Got up to a muggy morning and took the dog and the Dad to the beach for a quick surf.  Caly and Dad played stick, when the two other dogs would let them.  I surfed.

The water was glassy and clean, the waves were waist to chest high, and three good friends were in the water with me.  It wasn't perfect, but it was wonderful.

Back to the house too soon with a sandy mutt and a smile on my face, now I'm sitting here checking in on my vehicle with the Registro Nacional- hoping that all is clear so we can start driving soon.  No luck as of 8:30 AM, but maybe later....

Still have a few things to pack up, but otherwise pretty close to ready to roll.  Feeling a lot of mixed feelings-  excited for the journey, sorry to leave the place I love so much, excited to go to a new place I love.

Labels: land cruiser, tamarindo

Long day, but I think that it was pretty typical of how things go squirrely here and some of the beauty of living in Costa Rica.

I got up around sunrise to get an early start on the day and get a long list of things done.  After making sure that I had the tools and junk that I thought I would need for the day, I loaded up the car and hit the road...

It took me nearly ten minutes to realize that I had forgotten my coffee.   Dangit!   I did not want to take the 20 or so minutes round-trip to go get it, but knew that it was going to be a rough morning without.  Ah, well, such is life.

I arrived in Liberia after an uneventful 80 minute drive into the rising sun, and was sitting at the Revision Technica Gate when they opened for the morning.  I need to do a 'voluntary' annual inspection in order to straighten my vehicle paperwork.  The annual inspection is widely regarded as being slightly better than a dental exam, in terms of overall pleasure.  So there I was, smiling and friendly, chatting with the Person Behind the Glass Divider to get my place in line.  I was extra friendly and nice because I knew that I did not have an appointment (none available until end-of-month) and was thus at the mercy of said Person Behind the Glass Divider.  I knew that the no-appointment detail was unfortunate, but when I had spoken to the Person On the Phone yesterday, she told me that no-appointment status would take longer but was not a problem.

It was a problem.  In Liberia there is no provision for no-appointment status. You simply can't do it.  Would have been good information *before* driving all the way there!    Since the Phone Person was so wrong on the no-appointment status, I decided to ask the Behind the Glass Person to check for available appointments this week.  Pure genius on my part.  There *is* an available appointment.  Tomorrow (Saturday) in Nicoya, which is only an hour from my house.  Disco.

Slightly frustrated by my failure, but buoyed by my potential success on Saturday, I proceeded to the turbo mechanic.  The nice folks at Laboratorio Turbo Diesel are becoming friends of mine.  I see them twice a week this month.   After fully rebuilding my injectors, and accidentally giving me the wrong seats, which required removing/replacing the injectors not once, but twice;  then fully rebuilding my turbo, and not having a correct gasket which required a little fiddling, we were still right back as square one-  my turbo was only producing 5lb of boost when it should give 13.6psi.

It was a head-scratcher, but we rather assumed that the problem was the turbo wastegate, which they did not specifically remember testing when they had the turbo on the bench.  Too bad, the wastegate is pretty well hidden between the turbo housing and the motor and is thus a certified pain in the ass to access without pulling the manifold and turbo off of the vehicle (which is also a PITA, but at least it can be done whereas accessing the wastegate on-vehicle is closer to impossible).

I left the truck in their happy hands and went off in search of coffee.  I was pleased to eat at the bus station for the second time in a week (not sure about the 'States, but in CR, some of the best cheap food is always at public transit hubs: cheap and delicious).   The gallo pinto was fabulous, the coffee strong and hot, and my scrambled eggs with tomato were appropriately scrambled and tomato'ed.  The hand-made tortilla on the side could not be improved upon. 

After thoroughly enjoying my chow and watching the comings and goings of people at the bus station, I packed up and got ready to run some other errands.   Just then I got a call from the LTD guys-  they needed my ignition key to test the turbo.  "Waitaminute.  You've already re-installed it?"    "Yep".   

Now I'm worried.  There's no way that anyone short of a top-flight race mechanic on amphetamines could pull, troubleshoot, and install a turbo in the time it took me to eat my breakfast, it just isn't possible.  But instead of argue with the Office Guy on the phone, I walked back to the shop.  Sure enough, they hadn't pulled/fixed/replaced anything, but just needed to run the engine to trouble-shoot.  Okay.  No worries.  Here's the key, my bad for taking it (habit).

With that done, I walked back into town in the now-rising heat.   I walked to the bank.  Quick non chronological plot development:  Between the RTV and the LTD, I drove out to the COSEVI (similar to the US DMV, in a very broad sense of the word "similar") to see what need be done to renew my soon-to-expire CR driver's license.  Part of the process is to pay 10,000 colones ($20) at the bank and get a receipt.  In typical Costa Rican urban planning, the nearest bank is 10 or so miles away from the COSEVI office.  So I headed into town and here we catch the previous thread of our story....

In the bank I had number 110, number 74 was at the window.  There were eight windows with six of them staffed.  Quick mental math told me "Leave.  Come back later."  Which is precisely what I did.

I walked further into town to find a part for a neighbor.  That is it's own saga and I'll save the story for another day, but it involves many, many phone calls and several visits to Liberia to get a part fixed.  The part was never fixed at all, despite them having said that it was,  and we are back to square one.  Ridiculous.  Typical.

With no progress there, I walked back to the bank.  Not having a car is good exercise.  But hot.

