ORIGINAL JOURNAL

Cahuita - June 27, 2009

Starting my trip to Panama, I found myself lost. It's actually a funny story. The plan was supposed to be: head to a town by the name of Puerto Viejo at 6 in the morning Saturday the 27th. Easy enough right? No. The interesting thing about the Costa Rican bus system is that yes, it will take you to where you need to go, however, you never actually know when you get there. So long story short, I found myself in a small town by the name of Cahuita. (marked it on the map.)

The day we arrived was the day we started looking for a place to stay. Its funny how you find yourself in the middle of a place that you have no clue where on a map it even is. Since we had planned to get off the bus in a completely different city things has turned out to be more of an adventure I guess. At any rate, we found a small hostel hidden away in the niches of the rainforest about 100 meters from the beach. It was nice place for what i'm used to, let's be honest, anywhere with a shower is pretty nice to come by, regardless if its hot water or not. Also the beds had mosquito nets, way cool.

After we found our beds, we headed to the beach. We weren't planning on going to any beaches in Panama, so we decided to get as much time in with the Caribbean sun as we could. However, we had no clue what the beach at this random town even looked like. Turns out Cahuita National Park is actually a beautiful place, and yes; the Caribbean Sun had come out to play all day long.

We spent the day at the beach above and it was probably the most relaxing day i've had since I've come to Costa Rica. I chased around sand crabs all day and dove into some crystal clear blue waves to keep cool. Even though the water in this part of Costa Rica is so warm that jumping into it doesn't exactly keep you cool for too long. After finding a few coconuts to snack on and wave or two body surf, we headed in to nap a bit and then go out on the town.

The nightlife at this town was actually half decent. Ok, I guess that sounds a little bad. I meant to say that I had a fun night with my roommate keith. We met some random dudes to speak a little bit of spanish with, (even though speaking it after a few drinks its tricky hah. We got some nachos and then I watched the soccer game from my stool in the bar, trying to make my 2$ beer last as long as it could.

Moving on from Cahuita wasn't so tough, because I had been wanting to go to Panama for quite some time. So we jumped on a bus an headed down to Sixuola.

Critique
------------------------

The total numbers of visitors to Costa Rica's national parks has almost double since 1990, and you can add me to that statistic, because going to Cahuita puts me right into that category, (Estado de la Nacion Informe 10, 2004). I have an awkward group of numbers in the evaluation of Cahuita ranging from 3 to 10. The three is because on this trip, I have no urge to learn about the park, I merely just wanted to enjoy the sun and see the beach. However the location makes up for it, and I also get points for donating to the park as well I would say. Cultural Experience runs a lower number as well because I didn't really have a cultural experience besides spending a night in the town and eating some delicious Caribbean food at a local soda.  

Housing received a heathy 8 points because I could tell that the woman running the small hotel we stayed at was being environmentally savvy. She used energy saving lights and she would leave bananas hanging outside in a tree to feed some of the birds that came around. She also had a local man working for her, and she suggested to give a donation to the park. Human rights gets a perfect score because as I learned in class, the beach is run and operated by the Cahuita community. This brings high scoring for human rights as well as division of labor, because there was also a woman working the stand at the national park. I could not see any division of labor what-so-ever during my stay. 

EVALUATION:
-----------------------------------

Transport: (bus transport) 7
Food: (local soda) 7
Housing: (Eco hotel) 8
Destination: Cahuita 10
Cultural Experience: 5
Education: 3
Environmental Impact: 8
Division of Labor: 8
Human Rights: 10
Indigenous Involvement: 7

Total Points: 71/100

Ecotourist Impact:
Hard-Core Tourist rating C-