Camping meant staying at lots of places with little ability to do any blog posting because nowhere we stayed had any connectivity. Yes, more excuses! Maybe this daily posting, as Jenny suggested, is too ambitions. Anyway, here is a post to reflect what we are doing now.
We finished our last camp at Atenas, less than half an hour from Alajuela, roughly where the Nomad America base is. That gave us plenty of time in case transition day proved problematic.
We did a petrol top-up to leave the vehicle full and a bought some supplies from the supermarket just up the road. We were finishing our stint of camping but were starting our self-catered stay on the horse ranch.
This presented different issues, opportunites and logistical problems. For instance, we would have a fridge now, but no transport. There was a local shop but what sort and we’d have to walk to it. So, just to be on the safe side, we bought some essentials, like lentils, tins of beans and veggies, which Sarah could easily turn into a variety of meals. I chose a tin of tuna, which is always useful, nachos, salsa, beer and wine, which are most definitely essential.
The drop off at Nomad went smoothly. Diego and the staff took care of everything very efficiently. He was most impressed with the gift of WD40 that I left him – the first useful thing anyone had ever left behind. It had helped us with the zips and the rusty camping chairs and table, but we could foresee no further use for it.
We got an Uber direct to the horse ranch. It almost felt wrong that it should be as simple as “getting an Uber”. It also felt too cheap. The 90 minute journey only cost £20. I gave the driver a decent tip, but regretted it when I realised that he could have driven us up the driveway not left us by the gate.
Fortunately Brenda and Able came out to meet us. They’d thought a friend who was there could help bring the bags up in his car, but the friend must have misunderstood because he just waved cheerfully and drove past. Or, perhaps he thought our pile of bags looked too intimidating.
Now we are going to be car free, I think we are going to regret having so much baggage. We thought we’d packed light but still brought too much stuff.
Able took the heaviest bags, which was very kind of him, and more than he ought to have done. He showed us up to our cabin at the top of the farm.
It didn’t take us long to settle in and put our feet up.
We had a free afternoon, riding not starting until tomorrow. We took the opportunity to see what the hiking trails looked like. These should be hacking routes to ride along but the horses won’t cross the river yet. We agreed with the horses, although we might come back some time with our waterproof shoes and attempt a boots-on wade.