In the bank again (nearly 45 minutes later) they were serving number 97, but there were only five tellers now.  Still, there was AC, so I opted to wait vs. head out to do other errands.   I enjoyed watching a four-year old boy who was playing soccer between the waiting-area chairs and the tellers.  He had a little 4" rubber ball and was aiming at I-don't-know-what, but it involved hitting the backs of complete strangers' legs.  Pay attention: this is one of the things that makes Costa Rica AWESOME:  each time the ball would carom off of a wall and into someone, the Someone would usually look around for the offending object, smile, and kick it back to the young boy. 

Can you imagine what would happen in most places?!?!    I saw this little miracle of getting along played out a dozen times and was impressed by the gentleness and kindness of the people each time.  Children are sacred in Costa Rica.

Eventually a little girl got in on the action, playing with the little boy, and the assault on people doing business came to an end.  The parents?  I don't know who they may have been.  Various adults got involved at various points, but nobody seems to have been in charge.  If I were more energetic, I would tie this story together and better illustrate the metaphor that this experience is for living in Costa Rica.   Maybe in my novel someday.

SNAP: back to reality. The only reason I got to enjoy this heartwarming spectacle is that in order to execute a very simple transaction (pay $20 to the COSEVI to renew my license) I had spent 40 minutes sitting at the bank after a 45 minute walk around two while waiting for my number to come up.

My take-a-number-and-wait ticket said 9:08am.  I walked out at 10:56am and was back on the now-stultifyingly hot street.   TAXI!!!  

I jumped into a nice, new taxi with a big stinky driver.  On the ten minute drive to the COSEVI I asked him about why his meter wasn't running.... and got a mumbled, invented response.  We arrived safely and he extorted too much for the fare.  I talked him down some, but still got a bad deal.  Such is life.

I got an even worse deal from the little "medical exam" place across the street from COSEVI.  See, to get your license renewed, you have to have a doctor (nurse?  quack?) fill out a form that assures that you are alive, and have enough limbs and digits to operate a vehicle.  After checking my blood pressure, height and weight (I didn't write down the bp, but I think that there were numbers like 70 130/XX involved? I'm at the same 66kg that I've occupied for nearly 20 years and unfortunately I'm still 1,70 short with my shoes on)  she asked me for my blood type (A+, I knew, because I had called my mother to check) and if I had any ailments.  That was the "exam".  Oh, wait, she also asked me if I could read aloud a poster that was part way across the room, I could, which was apparently good enough for her.  15,000 colones ($30) and I was on my way.  Complete ripoff.   

I got to COSEVI and the nice guard person behind the desk (GPBD) shepherded me into the inner building.  He and I had talked earlier (remember the non-chronological twist a few paragraphs ago?) and he was very upset then that my driver's license number did not match my residence ID number.  One thing that Costa Rica does well vs. the USA is that they try very hard to have all of your ID numbers *match*.  It makes book keeping much easier for all parties.  In comparison, my recently renewed USA  passport number is totally different than my original passport number and also different than my CA driver's license and my Social Security number.  My library card is different still, but that's ok, I don't go to the library much anyway.  Side to my aside:  you can't even imagine how inconvenient the change of passport number is, in a country where your ID number is yours from birth till death.  It is inconvenient.  

So GPBD was in a little bit of a tizzy because the numbers were different and took it upon himself to Make Things Right.  Which was just plain fantastic for me as I vaulted ahead of twelve other people in line, and instead of trying to talk through a 1" hole in the glass, I got to actually enter the office of the Person With the Computer.  PWC and GPBD had a conversation that couldn't have been more inane, yet amusing, as he explained the situation, she repeated it, he confirmed it, she repeated it to me, I confirmed it with GPBD butting in to confirm my confirmation, then some sighs and literal head scratching, then finally PWC opened one screen, changed the license number to match my ID number, and this massive problem was instantly vaporized.  Ten minutes of 'work' for ten seconds of actually fixing the 'problem'.    But, hey, I was in the air conditioned inner sanctum under the protective wing of GPBD, so ten minutes watching other people sweating in 100*+ heat while my problem was solved... didn't seem so bad.

GPBD's kindness didn't end there. Perhaps he thought I needed special care after the perilous non-matching-numbers episode.  I don't know.  Maybe it was my winning smile?   He took me from PWC to another Person with a Camera and Computer.   I was genuinely impressed that PWCC managed to snap my photo, take my digital fingerprint, and get me to sign a little digital thingy all while speaking in a voice that I doubt even *he* could hear, inside his own head.  Nice fellow, but boy it would help if he could speak up a little.  At least the stuff I had to do was relatively self explanatory.

Maybe this is commonplace in some places, but the next part wowed me:  the machine next to PWCC's computer and camera started whirring and clanking.  It sounded like a sewing machine was mating with a VW bug.  Less than a minute later, a minute filled with Mr. Quiet's lips moving but no way in this earth I could even hear his whisper, let alone understand him, and 'click', my new ID spits out of the machine.  All done.  Nifty!  I signed a little book of his stating that I have my new ID, and I was off again- back into the now *painful* 106* full midday sun heat.   I stopped to show GBPD my new license (correct number) and he seemed touched by my thoughtfulness.  I imagine most people just walk on by.  Poor guy.

Sweating through my shirt after just walking across the street, I took a seat under the shade of the bus stop, and awaited a bus.   After a few minutes,  a cabbie was pulling out and gave me a "What's Up?" gesture.  Sort of a palm upturned with shoulder shrug thing.  Very common here.   He then point towards Liberia.  I rubbed my fingers with my thumb in what I believe to be a more-or-less universal "money" gesture, and he showed me five fingers.  I thumbs-upped him, he drove across the street and stopped.  Still stinging from my earlier cabbie experience, I confirmed 500 colones to get to Liberia.  He said yes, I happily entered the meat-locker cold of his taxi and we were on the way.  He smelled nice, like inexpensive soap.   This was an entirely more pleasant taxi experience and 20% of the cost of the "To" trip.  Happiness reigned.

