4 Jan 2019

Short & Sweet

by Ben & Kourt | posted in: Central America, Travel | 0

No, we’re not talking about Kourtney…

We’re referring to our time in Costa Rica. Although it was a brief stay, we do feel that we fit enough activities into our week that we sampled a lot of what Costa Rica has to offer. It is a beautifully green and mountainous area, reminding us of Guatemala (but at double or triple the price!). We can definitely see ourselves going back when we have more time & and a bigger budget to spend here.

Our first activity was to hike the tallest peak in Costa Rica – Cerro Chirripó. Coons’ Boy-Scout instincts led him to start researching early – #beprepared. Long gone were the no-rules hiking we’ve become accustomed to where you can just show up and hike. Unless you want to hike up and back on the same day (24+ miles with over 7K feet of elevation gain), you have to go through the government website and hope there are still spots left for when you want to hike. You need permits to hike (yes, they’re expensive); they allow a stay of maximum three days; you must stay in the base camp lodge; you must reserve one of the 52 beds in advance); you must order your meals ahead of time should you want them (they’re expensive too); and you have to check into two separate locations the day before beginning the summit hike.

Luckily, the last three-day stretch available was during Kourtney’s birthday weekend, so we were really able to explore all that Chirripó has to offer. A big plus of this hike is that they have water stations at the mid-point and base lodge so we did not have to carry our typical four liters of water with us. Additionally, the mid-point lodge allowed Kourtney to have more coffee than usual on her b-day! The hike up to base camp was long but enjoyable, and there were cows watching people on their way up, competing with the pack horses for strongest smelling manure.

We reached the base camp after 9 miles, checked in, and found our room with four bunk beds.

The “fun” thing about this lodge located at 11,155 feet is that there is never heat and they only have electricity from 6pm – 8pm, creating a Black-Friday-esque rush for the lone power strip every day. We talked to one of the staff, also named Benjamin, and planned our next day based on his recommendations. He loved Ben and gave us a couple tickets for free hot chocolate, which helped the fact that it was around 40 degrees in the lodge during the evenings. We met our bunkmates and had dinner with them; Bernett is a Navy Seal diver who brought his wife, Ruth, back to Chirripó to celebrate their first date 32 years later (#relationshipgoals). Although they live in Holland now, they are both originally from Costa Rica where they have a big family and lots of grand-babies impatiently awaiting their return for the holidays.

They were the best trail parents to us — “Kourtney, you are coughing a lot; here’s a pack of throat lozenges. Since were hiking to the summit tomorrow at 3am, here is some trail mix from our local grocery store in Holland!”

The early-morning summit hike was one of our longer ones: 3.4 miles through the vast national park illuminated by thousands of stars. Leaving the base camp at 3am, we crunched the ice and frost covering the trail for the first couple of miles until we reached the last section that was 45 minutes straight up! We reached the summit at 5am and settled in just below the summit with a gigantic boulder that sheltered us from the wind, just in time for the sun to work her magic.

Once Kourtney lost feeling in her hands and feet, we started our descent. One of the benefits of starting your hike in the dark is that the trail looks brand new in the sunlight. We found that beautiful lakes surround Chirripo and lots of greenery. Following Benjamin’s advice, when we reached the trail junction, we left our fellow hikers and struck out towards a nearby lake where we enjoyed a snack and the view all to our ourselves.

Once again at the main trail junction, Coons thought hey, it’s only 10am, let’s hike to Cerro Terbi and through to the Crestones. So we hiked another aggressive uphill to summit another mountain and over a pass to the Crestones – a set of huge boulders looming over the base lodge.

The view of Los Crestones from base camp – way up there!

And Kourtney just had to climb them.

The walk back was tiring and we realized we had hiked for around ten hours already. We returned to the lodge for a siesta, some lunch, and cards, impatiently awaiting dinner. Over dinner, we swapped hiking stories with a German and a French couple we had met that day at the lodge. The next morning we enjoyed our last meal, a hearty breakfast before we set out for the last 9 miles down to the town. Joining up with our bunk-mates and a Dutchman they befriended, we all set out together.

Towards the end of our hike, around kilometer four, we were confronted with an assault from above. Tree branches, leaves, and fruit were dropping onto the trail all around us. Bernett was the first to point out of white-faced monkeys making all the commotion.

