Costa Rican Memoir #2, part 2

dinnerintortuguero
Originally uploaded by Randuwa.

Once in the coastal village of Tortuguero, we disembarked and took stock. We knew we needed a meal and a place to stay, but we where not organized in our approach to securing this. The Belgian couples were, and so they secured the premiere room in the only house in the village with rooms for rent on the night of our arrival, and we were happy to let the other one. It held a twin and a double bed. So of our party of five, I shared the twin with a visitor from Ohio named Mr. G, and the three women slept on the double. Not beds in the formal sense of the world, more just lumpy mattresses suspended on frames just slightly above the floor.

As the evening continued, Mr. M. and his traveling companion, who was from Spain, Mr. P., joined us in this little room, sleeping on the floor. There was just enough room for one between the beds and one perpendular across the foot of the beds. We must have looked like the proverbial can of sardines!

But before retiring for the evening, we (the now seven of us) took a simple meal with the family in the only other room of the home. (Note the picture is of this event) They fed us huevos con atun, arroz con pollo and an ensalada of cabbage and tomatoes. It was a typical meal, which, along with our lodging, cost each of us the princely sum of $1.50. We dined under the pulsating glow of a single naked light bulb, all electricity in the village supplied by a lone gas powered generator whose humming and moaning punctuated the night from somewhere else in the little hamlet.

Afterward, I left my (exhausted and ever practical) American friends and joined Mr. M. for a little exploring. First at the local dance hall -- a pavilion covered slab of concrete that offered rum and coke while the music of the day: Lionel Ritchie's “Dance the Night Away”, as I recall, competed with the generator. The fiesta continued until the gas ran out in the generator, and with a sudden gasp and a sputter, the lights flickered, the music wobbled, and then all was dark and quiet. Everyone simply said their good nights and dispersed.

Mr. M. and I retreated to the beach for a time. I do not recall that of which we spoke. I do remember the utter incredibility of the heavens! The universe never looked so full of stars, and earth never seemed so much a part of the whole infinite cosmos. No wonder the Mayans were obsessed with the night skies! As the Caribbean lapped methodically against the shore, the fact that we live on an improbable bubble of gas surrounding a speck of rock spinning around a spark in a sea sparks was mind-boggling to me. I'll never forget that night.

Before long, however, there was a glow in the east, and by midnight the moon's brilliant reflection appeared obliterating all the lesser stars as it rose toward its zenith in the night sky. And with it's arrival it was time for Mr. M. and I to join our friends and rest for at least a little while before the final leg of our journey. We were to meet our guide at 4:00 AM and board a long boat, which would ferry us up to an outpost of settlers on the southern edge of the park. More to come....