I got back to my truck (and was immediately drenched in sweat again- 105 with humidity just isn't fair) to find that they had made some progress in that they determined that the turbo was functioning perfectly.  Being a turbo-repair place, they couldn't help but say that with a hint of smug.  After a few more test drives (one without the exhaust in place, wow, that does make a difference on noise and power) we determined the problem:  the fuel filter holder leaks air into the fuel line at a fitting. 

Let me recap the basic situation here:  I've just spent $1,000 on major repair items, as well as about a week of my own time doing the labor for 90% of the repair, only to discover that a $35 fuel filter housing needs to be replaced- about a 1-hr job if you move slowly.    Happiness's reign had ended.  

While they buttoned up the exhaust and removed the old fuel filter housing, I walked (and perspired, a lot) the two blocks to get a new housing.  Along the way, just for giggles, I stopped at the Toyota dealer to find out what Toyota wants for a new housing.  A mere $228 for the housing and filter and water sensor, and it'll take 24 hours to arrive.   At least I got a delicious cup of coffee along with my comedy relief.  I walked another block to the parts store and paid $34 for the housing and a new filter.  I also got some hose, in case you were worried.  And some clamps gotta have clamps.

Israel, the mechanic at LTD, and I put the new filter in, which required drilling some holes, but that only took a little while.  Then took the truck for a spin.  Wooo-hooo!!  Power.  Power like this truck has never shown before.  Plenty of boost, and a whole new driving experience.  The turbo and injector repairs, while not necessarily the cause of what had gotten me into the shop in the first place, have re-awakened this old diesel motor.  I'm very pleased!

My being pleased didn't stop there, however, when I asked the guys at LTD what I owed them for them having put 1 and 1/2 guys on my truck from before 9a.m. until after 3p.m.  they said "Well, you paid for the filter, right?"  I said yes.  "Ok.  Thanks for your business, we're sorry it didn't work for you the first time.  No charge."   Now very very pleased, I left Liberia for the drive home, passing at every opportunity, just to enjoy the surge of power.   I should re-iterate that the fuel filter was in no way their fault/bad call or anything, yet they appreciated my laid-back tolerance of their minor mistakes on the other stuff, and thus I got a nice freebie out of it.  That's sort of how it is supposed to work here--  a lesson that is hard to learn, sometimes.

Unfortunately, the little rubber connector on my boost gauge tore while I was driving home.  Perhaps too much manipulation during the various repairs.  So I didn't get to enjoy watching the gauge zoom up to 13psi, but still wasted a lot of fuel charging up every hill available. 

I also have to reset my idle setting.  The lack of air in the fuel stream means that the injection pump is slighly overfueled now.

I got home before sunset, stopping along the way to pick up some more supplies.  Still joyful, I grabbed the mutt and we had a nice romp on the beach, with a swim.  After that I took my sandy self to a local cafe to deliver some stuff I had picked up on the way home, and enjoyed a nice martini on the outdoor patio, with sand on my toes and the dog happily greeting each customer who came through.  Deposed Happiness leapt sprightly to the throne again.

After a martini, I took us to Sharky's for a burger and beer (where I bumped into some friends and enjoyed a great conversation, and another beer), before finally heading home and into bed, exhausted.

Just a typical day here in what isn't always, but always could be, Paradise.

Labels: Costa Rica, dog, land cruiser, liberia, repair, tamarindo, weather

Nothing gets you up on the roof faster than realizing that the first "real" rain of the season might be starting, and that there are six months worth of dead leaves filling your gutters.  

My first reaction when the pitter-patter began was to head out to our lovely outdoor patio upstairs to watch the sunset and storm interact over the estuary.  Light, flowing trees, gentle breezes, gray clouds, and zephyrs... OHCRAP!   The roof is probably covered in leaves!

Out comes the ladder, and up I went.  Sure enough, the leaves were nearly a foot thick in some places (our gutters are less than 6" deep). 

So far, the rain hasn't arrived with any force, just gentle droplets that more-or-less evaporate without flowing.  But at least there are mostly-clean gutters into which all the droplets can flow if their buddies decide to make a party of it tonight. 

And there is one less thing on my list of things to do.  Double-bonus.

Labels: house, tamarindo, weather

It was over 100*F in Tamarindo today (nearly 40*C).   I, however, spent the hot part of the day in Liberia, where it was 41*C in the shade at nearly 5pm.  That's 106*F, folks.  Hot.   Damn hot.

Oddly for this time of year, it is also windy.  Which is great comfort as the wind, at least, helps make the heat a little more bearable.  My plants don't agree.  They seem to think that the wind and heat is a good excuse to shrivel up and die.  

Labels: Costa Rica, tamarindo, weather

I really like the sound of parakeets squabbling in the tree outside my window.

I'm not so fond of the sound of doves.  It's just so... repetitive.
And the sounds of pigeons mating?   Hate it.  Flap flap flap.  Arrg. 


That's all.  Thanks for stopping by.

Labels: bird, tamarindo

Sometimes, when you spend a lot of time  doing preventative maintenance on a vehicle, you can't help but feel as if you may have wasted much of that time.  The job in question could have waited, right?  Maybe a long time?

