Costa Rican rafting - another goal re-visited.

The week in Costa Rica continues to be wonderfully relaxing and immense fun. The only problem is that I am not making much progress with my remaining unachieved goals. However, I do manage to keep revisiting some of the other goals that I have achieved previously.

We went horse riding again, a more gentle ride in hotter conditions, with some spectacular views over the countryside and coastline. I felt much more confident, despite being on a different horse, which was a little more stubborn than my previous mount.

The next day we all went rafting on the Naranjo River with H2O Rafting. The last time I went rafting was in Colorado, where I achieved goal #56. On that occasion the river had been low, and the rafting a bit technical, but here the river was flowing well, and we bounced through some spectacular rapids.



I took my camera in it's waterproof case, but most of the time the river was too exciting to be able to get it out, so afterwards Jelene bought the official photographer's disc of photos, and those shown below are all credited to H20 Rafting.




Yesterday we took one of the little runabout speed boats owned by John's marina development out for a run along the coastline just before sunset. On the return we pulled up a good distance offshore, and dived in to the wonderfully warm ocean, and floated lazily around as the orange sun sank below the horizon.

In between activities we have longed around on the condo balcony watching sloths, monkeys and toucans in the jungle below us, sipping coffee, smoothies, or beer, depending on the time of the day.

There is more horse riding planned for this morning - I am just hoping that my saddle sores don't hurt too much today!!

The great monkey-feeding exposé.

Jelene woke us early this morning, as there were monkeys by the swimming pool, and before long the monkey-feeding debate was in full swing. In the brochure at the condo there is a big article on why people shouldn't feed the monkeys.

I have been teasing Moe for some time now, as she is quite environmentally responsible most of the time, but I was beginning to suspect that the temptation to hand-feed monkeys would be too much for her.

And sure enough, she cracked, sitting on the poolside with a proferred handfull of banana. We laughed about her loss of environmental credibility, and she tried claiming that I was equally guilty, being present at the time. I likened myself to a war photographer, merely documenting the injustice and horror in order to be able to report it impartially.

(In the interests of fairness, Moe did point out the fact that my carbon footprint at the moment is more like a huge boot-stomp with all of the air miles I have racked up over the last two years - can't really argue with that!!)



Monkey-feeding - right or wrong? You be the judge! Comments invited...

From the condo information book:-

You might find feeding the monkeys (and other wild animals) to be a thrilling experience, but you are not doing the monkeys a favor. In fact you are actually harming them. Here's why:

1). Monkeys are highly susceptible to diseases from human hands. They can die from bacteria transferred off your hands that has no ill effect on you.
2). Migration to human-populated areas to be fed increases the risk of dog attacks and road accidents.
3). Irregular feeding leads to an aggressive behaviour towards humans and other species.
4). Contrary to the stereotype, bananas are not the preffered food of monkeys in the wild. Bananas, especially those containing pesticides, can be upsetting to the monkeys' delicate digestive system and cause serious dental problems that can eventually lead to death.
5). Feeding creates a dangerous dependency on humans that diminishes the monkeys' survival abilities.
6). Feeding interferes with the monkeys' natural habits and upsets the balance of their lifestyle centred on eating wild fruits, seeds, small animals and insects.
7). Contact with humans facilitates poaching and the trade in illegal wildlife.
8). Pregnant females who are fed nothing but bananas during their pregnancy will not give birth to healthy infants. The babies will be malnourished, or never develop to term and die before birth.
9). Monkeys need to travel an average of 17 kilometres each day to be in good physical condition. If they know that food is available in a particular location, they will not leave that area.
10). Not only do we pass on diseases to animals when we feed them by hand, but they can pass diseases on to us as well.

Horse riding in Quepos.

I only met Jelene and John briefly in Miami, when Jelene contacted me after reading an online article about my travels. But despite the brief introduction, they were kind enough to extend an invitation to me to join them for a week at their condo in Costa Rica.

The invitation was further extended to include Moe, so on Monday we left our San Jose hotel, and caught the bus out to meet John and Jelene at the airport. From there we entered a new world of private chartered flights and luxury condos.

John is a partner in the development of a huge marina on the Pacific shore at Quepos, and comes down once a month to oversee progress there. So instead of the four hour drive across the country, we had a four-seater, twin-prop Piper Seneca to whisk the four of us across to the west coast in about twenty minutes or so. We made a scenic loop around the marina, and John and Jelene discussed recent additions.



At the tiny landing strip in the jungle on the outskirts of town, a hire car was waiting for us, and the condo that we drove to is luxurious and spacious. We have a view across the most lush rain forest to the coast. In a tree not far from our balcony a sloth hung lazily in the branches. Apparently, monkeys often come to the swimming pool area below us in the morning.



On our first evening here John and Jelene insisted on treating us to dinner in one of their favourite restaurants. They know the manager there - they seem to know alot of people here - and we were very well looked after in the beautiful surroundings of Karolas Restaurant.