Ruth wins the award for best attitude because she hiked the entire 9 miles with a bum ankle and never did the smile leave her face! When we reached the bottom we all took a selfie, and Bernett brought us a celebratory beer at one of the hostel bars nearby.

He even arranged a ride for us which saved us an extra two miles of walking back to our hostel. Seriously, best trail parents ever!

The next morning was an early one but we arrived at our next destination, a small town on the Pacific Coast called Uvita, around noon. We stayed at Flutterby Hostel, a recommendation from a long line of friends. Side story about traveling: months ago at Kourtney’s high school best friend’s wedding (hi, Nicole!), she got to reunite with a mutual friend who had just completed a serious eight-month tour around the world! The day of the wedding, Coons and Kourtney invited Beth and Matt out on a hike to pick their brains for our upcoming trip (thanks again, you two!), and on this hike we got recommendations to meet up with Matt’s cousin Mike. Cool things like this happen all of the time when you are traveling. People are always happy to take care of each other. And just like that Mike told us the coolest place to stay, gave ideas for multiple excursions, and agreed to be our free tour guide for a day (mucho gusto, Mike and Aneeska!)

Flutterby Hostel is an eco-friendly place with lots of people, a great kitchen, free fruit, surfboards to rent, and awesome tree house accommodations.

The hostel hosted a trivia night and an open-mic night which made the place a fun place to hang around and enjoy some cervezas. We walked to the iconic whale’s tail in the morning

and enjoyed an evening surf-session in a rainstorm. Our favorite excursion was the one with Mike and his wife Aneeska, however, because we got a chance to see what the locals like to do on their days off! We went to the Osa Waterfalls which is a short hike through the jungle to this beautiful swimming hole.

We took turns throwing a stick for their dog, Bella, and all enjoyed some fresh coconut. Mike showed us where the sloths hang out high in the trees and sleep. We ate lunch together and then they got ready to fly back to the states the next day for the holidays.

Our time in Costa Rica was short and sweet but full of different terrain and climates. We spent some time challenging ourselves and making new friends in an entirely new country. All in all it was time well spent.

27 Dec 2018

¿Por Qué No?

by Ben & Kourt | posted in: Central America, Travel | 2

Some of the coolest places we’ve stayed and some of the most incredible adventures we’ve experienced are thanks to meeting and talking with people who gave their recommendations, both good and bad.

We wrestled with the idea of skipping Nicaragua because of its current political situation, its dangerous reputation in the news, and the fact that 95% of the south-bound travelers we talked to planned to skip right over it.

Not one to give up that easily, we started researching and looking for safe accommodations and thinking about our #centralamericatravel goals and we decided to go full send (hope you’re proud, Allen!).

As mentioned in our Honduras post, once Ramon said he was available to guide us up and down Cerro Mogotón, the highest peak in Nicaragua, and make sure we didn’t step on any landmines (sorry, Marla!), we said “Por Qué No!” and changed our plans to head to Ocotal, Nicaragua instead of León.

Ramon, despite his serious demeanor, is a pleasant and proud Spanish-only speaking coffee plantation owner who guides people safely up the mountain as his side gig. He picked us up from our hotel and after a drive down a long dirt road with quite a few river crossings, we arrived at his coffee farm (they supply Dogwood Coffee) where he and his brother fed us delicious bread and brewed the most delightful cup of coffee Kourtney has had yet!

Ramon & his brother take their coffee seriously

You can tell that these gentlemen take such pride in their work even Coons had trouble saying “no, gracias” to a taste, and if you know Coons, you know this is a BIG deal.

Our hike was so much fun! It was a beautiful, warm, sunny day (to start). The first part we were skipping on rocks over the river, balancing on fallen tree stumps, helping each other over large boulders, and crawling under downed trees.

The second section was steep, but thankfully the generous country of Luxembourg had donated money to make wooden “stairs” in order to make the trail more accessible and help increase tourism. The third section was MUD-DY. All of the sudden, we entered the classic fog-encased summit we have become accustomed to hiking in. Ramon casually mentioned after the fact that this part of the trail is damp and dank ten months out of the year — so that’s why you’re wearing knee-length rubber boots, Ramon!

