Neither of us can remember exactly how many years ago we spent a wonderful two-week holiday touring Costa Rica, but today, courtesy of our cruise ship, we spent the day in the Puerto Limon area on the Caribbean coast.

That original trip saw us spend most of our time on the Pacific coast, central valley including San Jose the capital and the area around the Arenal volcano. The two sides seem very different to us.

We spent this morning on a ship-organized excursion called the “Eco-river cruise.” We took a bus through the truly unprepossessing port town of Limon to a canal/river through a mangrove stand to see if we could spot some flora and fauna. We saw a few birds, the rear end of a sloth and some monkeys high up in the trees, but there were no crocodiles in sight. We saw so many the last time we were here. Evidently they are indeed much more common on the west coast.

Overall, it was a bit dull, but it’s always nice to visit a port. We were struck by the fact that if this experience were to be the only introduction that many of these passengers would get to an otherwise wonderful country, they might pass on the chance to return.

The weather is as usual very hot and humid. According to the report this morning, the humidity currently stands at 97% and we have a feel-like temperature of 38 C. Then it rained.

Our recommendations: fly into San Jose and head directly to the Pacific coast to Manuel Antonio Park. The Costa Rica you’ll find there is the Costa Rica you’ll long to return to! Panama Canal transit tomorrow. Cannot wait! (PS having a lot of trouble uploading photos on the satellite feed…more with stories when we get home!)