An unexpected swim, part dos

Yesterday, I took from Gwen's lead by taking to the waters with a camera still attached to me.

I'm in the tiny village of Tortuguera in Costa Rica. The adjacent beach is the nesting place for more than 100,000 green turtles. Viewing them can only occur at night time so during the day, we went out to view the wildlife in the national park located south of the village.

The standard way to do this is with a guide in a canoe, where only the guide is doing the paddling. We wanted to have a bit more fun so with a bit of negotiating, we managed to convince our guide to let us follow him in some kayaks.

Unfortunately, when I got into my kayak and onto the open waters, I lost my balance, and flipped the kayak over, while I had my camera on me. The good news though was the camera was in my bag, which miraculously, kept the water out.

Unfortunately though, the lens in my bag built up some condensation due to the humidity, and upon drying out, has left an inner lens fogged up.

So in short, my camera and 1 lend works. The telephoto is out of commission. :-(

Costa Rica - first impressions

So after a 2 days of travel, I finally landed in San José, the capital of Costa Rica. And based on the airport, it was hard to tell that I had even left the states! It had the same drab 70s metallic look that I assume was designed to look futuristic at the time but seems to always look old and dreary. Sort of like a metallic Barbican :-)

On the streets though, things look a lot different. I'm staying at a Backpackers that's quite central but you wouldn't know it. The streets are deserted with most shops closed although that could be due to siesta. Regardless, the place lacks any charm and for me, seems like a mash between Compton in LA and Havana (without the character).

Tomorrow, we're heading out of town to the only ancient ruins in Costa Rica. They're not grand but hopefully will be interesting. It's rainy season though so hopefully the day won't be ruined by it ;-)