On the other end of the spectrum-  I pulled my fuel injectors today to discover that they were horrid.
I've shipped them off to be rebuilt, hopefully by Monday, and can't wait to install them again and feel the difference in performance, I predict a very noticeable gain in mileage and power with less noise, less sooty exhaust, and a smoother ride.

Of course, much of the other stuff I worked on could probably have waited a long time.  Such is life.

here are "before" pictures of the injectors. The photographic quality is not excellent, I was in a hurry.

Labels: land cruiser, repair, tamarindo

We are a little surprised that the howler monkeys are still around...  they spent the morning lounging and nibbling leaves.  One came over to check out our bedroom patio, leaving behind a nasty momento and greatly ruffling the dog's composure, but otherwise innocuous.

Eventually we cruised next door to watch from our neighbor's better vantage point and had a great time inventing stories to describe the troop's behavior.   Of the 13 monkeys, we think that we identified the alpha male- other than his absurdly large and dangly bits, we also figured that his general attitude could only be described as "in charge".  There is an infant that was being cared for by what we think is an "aunt", because one of the other females looks much more like a nursing mother with a still-distended belly that could be from a recent birth.

When the "aunt" tried to hand the baby over to the female that we think is the mother, "mom" scurried away and went back to sleep, covering her bosom.   Her actions left us wondering what could be going on.

There was a minor tussle at one point, with one monkey walking up to another who was feeding and giving her a good verbal dressing-down.  The 'victim' ran off to a third monkey, who then went over to the first monkey and told her off.  In the mean time a male moved in between the first two and sat there scratching his butt, perhaps to say "Hey, you two.... settle down."  At least that is how we imagined the conversation to have gone.

Perhaps the most notable part was that a single male was sitting lower and apart from everyone else, once in a while the two other males would hoot and grunt in his general direction, at which point he would look away with what we imagined was a very sad look on his face.  We think that maybe he was either getting cut out of the troop or perhaps just failing to join.  Hard to tell.  As the day wore on he was further from the rest and around midday he seemed to have left to go off on his own.  Such drama.

Labels: Costa Rica, dog, garden, monkey, photo, tamarindo

Right around sunset we were doing some yardwork when a troop of about 9 Howler Monkeys cruised through out neighbor's yard, onto our fence (just about eye level, less than 3 feet away from us) then up into the neighbor's trees for a nice snack of tasty fresh leaves.

It amazes me that after nearly ten years of watching those beasties, I'm still totally fascinated by them.  They are just so amazingly....  primate.  How people can possibly persist in the disbelief of evolution, confronted with the intelligent stare of a monkey, is beyond me.   But that's another discussion.

Back to the antics of the Howlers.  They strolled through the trees, working their way to or back yard, munching on fresh bugs and blossoms while grunting and squeeking at each other.

We had made plans to have a small bonfire in the back yard and I worried a little that the fire/smoke would bother them, but it didn't seem to do so as at least one was in a tree almost directly overhead throughout the evening.

We watched a spectacular moonrise as little puffy clouds organized themselves into what looked like ripples on the sand at the beach.

This morning my love of the Howlers waned as their guttural screams greeted the first rays of dawn.  If you've never been awakened by a large howler monkey less than 10 feet from your window, I won't be able to describe for you the mix of terror and annoyance that you feel as your heart rate slows and your sluggish pre-dawn brain remembers that "It's just a monkey". 

And so we start another week...

Labels: monkey, photo, tamarindo, weather

Sure is windy around these parts right now.

The beach was spectacular this morning-- wind swept, perfectly clean and neat, hardly a footprint to be seen.  At low tide we stood with our feet in the cold (for us) water and felt the sting of the sand on our back while playing with a deliriously happy dog.  Funny how sometimes a beach trip will make her happy, but other days it makes her HAPPY.  I suppose that we all do the same sort of thing, at some point.

I was frustrated to see people watering the street this morning.  For those of you who don't live in dusty 3rd world countries, around these parts some folks waste a bunch of (evermore precious) water by spraying it onto the gravel/dust road in front of their home or business.  The thought process appears to be that by wetting the ground, one reduces the dust created by cars driving by.   I'm sure it works.  Absolutely certain.  For the first hour or so, I'll bet that almost no dust is created in the area thus wetted.

But most folks only wet the area right in front of "their" space.   So dust is still kicking up from either side of the moist patch.  And it is WIIIINDY right now, like up to 50mph gusts.   The wind is kickind up dust from all over the province and moving it kilometers in various directions.  How much does 10 meters of road matter?   Finally- the same wind and the tropical sun dry out the moist patch within an hour...

I suggest that these same folks would get a lot more relief by planting a hedge or some trees in their area and watering those instead of the street.  It would lend some shade and knock down the wind a little, as well as providing a host of other aesthetic and environmental benefits.

Some day, when I'm supreme ruler of of everything, this watering the road business is going to stop, dangit.

Till then, I'll just try to enjoy the wind storm for its howling fury and hope that nothing big falls on anything expensive around here.

Labels: Costa Rica, tamarindo, weather

We awoke early on the first of January... about 5:30, but after listening to fireworks, barking dogs, drunken revelry, and various other noises, 5:30 seemed very early.

We grabbed coffee, dog, and the camera and headed to Langosta Beach to welcome the first sunrise of 2010. We were lucky enough to watch the full moon disappear into the Pacific at about the same time, it was beautiful.

