River Swimming Hole

Thursday, Jan. 10, 2013--Cañas

We were unable to confirm a hotel in Playas del Coco for tonight, so we decided to stay here in Cañas for another day.  With such a good hotel here, we just hated to leave.  

Breakfast was a bit weak, but it was free.  We had a single scrambled egg, white rice and black beans, tortillas, coffee, and juice.  

Our main goal today was to go 4 1/2 km (2.7 miles) north of town to the Rio Corobici.  We left around 10:00 and it took an hour to get there in bright sunshine and heat.  What a nice place it was, though.  It was a slow moving river with large rocks along the shore and shade trees overhead.  A rather strong wind made it cool and pleasant.  The highway bridge was one of the old-fashioned kind with the overhead metal framework.  Just past the bridge, a woman was doing her laundry on rocks while a man was bathing.  Later, 6 boys arrived and swam in an area just to our right.  We sat in the shade watching them as they dove into the water, chased each other in it, wrestled in it, etc.  It was a bucolic experience.  We stayed there for 2 1/2 hours just letting the world turn while we relaxed.

It was 13:30 when we left, so the day was even hotter.  Fortunately, after only a 10-minute walk down the highway, a farmer in an SUV slowed and asked where we were going.  When I said, "Cañas," he motioned for us to jump in.  We were back in town 6 minutes later rather than having walked in the heat for another 50 minutes.  

After drinking cola in the room under the air-conditioning, we went to our swimming pool at the hotel and cooled down in the water there.  Then we headed to town where we had dinner at the same restaurant where we ate yesterday.  Today, we had chicken in a sauce with oranges, rice, brown beans, cabbage salad, and fettuccine along with tamerindo juice.  Then we wandered town, watched the skateboarders for a while, stopped at a supermarket, and returned to the hotel.