Burn baby, burn
Today I woke up with the feeling I was under water… Everything sounded muffled, I felt a tad dizzy and just so moist all over. The high humidity here combined with swimming every day seems to have caused a tad bit of a swimmers ear issue for me. Talia drove me down to a Farmacia in town to get antibiotic drops. This town (Quepo) is wild, there are basically all one way streets and general tom-foolery in the roads, signalling is NOT a thing here lol. I had her just drop me at the door and take a lap.
The pharmacist spoke decent English which was a god send, even though I was prepared with Google Translate screenshots of about 10 different ways to say “I have an ear infection” “swimmers ear drops” etc. They game me instant relief. I am not sure if they worked right away but I felt relieved to know that it shouldn’t get much worse, they are not painful yet just WET, far TOO WET.
We had wanted to go to the National Park today but they sell entrance tickets in waves and the only wave avail was for the 1 pm entrance (it closes at 3pm) so we decided to save the park for tomorrow and just hit the beach.
We went to a smaller beach called Eiesanz, it was GORGEOUS! (See photos though it doesn’t really show the full effect) We spent the day swimming, sitting in the shade and soaking up some vitamin D.
I forgot to mention but yesterday I bought a big lifeguard hat so I wore that all day today (even in the water), it was a life saver for my face but sadly by shoulders got toasted. I work lots of sunscreen and reapplied like crazy but I think my time in the water got me. We were all roasted, toasted and grilled… especially Kaya.
Her burn is so patchy from where her legs had sand on them but most of the back of her legs are bright red.
For lunch we went to the restaurant with a view of the National Park, it has a nice breeze and gave us some relief from the intense heat of the day today.
I had a falafel salad, my first truly healthy meal of the trip. I really needed something green in my system. I also had a lemonade with Mint, it seems to be a pretty common drink here and I just love it, I might have to start making these at home.
Back at the hostel we sat at the pool and I tended to my shoulders with aloe. We read and listened to one of the best playlists I have heard in a while. It was all classics like Abba, Elvis, Michael Jackson, etc. It really set the mood, I wish I could have shamazm’ed them all, we knew all the songs but it was just really well put together.
The rain set in at the pool so I went and had a nap in a hammock in the lounge area. The sun zapped us all so we took a beat to regroup. For dinner we went to the supermarket to get groceries and prepared a stir fry. As we cooked and ate there was pretty intense rain and lightning, so cool! This place feels a bit other worldly.
Okay more about the hostel Plinio, its basically like a 3-5 level (weird split levels) tree house feel compound. There is a lounge near reception, hammocks, a pool, restaurant/ bar area, a patio with rooms off it. It is very rustic (no aircon), and wooden with a lot of decorative tapestries and paintings (quotes and flowers). I really like the vibe here, its pretty laid back.
Note from yesterday:
I did some googling on the rows of palm trees we saw on the drive in. So basically the Coast was “explored” by Spanish conquistadors and then after them came the American Fruit Company which established banana plantains. Both had some pretty gnarly treatment of the native Quepo people, not a happy read but super interesting.
A banana disease wiped out the banana plantation in the 1940’s so it was replaced with African palm trees which are still there today!