Steve caught what was almost certainly the first wave of the year in Langosta (and Sapo, too). Unless someone was full-moon surfing, that is. Which would have been a pretty cool idea, but probably not such a safe thing to do in Langy. The surf was decent and Steve enjoyed it. While he was doing that, Bb and the dog were doing yoga (and doga?) and playing with sticks and plastic bottles on a nearly-empty beach. It was an idyllic way to start the year.

After a nap, Bb had to do some jewelry work while Steve went next door to enjoy a rum and gingerale with the neighbors. Ginger beer would have been even better, but you gotta do what you can with what you've got, sometimes. It was a hot day- over 100 in the sun, but sitting in a breezy (windy!) patio in the shade talking with friends was just about perfect.

We finished off the day with a bbq and a few more glasses of cheer, then came home to sleep soundly, looking forward to the weekend (also, a great way to start a new year!).

Labels: 4wd, 4x4, beach, Costa Rica, dog, photo, tamarindo, weather

"Let's run down to the beach for a few minutes".

Seems like such an innocuous phrase.   An hour later, in mud up to my knees, hopelessly mired in who-knows-how-many feet of clay I found myself thinking, "Maybe we should have chosen a different route."

Mea Culpa.  There, that's out of the way.  Nobody to blame but myself.  I drove the truck into a mud pit, we lost traction, got stuck.

If you're satisfied with my admission of guilt, stop reading now, because I'm going to offer some excuses as to why I did what I did (and some thanks to those who participated with a smile and those who ultimately saved our bacon).

Before I go further, I'd like to share this image   <------
It was taken in the almost the exact spot where we got stuck last weekend.  The difference is that this image was taken back in the *wet season*, when you expect mud (notice the water, and thus, mud).

I drove over the same spot in the *dry season*, expecting that the mud would be less of a problem.   As it turns out, instead of muddy ground, it had turned into a clay pit without a bottom.  If you want to get into pottery, this is the stuff you want.  Nothing but slippery, slimy, clay.  Wonderful.  But not so much wonderful for driving a car on it.  No-sir-ree.  In fact, not so much good at all.

But I can't even blame the clay (completely) because while we were stuck there digging around trying to free ourselves it was brought to my attention by my long-suffering and utterly wonderful wife that there was a route through the middle of the clay muck that was a little bit higher and a lot firmer than the lower and softer goo through which I foolishly tried to drive.  I'm going to blame a lack of seeing clearly through the dirty windshield and the 8am sunshine, but probably it was a lack of taking sufficient time to really look at where I was going.

After spending some time with logs and sticks and shovels and mud and airing down tires (which isn't so easy to do when the tire is mostly underneath the mud), I accepted the obvious truth that we were good and mired.   Fortunately we were good and mired within a mile or two of home, and had cellphone coverage.   I called our pal Donny, who drove down and with minimal effort, pulled us out.  Amazing what a difference it makes to have a few tons of Land Cruiser tugging on a vehicle.   If I haven't said it recently:  the best recovery device is still.... another vehicle!

Quick side note:  Bb was pretty bummed that we were stuck, as she just wanted some beach time.  But within a few minutes, she and the pooch were playing fetch along a really pretty stretch of a nice little jungle road, enjoying cool morning breezes and the sights and sounds of nature.  I'm a fortunate fellow to have such a wonderful spouse.   The dog, incidentally, thought that the whole experience was peachy-keen.  "Play in the mud?  And a creek?"  "Okay!!"   "Wait, now we're going to the beach too?"   "Okay!!"   "Oh, back home for a shower and a swim in the pool?"  "Okay!!"

Oh, to be a dog. 

Once unstuck (thanks again, Donny), we proceeded down a different (grassy, not muddy) back route to get to Playa Avellanas.   It was a postcard-perfect day, we played with the dog, swam in the estuary, rolled in the surf, and washed away the mud and any worries that may have lingered.


I then spent an hour with a pressure washer trying to get most (not all) of the mud off of the bottom of the truck.  Wow.  Must have had 100lbs of that stuff gunked onto and into every possible nook and cranny below the body.  Impressive.

As it turns out, getting stuck where we were was a blessing:  the following day we went horseback riding along the same route and saw that there were at least two subsequent mudholes that would have been much more difficult to drive through and much more of a serious problem to get out of.  Not to mention that anyone coming to help would have had to negotiate the difficult spot in which we were stuck in order to get to the even-more-difficult holes later on.

Clearly the reason we got stuck where we did was an amazing act of prognostication on my part.





See: That's how good I am.

Labels: 4wd, 4x4, avellanas, day trip, dog, land cruiser, mud, photo, tamarindo

Got up slowly, for the first time in a long time, and watched the morning develop outside the window while enjoying a little air conditioning (more for noise abatement than for cold, the mornings have been lovely).

Threw the board on the rack and the dog in the back and cruised down to Tamarindo Rivermouth to catch some overhead waves with offshore winds.  Good surf, and darn fun despite the brief and painful longboard-nose incident.   No permanent damage to either part.

The slightly crowded beach (for here) gives me hope for a little micro-scale economic recovery, which is welcome.

Back to the house to do some yard maintenance, hand watering the yard on a windy, sunny day might not do much for the plants, but it feels good for the person doing the watering.

Baked a few loaves of bread, made some marinated cherry tomatoes and eventually cooked the pork roast that has been marinating for the better part of a week.   Jocelyn whipped up some yucca/sweet potato "mashed potatoes" that were wonderful, as well as an arugula and peccorino salad.  We enjoyed some delicious Zin brought by Ben last month, while cooking, then a little more of the same while eating. 

