired by Calvin and Hobbs

Safety Announcement: Please always wear a helmet. We do in real life but they are very hard to draw.

Exploring the Nicoya Peninsula

When we first conceived of this trip it filled us with both excitement and nervousness. There was so much that we didn't know about how it would work. As the trip became real, continually, and bit by bit over the last two months we've faced many of those concerns and are learning our way through them. For example, I'm not sure you ever get used to setting out each day not really knowing where you are going to sleep that night, but we've certainly grown confidence in our ability to find something that works and so are increasingly able to carry that uncertainty more lightly.

But time and again we find that the greatest satisfaction and the greatest reward comes from when we find ourselves confronting new and different challenges - some that we choose and others that we don't! It is when our rhythm is disrupted or when we find ourselves doing things that combine anxiety and excitement that we know why we are on this trip.

Increasingly feeling comfortable and confident in what we are doing gave us the space to decide to spend a few days away from the traffic and on a detour around the Nicoya peninsula in western Costa Rica, an area famed for its great beaches and dense canopy. On the western side there aren't any asphalt roads to speak of, just a variety of dirt roads and rocky tracks. Our plan wasn't just to follow these tracks, but also to forge new ones and where we could (tide permitting), ride on the beaches. Hence the anxiety. But we'd read a blog or two suggesting it was possible, and that our effort would be rewarded, coupling it with excitement.

Whilst knowing that a road is asphalt encompasses a range in quality, for non-asphalt roads, that range is ten fold and we've experienced a good spectrum of that in the last few days, from hard packed dirt that your wheels fly over the top of, almost feeling like there is an added spring in the surface like you might find in running track, to wet rutted tracks with unexpectedly deep puddles and a surface layer of slick grey mud that slides all over the place; to red rocky paths with deep crevices running through the middle of them.

On the first day these roads wound round the coast rising up (often steeply) to provide stunning views of the sea and dropping (pleasurably) down to give us access to the beaches...

Calves of steel

Peaceful palm avenue

...where we met the sand. Beautiful wide open expanses of sandy beach with not a single person in sight. With the tide out we could ride on the newly drying sand at a glorious pace, relishing the treat of our apparent solitude with magnificent views. But when we hit the shingle we slowed to a painfully slow crawl, dragging the weight of our back wheels step by step through the deep gravel. The thrill here was looking down at the stones and shells beneath us and noticing how many of these tiny shells were independently moving, carried on their way by an inhabitant hermit crab.

Red faced selfie

The roads were often intersected by rivers as water off the mountains to our left hurried on its merry way to the sea. We'd been warned that these river mouths also provide outlets for crocodiles, similarly emerging from the jungle within. At many crossings there were simple bridges and we took pleasure in scanning the banks below for a glimpse of a sharp toothed reptile. But on our second day we came to an abrupt halt where the water flowed right over the road. Those same warnings ringing in our ears, we contemplated our options. With the desire not to have to do a massive detour pushing us (Ali) forward, and rational terror pulling us (Lizzie) back.

It didn't take long to notice the sign acknowledging the presence of crocodiles, which was all the confirmation we needed not to proceed. But on consulting a man living in a lone house some 500 metres back up the road he nuanced this by explaining that there are crocodiles, but that these are not a problem for people. This chink in the definitive danger caused us to waiver - we weren't sure that we quite understood what a crocodile that wasn't a problem for people meant, but the implication was that this route was not off the cards.

Back at the water's edge we began the laborious activity of removing our panniers.  The river rose up to just below Ali's crotch and we'd have to unload our bikes so that we could carry them, unladen, to the other side.  This would also mean crossing not just once, but mutliple times to transport the load across, hiked over our shoulders.

Each crossing took between a minute and a half and two minutes.  This was no mad dash, but a slow, intentional endeavour that took all our steel.  One waded out whilst the other waited on the banks, nervously scanning the waters edge left and right for any sign of life, equipped with a tiny (like, really tiny) Leatherman, ready to fling ourselves into the melee should any misdemeanour occur.

Ali bore the brunt of these multiple crossings, traversing the river again and again, including the excruciating return journeys where, empty handed, he would have to wade back across to collect another load.

Ali emerging from yet another crossing

Needless to say, no attack occurred.  The Leatherman was spared the indignity of being shown to be a woefully inadequate tool and our hearts slowly returned from their lightening pace to a moderately heavy thud.  In fact, we saw no signs of life at all.  (We joked about how we might have experienced that exact same scene entirely differently were it not for our sense of the unseen danger).

We have not covered a great distance in the last few days; the going has been slow and tough as we knew it would be.  But we've been rewarded with fantastic views, great wildlife and a deep sense of satisfaction. It is our bikes that have borne the brunt of our adventure; they were literally screeching for mercy as we nurtured them into our rest day, sand seemingly in every nook and cranny. They deserve some TLC, which will come once we have spent our well earned beer credits!

Lunch stop on an empty beach with a perfectly placed picnic bench