We really could have used some rubber boots

After we reached the summit and shared a snack, we started down the other side through more mud and clouds, finally finding the sun again in a large field of flowers almost as tall as Kourtney; don’t they compliment her rain jacket nicely?

Despite this damp and dirty hike, we had an absolute blast and remained in good spirits the whole time — maybe the coffee and the pizza for breakfast helped too.

After Ocotal, we took a Colectivo bus to Somoto to enjoy a canyon tour. Described as the “Grand Canyon of Nicaragua,” this six hour trek was a must-see and reminded us of the Narrows hike in Zion National Park.

Our guide brought us hiking and swimming over and through large rock faces; pointed out the best spots to jump off the rocks; and he pointed out bats in the caves and iguanas bathing in the sun. We found bullet shells, indicating that we were close to the border with Honduras (of course!), near the fork in the river where the Honduran and Nicaraguan sections meet. The intersection of these two rivers forms the Coco River, the longest in Central America! We had a blast on the tour but we were definitely looking forward to some traditional gallo pinto (Nicaragua style rice and beans) and pollo back at the hostel.

From Somoto, it was finally time for some volcano sledding in León. The non-profit organization Quetzaltrekkers runs their version of volcano boarding at Cerro Negro. A 45 minute hike up volcanic rock in the blistering sun brings you to the top where you can see other volcanoes in the area. Careful not to touch the rock for too long as it is hot enough to roast vegetables over!

Our guide, Wilbur, who hates volcano boarding (too much sand everywhere!), gave us a quick briefing and ran down the hill in order to snap photos and videos of us cruising by. Dressed in our minion suits and safety goggles, we hopped on our sleds, kissed our lucky eggs, and dropped into the black sand dunes!

Wilbur was stunned we wanted to do it again, but we had the need for speed and went for round two. Luckily we booked with Queltzaltrekkers, the only company that lets you take two runs down the volcano for the price of one. We were still finding small black pebbles in our hair weeks later, but this excursion was well worth it!

From León, we took another couple of buses to Granada, our final stop in Nicaragua. We stayed at Hostal Oasis, a recommendation from the couple we went volcano boarding with, because it has a pool and Nicaragua is muy caliente! The free rum hour didn’t hinder the decision either. We met a lovely couple there and we booked a tour the next day for their sister hostel, Paradiso, to enjoy a day on the water.

Of course, the weather this day was cloudy and overcast, but we made the most of it, kayaking on the white-capped lake, and kicking butt in a couple games of pool vs. the sharks from London.

In Granada, we also enjoyed climbing church towers to view the town and touring a local cigar factory.

Realizing the food budget was getting out of control, we stopped at the local grocery market to buy food; we cooked almost all of our meals in the kitchen at Oasis while chatting with a French couple who are biking through Central and South America with their THREE children (two, six, and eight)! The tres amigos study for at least an hour a day, and the parents report the children speak better Spanish than they do.

This low-key stop in Granada was much needed because next on the agenda is a three-day hiking trek in Costa Rica for Kourtney’s birthday weekend!

13 Dec 2018

Best Laid Plans…

by Ben & Kourt | posted in: Central America, Travel | 1

You all know Coons; he’s a man with a plan.

Our journey to Honduras was to start in Gracias where we planned to hike the tallest peak, Cerro Las Minas, in Celaque National Park. We stayed at a beautiful hostel just outside of town called El Jardin where we enjoyed some home-brewed beer and a nice dinner.

We walked to the local grocery store to purchase stuff for sandwiches, water, and extra batteries for our headlamps. It’s better to be safe than sorry, right?

We got a later start than we planned the next day; mostly because when hostels say breakfast starts at 7:30 what they really mean is the staff will arrive at 7:30, mop the floor, take your order, go purchase the food, cook it, and then serve it to you. So at 9:45am, we were on the trail heading up! We got to our campsite around noon, set up camp, dropped anything else we didn’t need for the summit push, ate some lunch, and headed back out on the trail. The second section was tough with switchbacks thinly disguising a steep elevation climb and multiple downhills giving away our hard-fought elevation.

The third section was enclosed by gigantic trees in a very well marked path and a more reasonable climb with a final tough 30-minute push to the summit. Arriving around 3:30pm, we only lasted 15 minutes at the top because it would be getting dark soon and we wanted to take advantage of as much daylight as we could.