We dined by candlelight under the stars, on the pool deck, enjoying the evening breezes and an intermittent meteor shower to the southwest.   Eventually we turned out the lights, extinguished the candles and struggled through a losing battle with sleeping vs. star-gazing while enjoying some dark chocolate and a little more of that bottle of Zin.

Labels: food, tamarindo, weather

Finally got my roof rack re-installed yesterday, took much longer than it should have to prep it, and also too long to just plain get it installed. Sharp drill bits work much better than dull drill bits.  Drilling 1/4" steel is time consuming, even with sharp bits, especially when you mis-measure 6 of 12 holes and have to redo them. Jocelyn was a super star, lifting sun-heated metal overhead on a hot day is unpleasant work but she helped immensely, taking the rack back off, then re-drilling, then putting back on was a drag.

With the rack finally in place, we figured "hey, lets take a spin over to the hill behind the estuary to snap a photo and enjoy an afternoon beverage".   The hill is only about a mile away, nice n easy, no worries.

As this is the very beginning of the dry season, there are many wildflowers on the roadside, choking  the roadway... no worries, just stay in the middle and drive on up.  Sure, the road has a few little ruts, 4wd, onward and upward...   we jog this road all the time, nothing to see here.

Um...

Why did we suddenly shift 2 feet to the right and are now sitting at 45 degrees with two wheels spinning in the air?   This isn't the way it is supposed to work.

Stuck.   Totally and completely.  What we couldn't see for the shrubbery is that along the right side of the road, a ditch very suddenly forms-  within a car length it goes from 12" deep and 36" wide, to suddenly 4 or 5 feet deep (no exaggeration) and 18" wide.    I was resting on both axles, the front passenger side fender, and one rear tire.  Nothing else.   Great.

I tried reversing out, you never know, right?  But didn't even have enough traction to notice a change.  Ok.   So be it.   I jumped (literally) down out of the driver's seat and finally convinced Jocelyn to climb over and jump out too.  She was (not without some reason) worried that climbing around might upset the balance of the truck and topple it.  I *said* it was impossible, but truth is that I was wondering how much further the truck could tip without flopping.  At least it fell into the ditch on the uphill part of the road.  I guess that's good.  Still, I preferred it didn't flop all the way onto its side.  That would complicate the extraction.

For sure it was good that we were less than a mile from home.  We trotted back and borrowed a neighbor's 4Runner, grabbed my hilift out of the garage, and a 5ftx8" log that was in the garage as well.  

To minimize potential damage to the 4Runner's IFS front end, I reversed up to where we were stuck.  That alone would have been nearly impossible without Jocelyn's very able spotting. 

Remember, I was in 4wd on the lifted Cruiser on 33's to get to where we were stuck, driving up in reverse in a stock 4runner on 31s was....  slow.  Of course I was also hyper-aware of not getting near the sides of the road (and potential invisible ditches).

Got to the Cruiser and wedged the log under the rear tire to act as a ramp out of the ditch. Hooked up the strap (factory tow points on the 4runner could be improved) and Jocelyn jumped behind the wheel.  I clambored up into the Cruiser thinking, "Ok, this'll be over quickly."

She starts driving down hill, in low, reaches the end of the strap, I'm ready for the jolt....

Nothing.  Just spinning tires on the 4Runner.  Not even so much as a shudder on the Cruiser.  Not so good.    "Ok, back it up, try it again, give it a little gusto!"   She hits the end of the strap going .... 5mph?  ...  Nothing.  I can barely feel the Cruiser move when she hits the end.  No chance that we are pulling it out this way.   We did try two or three more times, but didn't want to hit it hard because the front fender was resting on the bank and I didn't want to leave it there.

Jocelyn (wisely) suggested that we dig out the bank a little bit, so I broke out the shovel and the Max-Ax (with shovel) and started digging.  Side note:  the Max is super-versatile, but like most "does everything" tools, it is not the ideal solution for any given job, in this case, digging.  It is very heavy and the ax head is unwieldy. But it sure beats using branches or bare hands.

We dug for a while, and realized the extent of how badly stuck the truck really was.  It was pretty bad.  Front tire was in midair in a 4-5ft ditch, back tire was hitting dirt, but it was pretty crumbly dirt.  Driver's front was on dirt, solidly, but I don't have lockers in front, so that didn't help us any, driver's rear was in the air.  Great.

Eventually my approach evolved into digging out the sides of the ditches to basically fill the ditch, also digging out the dirt from under the driver's front tire, to lower that corner of the truck and level it out a little.   As much as I could reach without crawling under the truck (no sense killing myself) I also dug out the dirt under the axles, further leveling the truck.

The real improvement was strapping the axle to the frame, dropping the hilift into the ditch, and lifting the front corner, to lift the front tire, to fill underneath it with stones and dirt.

I think that the hilift is both one of the best and scariest recovery tools made.  I'm impressed as all get-out that you can lift a ton or three.  That's amazing to me.  Even more impressed that you can lower the same weight in a controlled way.  Awesome machine.

But standing within a foot or two of a ton or two of Land Cruiser being held up by only a 1" x 2" perforated steel bar....  makes me nervous.   Especially when weight is sitting just about near the end of the 60" hilift.    I felt a little better for being uphill, I guess that meant that at least I wouldn't be crushed by a rolling vehicle after being impaled by steel from a failed jack.  There's that. Gotta look on the bright side.

The jack held, I got some dirt and rock under the tire. No damage to me and no additional damage to the truck.