Yesterday morning I woke feeling slightly nervous, as it was time to revisit one of my earlier goals. Jelene has a share in some stables here, and when we arrived, our four horses were saddled and waiting for us. It was overcast, and in the cooler weather the horses were apparently less sluggish than usual, and keen to run.

The last time I was on a horse was on the US west coast at Oregon, where Debbie and her friend Paul had helped me achieve Goal #22 of riding along the beach at sunset. I had managed a gallop, but with little style or control. I had also fallen off, which didn't help my confidence.

But the horses here all seem very calm and are very sure-footed and smooth to ride. With a few words of advice from Jelene, and more from Moe, who looked supremely confident on her sleek and speedy-looking mare, we were off.

We walked for a while, then trotted, and before long we were galloping. "Just relax," I was frequently reminded - not quite as straight-forward as you would think on a horse hurtling along a gravel track through thick jungle.

We slowed at the river, and our horses waded through waist-deep water, and we were off again. Eventually we turned for home, and by then I was starting to feel much more comfortable. My horse was keen on the return journey, and I let her go, out ahead of the others, a huge grin on my face. What a wonderful feeling.



I now have a couple of saddle-sores, but am now hooked! I want to get much better at this.

We drove down to a local bar in the evening, where I spotted Craig, who we had met at the condo complex the day before. The evening involved salsa dancing, another challenge for me, but with some patient advice from salsa-star Christine, our condo manager, we were soon on the floor in the midst of the stylish local dancers. Moe was very tolerant of my foot-stomping clumsiness, and we had a great time.



It was certainly a good decision to accept John and Jelene's kind invitation. This is turning out to be a great week, and a wonderfully luxurious follow-up to our fantastic week in Jamaica. I am incredibly grateful to them for their kindness and hospitality, and I am also grateful to them for facilitating the opportunity to spend another week with Moe, who is great fun to be around.

Breakfast in Jamaica, lunch in Miami, dinner in Costa Rica.

Our pre-arranged Jamaican taxi arrived, to our amazement, exactly on the dot of 3am, and once we roused the hotel receptionist from her deep slumber, and recouped our deposit, we were on our way. At the airport the coffee shop opened early, and Moe finished off her yoghurt and juice.

A short hop took us back to Miami, where we had booked a mid-afternoon flight out to Costa Rica. There had been an earlier flight option, but we weren't sure if we had to come back though US Immigration. It was good that we had given ourselves plenty of time, and after a reasonably easy entry back into the States, we shared a large Chinese buffet meal for lunch.

The flight to San Jose in Costa Rica is just under three hours, and a bus costing less than a dollar each took us into the city, where we found our cheapie hotel. We dropped our bags and headed out for a look around.

The city centre is busy and vibrant, with sellers all along the main shopping street with carts and blankets set out, selling all sorts of stuff. It is lovely to be back in a place where every interaction with a vendor doesn't feel like running a gauntlet of dodgy sales techniques. Despite it's laid-back atmosphere, Jamaica had a pretty high sales pester factor. It is so noticably and refreshingly different here.

We had very tasty Costa Rican coffee in a cafe, and bought fresh bread, cheese, fruit and veg for a healthy homemade local dinner. Three meals in one day in three different countries!

We have had a day today to explore San Jose, starting with an unusual local breakfast of rice, egg, plantain banana and tortillas! We wandered parks and markets, and headed home once the rain in the afternoon started.



We're now looking forward to meeting Jelene and John, and flying across to the Pacific coast tomorrow morning.

Last day in Jamaica.

When I met Jelene and John in Miami just over a week ago, they told me they were going down to Costa Rica on business on the 24th, and would be staying in their condo down there on the Pacific coast. Would I like to come down for a week, they wondered? Monkeys come to visit them at their swimming pool, and they have horses to ride in the wilderness.

Hmmm, I do have things I feel should be getting on with, as some of my goals seem to be slipping further out of reach. But I am coming to accept that I will not achieve all 100 goals, and as I have always said, it is more about the people and the overall adventure.

And spending so much time with Moe this week in Jamaica has suggested that my journey may have other possibilities in future. The overall adventure seems to be bigger than just a list of goals, and I am just enjoying that right now.

So I finally decided that the Costa Rica opportunity is too good to miss out on, and I think Jelene and John will be fun to hang out with for a while. They have been kind enough to extend their invitation to Moe too, and I have been trying to persuade her to postpone her return to Canada, and to join me on the trip down to Costa Rica.

She has other committments, and has been wavering, but yesterday made her decision. She had alot of emails to write in order to cover everything for another week back at home! We're off to Costa Rica, and have flights booked now. We fly tomorrow back to Miami, have a few hours in the airport, then are straight back out to San Jose. How exciting!

We have spent the last few days idling around Negril, swimming, wandering into town, and yesterday afternoon, once again we headed out to Rick's Bar on the cliffs. We refused to be distracted too much by coffee shops, bars, and roadside salesmen, and made it to Rick's before sunset.

