A relaxed gathering around 9am after we had eaten breakfast. We had never risen and breakfasted so late throughout the holiday. Before this 7 am had been our latest breakfast time.
The weather looked good when we set off. We walked along the main road to downtown San Jose. The shopping area consisted of multiple cheap shops. We headed initially to the central market which consisted of lots of street food stalls, plus butchers, fishmongers, a few grocers and household and clothes. Nothing that interested any of our party of Jacqui, Sue, Carol, Anne and of course Maggi and myself.
The group then wanted to go to the Artisan Market and I managed to guide us there. What a disappointment? All of what I saw consisted of tat, probably manufactured in China and labelled with Costa Rica signage. Despite my thoughts Anne bought a bunch of very small mugs which looked absolutely useless.
We wandered on to the National Theatre, a 19th Century building right in the heart of the city. When we arrived there wasn’t a seat to be had. The place was full of tourists. We sat separately from the four girls, Anne, Jacqui, Sue and Carol. I ordered a delicious sandwich and a cup of coffee. The waiter recommended a more expensive coffee than I originally chose. I’m glad I accepted his advice. The flavour was stunning, a whole variety of subtle aromas drifted up from the cup, delicious.
Maggi ordered a sandwich to go and I had the 2nd half of my sandwich wrapped to go. We left and found the Pre-Colombian Gold Museum. We wandered around the museum for 90 minutes and found it quite interesting. I didn’t think that the exhibits showed great art but they did reflect the abundance of wildlife in the environment of the indigenous peoples of Costa Rica.
When we emerged from the exhibition we sat in the shelter of the building while we ate our sandwiches. Outside the rain fell. We finished our food and the rain eased a little and we decided to head back to the hotel in our t-shirts and jeans. We dodged from one shelter to another, walked back through the market and out the other side. We stopped at MacDonalds and sat and consumed a drink while we read our books and waited for the rain to stop. It didn’t. We moved on. Eventually we arrived at the final sheltering point. We stood there for 10 minutes hoping that the percipitation would cease. No luck. Then Maggi spotted a discarded umbrella just near. She picked it up. It had no handle and was a bit battered but it worked. We walked on with a little bit of cover and made it back to the hotel.
In the evening we walked around the corner and ate in the Estacion Atocha. An excellent meal. Maggi had a steak and I had a bean stew with bits of bacon. A traditional Spanish dish the waiter recommended it was full of flavour.
We were tucked up in bed by 9 knowing that we had to take a taxi at 5 from the hotel to take us to the airport for our two flights to Seattle.