However, night fell quickly on the other side of the mountain (helped in part by the newly formed rain clouds) and before we knew it it was time to bust out the headlamps — only Kourtney’s wasn’t working despite the brand new pack of Duracells. So with the iPhone-turned-flashlight in one hand and a hiking pole in her other, we finished the last two hours of the nine-hour hike back to our campsite in the dark, listening to the animated sounds of the jungle at night. Please, Mr. Puma, stay far, far away!

From Gracias, we planned to stop in La Ceiba for one night and take the morning ferry to Utila to start three days of scuba diving. Unfortunately, when Coons woke up the next morning, he recognized the familiar feeling heralding the arrival of an ear infection; something that would make our plans for diving difficult, to say the least. So we asked to stay at our hostel another night and went straight to the clinic. The doctor confirmed his infection and gave him drops, pills, and steroids to speed up the healing process because of our intention to dive ASAP. For those of you counting at home, that’s two months and two trips to the clinic. On the bright side, Coons’ medical Spanish is improving with each passing month. We’re now taking submissions for what December’s trip to the clinic will be…

(#) Blessed with another couple of days in La Ceiba to fight off the infection, we started researching what else there was to do. Of course, the #1 recommended activity… white water rafting! Kourtney said “no” immediately and finally agreed to consult Kristian (her sister and our go-to travel nurse) before shutting the idea down completely. With a thumbs up Snap-Chat emoji and a recommendation for earplugs, she agreed we were good to go! Not one to let a silly infection deter him, Coons dragged Kourtney to the other side of town to Walmart to purchase premium Speedo earplugs (and 36 Nature Valley granola bars!!) and we booked the trip for the next day. The earplugs worked great and we had a blast spending the morning bouncing off rocks and jumping off cliffs into the water.

Break for some swimming and jumping in the sun

We (finally) made it to Utila a couple days later to dive and obtain our PADI Advanced Open Water Certification. We ended up finding a great deal with Gunter’s Ecomarine Dive Center that included four nights of free accommodation instead of the standard three! As part of the package, after you finish your certification, you get two free fun dives. We completed seven dives over three days including a navigation, buoyancy, deep water (over 100 feet), a night dive, and a shipwreck dive.

Yup, that’s us going inside of the Halliburton ship that’s been sitting at the bottom of the ocean since 1998!

We really felt like family at Ecomarine. It was by far the highlight of Honduras for us! The diving in Utila is beautiful and the staff was just wonderful. We hung out with Carol, Gustavo, and Chris for a Sunday night movie on the dock and shot some pool at the Skid Row bar across the street. We highly recommend staying with them in you ever find yourself wanting to dive for cheap in Honduras.

When our time was up, we planned to take the ferry back to La Ceiba the next morning and head straight to Leon, Nicaragua on a 15-hour shuttle for some volcano boarding. Shuttle and hostel booked for the next day, we settled in at the bar to relax and enjoy our last night on the island. Later that night, the woman we booked the shuttle with, Natasha, found us and informed us that the shuttle that “runs every day to Leon” wasn’t working (?) and the other shuttle company left only on Mondays and Fridays — it was a Tuesday. Ok, new plan, let’s just take the ferry and then try and get somewhere close to Leon?

The next day we took the ferry and found a bus to take us to Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras, and the closest point to Nicaragua we could get on a long travel day (7:00am – 9:30pm). As mentioned earlier, Coons likes to plan things. He had been trying for weeks to find a guide to take us up Cerro Mogoton, the highest peak in Nicaragua. While most other hikes we could do without a guide, this was one we couldn’t tackle on our own. Aside from the trailhead being very remote and impossible to find, the peak is on the border with Honduras and was filled with landmines during a not-too-distant conflict. Fun! Mid-way through our journey to Tegucigalpa, we finally heard back from a local trekking company in Nicaragua with the number of a local named Ramon, a Spanish-only-speaking guide to call who will be happy to bring us to the top. From the corner of a busy bus station, Coons worked his magic on the Google Pixel, and we had a plan to climb it in two days. Plans to go to Leon were scrapped, hostels were canceled, and a new plan was concocted.

Even though none of our original plans worked out, we still got to do the things we love: travel the country, hike, and dive! While these constant changes can be frustrating, our flexibility and hiking-heavy itinerary give us a chance to get off the gringo trail and experience the country the way the locals do which is an important part of this trip for us.

