Visit to Puntarenas

On Sunday, we went for a day trip to the port of Puntarenas with our friends, Francisco and Griciela. Puntarenas was first found (by a European) in 1519 when Ponce De Leon, on his quest for the Fountain of Youth, chanced upon it. At one time, before the advent of big trucks that emit a lot of black smoke and slow down travel on the winding ascents and descents, a railway system ran from the sugar cane fields (which when fermented results in the National drink of Costa Rica "guaro" that really packs a punch, but I digress) of Costa Rica to the city. We took the bus from San Ramón ($5.00 return). Even though it is only a 35 km journey, it takes about 75 minutes due to the aforementioned highway obstacles.
Now, Puntarenas is a stop for Cruise Ships and hordes of passengers who spend the day purchasing the wares of hundreds of vendors packed along the beach walkway. On Sunday, there was nary a cruise ship in sight. Consequently, the beach was the domain of Turistas Nacionales- Ticos and their families with bbq's, coolers in the shade, tents for shade, eye shades, sun shade-but no shady characters. Shade was imperative as it was about 40% in the sun. A bonus to no visiting maritime hotels is that the dock is open to the public for promenading, fishing and gazing. We saw a fever of Manta Rays. I weighed the option of passing on a warning to those swimming by the shore; however, given my well documented limitations with Spanish, I did not want to run the risk of anyone causing damage to them as they are an endangered species (and, there were those bbq's nearby).
We chose to forego the shade and walked for about three hours, along the entire tourist sea wall, past the Ferry Terminal that transports people and vehicles to the wonderful beaches of the Nicoya Peninsula, through the side streets and barrios and back to the bus station. It was a great day filled with new, but not really cool, adventures.