At some point while I was doing my excavation project, I managed to raise another friend on the phone.  I told Jon that I was stuck and asked if he wouldn't mind stopping off at my house to grab Jocelyn (who had returned the 4Runner) and bringing his Discovery up to help me get out. Not only did he bring Jocelyn and the disco, he brought his gal and their 3 (4?) month old baby, Benno.   It was like a pleasant Sunday picnic, only no delicious food, no wicker basket, and a very stuck Land Cruiser.  I guess it wasn't much like a picnic at all.

The girls took a walk up the hill while I continued digging with Jon's help.  I don't think I would have been able to keep going without someone pitching in, I was pretty beat already after two hours of hacking away at the rocky dirt in the 90 degree heat. Jon's enthusiasm was at least as welcome as his digging (which was very welcome).

I should take a brief moment to be thankful that we were in the shade, on a hillside with some breeze.  It could have been much hotter.   We also had (have) a can of Off! in the truck.  Were it not for that, this would have been a much itchier story.

So as the darkness descended, and with an awful lot of dirt moved from under the truck into the ditch, Jocelyn made the executive decision to either pull the truck now or give up for the night and back the disco down the trail.  See, we hadn't planned quite as well when driving the disco up, and while backing down the trail was going to be a hassle in the fading daylight, it was going to be borderline dangerous (ok, maybe not so borderline) to do it in the dark.

So we hooked up the trucks again (side note:  factory tow points on the front the discovery are very robust, but also very small and difficult to access.  Probably ideal for some shipping device that is used in transport, but tired hands and a tow strap and shackle... required patience.)  and gave it a little tug.  First try=nothing.   2nd try, with a very little bit of force, and the Cruiser got both back tires on the ground and backed right out, as if from a parking space.  Free!!  At last!

I did leave about 6" of fender flare on the ground, for which I'm a little bummed because going flare-less here isn't really an option due to the Revision Tecnica (road safety test).  But one damaged flare is a small price to pay vs. a flopped Cruiser.  The front bumper may have gotten some damage in the process.  Hard to tell- my bumper is pretty trashed already.  If it is further damaged, I may never know and certainly don't mind.   I will be designing easy hi-lift attachment points into whatever bumper I build in the future.  And whatever repair work is needed on the flare, I'll get it done when I eventually repair the marker light on the other side.  Still brightsiding here- at least I hadn't just repaired/replaced the factory bumper right before busting it again.  There's that.

I detached the strap and jumped behind the wheel of Jon's truck to back him down the hill.  He ran ahead (behind) with a small maglite (better than the flashlight I didn't have in my truck, bad planning!) and did a fine job of spotting.  I was tired and more tired, so his conservative spotting was probably a very good thing.  Driving an automatic in reverse down rough terrain is not as pleasant to me as using a manual transmission.  By a large margin.  I wonder if the disco doesn't have some of those fancy features where it should moderate speed/braking automatically, but at night with an exhausted driver was not the time to find out. 

The trail widened just enough to do an 8 point turn to get the truck pointed straight, then we drove  down a little further to where Jon and I decided that he would be fine completing the road on his own (and I would have less dark and bumpy uphill to jog back to my own truck).

I borrowed his light (again, must remember to put a few in my truck, bad planning on my behalf) and started jogging uphill again.  For about the first time I realized that 36 really isn't 26.  I couldn't jog.  I wanted to jog.  My mind was jogging.  My arms were swinging in a jogging-like style.  My legs, on the other hand, were walking.  I know I'm no shining example of physical fitness, but usually that just means feeling more sore in the morning, not "unable to continue at my desired pace".   It was humbling.  But walking up didn't take that much longer and while I was walking Jocelyn had stowed all the recovery gear and generally prepped the cruiser for our return.   So I handed over the light, she spotted me down (much less conservatively than Jon had, which was also fine) to where we could turn around, and then we headed off down the hill. 

Defeated, but triumphant.  Somehow.

Jon and Philine (and Benno) were waiting for us at the bottom with two cold beers.  That sure tasted good!  We thanked them profusely and inadequately for their help, then returned home for a much needed hot shower then headed over to our neighbor's house for a delicious bbq and some more liquid therapy.

All in all, not the quick jaunt that we expected, but it was a pretty fun day anyway and we impressed ourselves at how well we work together in a situation like this.  I'm very grateful to Camilla for loaning us the 4Runner, and to Jon and Philine who spent their Sunday afternoon helping us out.  Of course I'm also very impressed by my lovely wife, as I don't think that most wives would have come back to help dig more and spot and generally participate in the extraction.

Oh, and the roof rack performed flawlessly, but I still don't have a decent picture of it.

Labels: 4wd, 4x4, Costa Rica, day trip, food, land cruiser, photo, tamarindo

After class on Saturday I finally broke down and bought new tires.  I've been reluctant because I want to switch to 16" rims and a certain tire size (255/85r16) but between the higher cost of those tires and the additional cost of new rims, couple with the fact that it is difficult to find the rims that I want and also difficult to find the tires that I want in this area, I gave up.   Sounds dramatic.   I always fret too much over tire purchases because I figure I'll be using those tires for the next 3-5 years and prefer to do it "right" in the first place.

But the old tires were wearing very fast.  There was still plenty of tread- at least 30%- but the steel belts had burst through the outer layer on one tire last month, and another this week.  I swapped the first into the spare position, but had to drive on the second for a few days and was very nervous about it.   Driving around unsafe is dumb.

