I Headed South

Which Way to Go? If undertaking a life lived on the road, you have to look around where you find yourself then sometime later it beggars the question ''Where you want to go next?''. That's more difficult than it sounds, for as Oblio explained "Everywhere you go, there you are". Like the Scarecrow said to Dorothy in The Wizard Of Oz...

''Which Way? Which Way?''

I''m getting ahead of myself, so Long Story Short ... when both my marriage and my career ''Went South'' near simultaneously while I lived long term in the ''El Norte'' towns of Coeur d'Alene, Idaho and Spokane, Washington I took a modest pension (earned from working my ''last'' job for about 20 yrs) and settled my affairs, selling my car, paying off Bills and giving away the larger and less moveable of my possessions to friends. With a backpack, a passport and a debit card I caught a flyer to Guatemala to meet with my friend and online Travel Guru, Andy Graham, The Hobotraveler. In Antigua, Guatemala he introduced me to two other Travel Bloggers, Wade Shepard of Vagabond Journey and his friend Mira of Lady The Tramp. Three Cool people, to be assured. Andy, The Hobotraveler had graciously offered to show me the ''ropes'' the ins-and-outs of travel in the 3rd World. ''Guatemala is a good place to start'', said Andy and as he really the bonafides, I came to give him my attention. School was in session. Much informal intense classwork, like "Don't carry your wallet'', ''Carry a padlock'', ''Don't eat that'' and ''Learning to ride Chicken Buses solo with diarrhea while delirious and disoriented". Inspection was a daily event -- ''Where's your toilet paper''. Andy did me a favor! I have to thank him for the much-needed dose of reality and I'm trying to repay the favor here and there to others on the road.

I somehow became the enamorata of Maria "Mane'' Elena, a volatile Chilena massage therapist/psychologist-hypnotist and before I knew it I was on the road (and probably hypnotized), leaving lake town Panajachel, Guatemala where I had settled for a couple weeks in Isla Utila in the Honduran Caribe. After Mucho On Agains/Off Agains we took the ferry back to the mainland and bused back thru Honduras, then Nicaragua to light in Costa Rica for awhile. Tamarindo, a touristy beach town (mostly Argentinian and Italian - Gringo's coming in 3rd place, ahead of the French) became our home for about a month, where we took side trips to see giant sea turtles, give each other massages, walk on white talcum powdered coral sand beaches and generally work on our tans. My novia (girlfriend) after several months recently flew back to Santiago, Chile to bus on to her home in Capilla del Monte, Argentina and I once again find myself solo, Claro (unattached), a strange disattached feeling. I'm better for the experiences and my life taken up on the road.

I've currently staying in the excellent MiCasa Hostel in San Jose, the capital of Costa Rica for a month or two more now (that brings me up to about 3 months here, including Tamarindo and means I'll have to do a 72 hr Visa Run to a neighboring country during my habitacion here) until my travel and living expenses are in shape to reside in my next country. I have to replace a laptop and camera, which rolled away in a 3-wheel TukTuk taxi back in Panajachel and I've learned that's cheaper in Panama. In order to do that I'm to meet at the Teatro Nacional (The national Opera House) today at noon to see a $130/month room in a shared house to cut my expenses in half once again. Nice to keep ones standard-of-living (whatever that is) while increasingly paring back expenses. I'm picking up conversational Spanish along the way and will get back to classroom study once in Panama I figure, if not here in Costa Rica. It's really indispensible for a traveler to speak the local language and I find myself becoming increasingly fluent in Spanish.