We’d like to thank Booking.com for their flexibility and cancellation policy 😉

5 Dec 2018

Amigos Everywhere

by Ben & Kourt | posted in: Central America, Travel | 0

What’s the best thing about El Salvador?

It’s the people.

Everyone we met in El Salvador went out of their way to be helpful to us! We started our journey on the beach in the small surf town of El Tunco with the intention of learning how to surf. After a few not so promising days, we befriended Omar from the surf shop who brought us to his family’s beachfront restaurant for two hours of private surf lessons.

The black sandy beach was the perfect spot to learn the mechanics of surfing, which we learned is more technical than the surf instructor in “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” says. Omar also organized a waterfall hike and took us to his favorite spot to get pupusas – corn-filled tortillas with your choice of filling. Omar said to get the pescado and it did not disappoint!

After the beach, we traveled inland to Juayua where we stayed in a lovely garden hostel with a fun hang-out area and over 500 movies! There was something magical about cooking stirfry and watching “Little Miss Sunshine” that made us feel at home. Here we met Douglas who brought us on a six-hour trek to see seven different waterfalls!

One of the seven waterfalls from the hike

This trek included hardhats, rappelling equipment, a machete, and lunch — all of which Douglas carried to make sure we had a pleasant and safe experience!

While we were mowing our sandwiches, he was sharing his with the perros, and while we were swimming and enjoying the sun, he was picking up garbage people left near the falls.

We took a day trip by chicken bus to Ataco to enjoy the colorful streets filled with some impressive paintings.

We enjoyed a nice lunch, a splurge of pesto and shrimp pizza with a carafe of sangria, before walking up to the mirador that overlooks the entire town! The best thing about taking the chicken buses is that all of the locals want to know where you are going and what you are doing and they always make sure you get off at the right spot!

After our relaxing and unplanned stay in Juayua, we went to Santa Ana – our jumping off stop for Volcan Santa Ana. We weren’t expecting to love the town as we were walking down the dreary streets, but then we met Chillen. He was the cousin of Julio, who owned the Pool House Hostel we stayed in, and he drove us in his white Honda Accord to the park to hike. The volcano hike was fun with great views at the top of Lake Coatepeque and a green sulfur lake in the middle of the crater!

Panorama shot from the top of the volcano

After our group of five finished the hike, he was at the bottom waiting to bring us to Hostel Captain Morgan to swim on the lake for the afternoon. This lake has a similar feel to Lake Atitlan in that there’s hiking around cool, blue water and nice places to drink cervezas and eat hamburgers.

View from the deck of Captain Morgan’s hostel

On the way back to Santa Ana, Chillen said we should all go to Clubbers for bottle service and dancing because that’s what you do on Friday night in Santa Ana. He would pick us up at 9 pm. During cocktail hour, he offered to drive us the next day to Apopa where we could catch the bus to La Palma free of charge because he was going that way anyway! We, of course, tipped him for saving us the hassle and letting us catch a few more ZZZs the next morning!

In La Palma, our goal was to hike the tallest peak in El Salvador. El Pital is on the border with Honduras and at the summit there is a white monument where you can stand in two places at once! Here is Coons in El Salvador and Kourtney in Honduras!

This was to be our last day before entering Honduras through immigration, however, we were running out of money and none of the ATMs were taking our cards. To save our cash, we were hitchhiking our way to and from the park entrance of El Pital and planning to skip meals in order to save money and get to Honduras or anywhere with an ATM that would work. And then we met Brian.

Brian is an 18 year old kid from California in El Salvador visiting family and renewing his citizenship. Desperate to speak English with us, he asked us to join him and his cousins for lunch. He offered to give us some cash with a quick Apple Pay transaction to hold us over for a couple of days when he heard about our troubles. We walked around the town with him talking of revolutions for this poor country he loves so much while his cousins chatted up girls washing windows outside small tiendas. He bought a soccer ball on the drive back towards our hostel, so we stopped to play with the guys and some smaller boys that joined us on the field. Kourtney watched as Brian made sure everyone got a chance to touch the ball, all the while thinking, I hope someday my kid is this cool and open-minded and generous.

Be kind to one another.

It’s the El Salvadorian way.

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