So I bit the bullet and bought some new tires in Santa Cruz.  Ended up with 33x12.50r15 Yokohama Geolander MTs.   I would have been happy to have put an all terrain on- saves a little bit of fuel consumption/noise, but there weren't any to be found in that size.  The slightly larger (I did have 31's) tires look great on the truck and it drives much better with new, balanced tires.

Since I now had tires (and had fixed some other stuff earlier in the week) I immediately drove the hour south to the vehicle inspection station to get my annual revision completed.   Dropping in without an appointment on Saturday was a bad idea.  I spent over an hour waiting to get into line, then about half an hour in line (faster than normal), then another half hour driving through the whole station, just so that a tech could look at my new bushings (10 seconds) and say "ok!".

One plus to being stuck in the station chit-chatting with the tech was that he was happy to help me weigh the truck-- they have a big suspension machine onto which you can drive front or rear tires, then it displays the weight at each wheel.

Mine were:

	driver's	passenger's
front	642 kg (1412 lbs)	552 kg (1214 lbs)
rear	664 kg (1460 lbs)	640 kg (1408 lbs)

Just in case you were wondering.  Not sure why the front driver's side is heavier, I certainly don't weigh 100kg (200lbs).  Not sure I care too much.

One the way home there was a transit police officer sitting under a shade tree, casually gunning people on the highway.   I passed and waved (I always wave in the hopes that over time they'll recognize me and be nicer should I be caught speeding- there are only 10 or so officers in this area in the transit division).  Then it ocurred to me that I could check the new tires effect on my speedometer against the cop's radar gun.  In the end, I'm more interested that my speedometer match the cop's gun than that it be accurate.  They're not ticketing based on reality but rather based on what the radar says.

So I turned around and drove back, pulling over at his truck.  I think it made him a little nervous to have someone pull themselves over.  But I slowly got out and chatted him up.  Once I explained what I wanted, he was happy to help out.

So I did another pass, he recorded my speed, and it looks like the taller tires have put my speedometer bang-on.  I was doing "just shy of 80 kph" on my speedometer and he showed me driving 77kph.  Good enough for me.   Chatting with him the second time, he was much nicer and asked me some questions about the truck.  I'm always amazed at the bad rap that police are given.  I've had some bad experiences, sure, but whenever I talk to them for a bit, they almost always turn out to be friendly.

Sunday was a lot of work for little progress.  As Jocelyn points out, I may have set a new record for installing my rear sway bar.  I started around 7am, planning to be done in about an hour.  I finished around 1:45pm.  Short version:  I sheared a bolt head.  Lesson learned:  a few minutes chasing out old, rusty holes with a tap before installing old rusty bolts is time well spent in prevention.

Lesson #2:  "Easy Out" isn't a good description for the tool it describes.   A better name would be:  drill-in-awkward-position, struggle to set not sharp tool into bolt, crank until passing through bolt, then have to weld rebar to shank to pull out before finally giving up and drilling out old nut to re-tap with larger diameter and use different bolt.   But that would be a lot of words to fit on a small package.  So I'll just have to remember that "Easy Out" isn't.  Lesson learned.

At least the sway bar is installed.

But I can't drive the truck to test it because my driver's window motor seems to have failed.  I'll be working on that this morning (Monday) so that I can actually close said window.  I don't like electric windows.

Sure is a pretty morning-  coolish, light breezes, time to shut computer and open car door to fix window.

Labels: land cruiser, repair, tamarindo, weather

I had a very nice birthday party last night.  Thanks to all who attended.
For whatever reason, I got into my head that it would be a delicious appetizer spread.  Jocelyn and I spent a few hours prepping on Wednesday, then some more hours baking Thursday morning, then finishing on Thursday night.    It was a blast.  I don't plan to make so many apps any time soon.
The menu included:

• Pan Seared Oven Roasted Pork Loin with an onion/soy glaze, sliced thin and served on lettuce leaves with red bell pepper, jalapeno pepper, and some shredded white onion.
• Basil leaves topped with sardine and a guava reduction
• Turrialba cheese with red bell pepper and basil, drizzled with balsamic reduction, on picks
• Fried Chicken Wings plated on celery leaves
  
• Basil, Oregano, Parsley & Garlic bread topped with a black olive and sour cream tapenade garnished with parsley and red bell pepper
• French bread with same tapenade, etc.
• Whole wheat baguette with same tapenade, etc.
• Turrialba cheese cubes, plated with chopped parsley
• Six fresh-baked loaves, sliced, with olive oil for drizzling
• Carrot stick
• Celery slices/sticks

There may have been something else, I don't recall exactly.
Some friends (Judd and Jacqueline) were nice enough to bring over two whole additional platters of appetizers- including some puff pastry, fried zucchini, ham-wrapped plantains (yum!), and more.

Many brought wine or other libations, one of the standouts is a Costa Rican produced passion-fruit wine that is a "demi-sec" and very interesting.  I'd like to try it ice-cold on a hot afternoon.  I think it would also make for an excellent mimosa-style beverage, or a dessert wine.   But sipping it mostly-cold after eating a lot of spicy/salty food was not the best pairing.

Of course, the people present are what really makes any party, and I always enjoy the company of good friends.  We are very lucky in that regard.

We finished off the evening with some chocolate cupcakes smothered in spicy chocolate frosting.  Yummy!

A nice change from a 'normal' party for us was that we made everything finger-edible, so instead of doing a bunch of dishes and silver, we just threw some napkins in the washing machine, and had glasses and serving plates to clean.  More prepping, but less cleaning.  Prepping is more fun.

Labels: birthday, bread, food, photo, tamarindo