Cartago

Saturday, Jan. 5, 2013--Puerto Viejo to Cartago

Although we enjoyed seeing Puerto Viejo, we were glad to leave there this morning.  It's a nice, casual resort, but there was nothing there to really hold our interest for more days.  We got up early and caught the 7:30 bus to San Jose where we then caught another bus to Cartago, the former capital of the county and a nice, clean city that is easy to explore.

My stomach started bothering me on the trip to San Jose.  At the same time, I noticed that I was burping a lot.  After we arrived at the station, I went to the toilet.  It wasn't diarrhea, but just a lose bowel movement.  My guess is that my stomach was just a bit upset by something (such as the antibiotic my urologist prescribed that I have been taking).  I've been fine the rest of the day.

The guidebook doesn't have a map of Cartago, so we were having to guess where to get off the bus here.  We passed what seemed to be the downtown area and the bus was continuing what seemed to be the edge of town.  We quickly decided to get off.  We rushed to get out bags out of the hold below and started walking back toward the square we had seen.  Half a block away, I realized I had left my backpack in the overhead rack.  The bus was still parked so I rushed for it waving so the driver could see me in his side mirror.  I entered the bus and pulled my backpack out of its place.  At the same time, I heard several people make an "oooo" sound indicating that it would have been bad if they had left and I had lost the bag.  It's so easy when making a quick decision to do something like this.  I've lost my backpack twice before in Bangkok under similar circumstances.  The first time, I went to the police, and the bag was still on the bus at the end of the day (although someone had cut off the ties and gone through it taking a few things while leaving the most valuable to me--camera memory cards, camera charger, etc.),

As far as we have found, there is only one place to stay in Cartago.  It's the Los Angeles Lodge (top floor in photo at link) directly across the street from the National Basilica, a beautiful church dedicated to a statue of a Black Madonna.  It's actually the nicest church I think I have ever visited in Central America.  It’s a pilgrimage site, and all day long people are crawling toward the altar ontheir knees to ask the Black Virgin to heal them or others. At night, the church is lighted and we can see it from the balcony of our hotel.

Besides seeing the Basilica, we walked through Cartago seeing old homes, old public buildings from the colonial period, another square where the ruins of a church destroyed by an earthquake stand, etc.  In the evening we walked to a Walmart that is only 1 km (1/2 mile) away.  There, we bought rolls, ham, chips, and bananas which we brought back to the room to have as our dinner.

Unfortunately, there is a bar below the hotel which is having live music tonight.  We are going to have to sleep with ear plugs.