Three Paragraphs

Our progress has been less than stellar. We are deep into hour three of a two and-a-half hour drive, when an unfortunate thing happens. Somehow a small, muddy lake has settled right where the road we are travelling used to be, and the grand marshal of our gringo parade has apparently persuaded his driver to plunge the heavily loaded, pointy nosed mini-van into the impromptu lake. Of course they are stuck. There is probably about five tons of dried food and medical supplies loaded in that poor van, so they are stuck beyond bad. I am only a “kid” among men too, so I can’t possibly help. The women and children were ordered to just sit tight and let the men handle everything. I am disappointed though; we are on a stretch of road that is all but barren of bushes or trees. There is no chance of a smoke break here.

On the bright side, it only took two hours to free the mini-van, and we are moving again. We found out during the wait that this lake was pretty much a permanent fixture here, and that there was an easily traversed road that went around it. The next leg of our journey requires that we cross The Golfo de Nicoya via ferry boat.

The operation looks simple enough. There is a small shack with a ticket window in front, built of rough-milled wood siding and a rusting metal roof. The ferry dock is nothing more than a cinder block wall with tires dangling from ropes to cushion the impact of the boat. The ferry is already being loaded on our side as we are pulling up, so after ticketing it looks like only a couple of our five vans will make it aboard. It looks like the remaining members of our group will be waiting for quite a while judging by the visible condition, and the groaning and grinding sound emanating from the bowels of the ferry.

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