Costa Rica - pura vida o puro tourismo?

It is now the fourth day that we spend in Costa Rica. Somehow it feels like being here already for a while, maybe since we have already been staying at three different places: Straight from the airport we went to Alajuela, where we stayed in a very artsy hotel run by a local artist. Streets were filled with vendors, honking cars and motorcycles and lots of people, just like you might imagine the life style in a central american city.

After some internet research, we figured out a bus connection to the small mountain village La Fortuna. 6.50 am was the time to go. Since there is no daylight saving time, sun rises around 5.30 am so everybody seems to be an early bird. Although we new the theoretical departure location of our bus, we got lost between the five or more bus terminals spread out all over the city. Eventually, a friendly bus driver gave us a private ride in his bus to the right terminal - very nice.

Three and a half hours later, we arrived in La Fortuna. At first seeming like a nice, peaceful village at the foot of one of the many volcanos in Costa Rica, this place turned out to be an infernal tourist trap: one (tourist adjusted) adventures offering company lined up after the other, and scaming hoteliers all over the place. Right when we got out of the bus, and I mean right when touching down on the street, an especially eager hostel owner grasped us and would not stop advertising his hotel showing pictures of the great rooms, the breakfast buffet and more extras. He did not understand that we were deciding on our accomodation ourselves. I was already fed up with the place and never really recovered from the general atmosphere lacking any authenticity.

However, an active volcano is something exciting. Proudly presenting: Volcano Paoz! Besides dozens of spas around town using thermal water pumped from the ground, there is a natural hot spring, which is basically a small river heated up to 40 degree celsius (feeling like even more) by a subsurface lava stream. This is marvellous! And people for some reason prefer the artificial hot springs, so it is quiet as well.

Since Paoz has been spitting lawa constantly since its last big erruption in 1969, we went to see the lawa's glow at night. Although we had a clear view - which is not too often the case - the volcano would not want to be too active that night. It would have still been a beautiful experiencel, if the miraculosity of the place would not have been slightly destroyed by vast masses of tourists joining. A constant stream of mini busses arrived at the small spot, where the view to the mountain seemed to be best. I believe most people still liked it.