This time cliff-jumping was still in progress, and I watched several people jump of the high clifftop platform. Oh dear, I knew that I wanted to do it, but it was impressively high. But after watching one of the fit young locals jump off the enormously high treetop platform, I handed Moe the camera and money from my pockets.

"'Dis guy look confident," smiled the lifeguard, but I felt far from it as I peered over the edge. It was a long fall, but a straight clean entry meant it was painless, and as I climbed back up to Moe she told me I had to go and do it again, as she had missed getting a picture.

The second jump went as well as the first, with a bit of a slap on the soles of my feet. "No, missed it again," grinned Moe. "Once more please." I was suspicious, and asked to look at the camera - the pictures looked fine to me! It was time for a beer!



At the start of the week, we had all sorts of plans to rent a scooter or maybe bicycles, and head into the mountains to see some waterfalls. But with a beautiful beach, and an easy lifestyle, we have reached the last day here, and have been no further than Rick's a couple of miles away.

And I have loved it. It has been so relaxing to have nothing that has to be done, and nowhere that we really have to go. The only obligation has been to do some "work" on the book, in order to fulfil the loose requirements of the "workplace romance" goal. Blissful.

Goal 88 - romantic workplace.

This was always going to be a tricky goal to achieve, as I haven't really done a stroke of work for over two years now (which is just the way I like it!)

So this is one of my more unusual goals, and comes from a visit back to the UK from Australia, when at a big family meal we all drew a card from a pack of "50 things you should do before you die" cards. Here is what I wrote back in 2008 in the goal description:-

Just over two years ago I flew back to the UK, and turned up on my mum's doorstep on her birthday as a surprise. She was quite shocked, but very happy too. I had asked my brother to arrange a big family gathering for Sunday lunch, and uncles, aunts, cousins and their kids came from far and wide.

We all had a great day, and my cousin Christine had bought me a small present. It was a pack of fifty cards, with fifty suggestions for "50 things to do before you die".

That afternoon we had each family member pick a card, and accept the task on the card. The challenge was to complete that task before I next headed back to the UK. And if all goes well, I plan to be back there by the end of September!

These were the goals, which were drawn at random:-

Visit Paris
Look up at the night sky through a telescope
Go on a blind date
Take a trip in a hot air balloon
Give more than you can afford to charity
Enact a favourite fantasy
Compromise
Buy everyone in a pub a drink
Take a sick day when you are not ill
Do a bungee or parachute jump
Take a luxury holiday
Go to a huge sports game - football, rugby, baseball, American football, etc
Swim with wild dolphins
Ride a rollercoaster
Hug a tree
Stay up all night and watch the sunrise
Get drunk on champagne
Clean behind the fridge
Ask a stranger out
Have an office relationship

My challenge was the office (or workplace) relationship! So far I have failed to achieve this goal (although I did kiss one of the girls who I worked with when driving trucks in Kalgoorlie!) I have no idea how I can succeed, as I do not plan to do any work between now and my arrival in the UK. I think I have to accept that this is going to be one that I fail this time round.

But I am going to leave it on the list for the 100goals100weeks challenge, and see if I can still achieve it. I reckon I will have to do some work at some stage to top up the funds!

I did plan to do some work back on the trucks in mining when I returned to Australia in 2009, but due t the economic downturn at the time, driving jobs were few and far between, and eventually, after some half-hearted job-searching, I simply set off travelling again.

So as the end of my journey approaches, I am starting to get to work on the final goal on the list, which is to secure a book deal about the whole adventure. This is how I hope that I might pay off some of the spending I have been doing, and so in a way, consider anything done towards progressing the book project as the nearest I will come to work for a while.



Moe, who is with me here in Jamaica, is also working on a book, and we have spent a bit of time together with our laptops at work on our respective projects. And what more romantic a place could you find than Jamaica?

Workplace romance? Well, there has at least been a little work done, and that's enough for me to count this one as goal achieved!

Jamaica-time.

On Saturday morning in Miami Moe and I got to work for an hour or two with the laptops in the hotel lobby, and before long we had booked flights to Jamaica, along with a hotel for the week we planned there.

Our flight left that evening, so we had a few hours to have a look around Miami. We went looking for a mini-golf place that I had discovered online, but it seemed closed down when we found it, and instead we had a wander around the used car lots nearby, and managed to get some much-needed laundry done.

We cruised down the coast, and wandered down to Miami beach before finally heading for the airport. There was a bit of a mix up with flights, and somehow we had been booked on flights for the following day. After several phone calls, and some fantastic assistance from the extremely helpful American Airlines staff, we managed to just make it onto our original planned flight, with some very hastily-packed baggage.

In Jamaica, because of the booking mix-up, we now no longer had a hotel room for the first night, and eventually caught an expensive taxi to a cheap (by Jamaica's somewhat expensive standards!) hotel. Hotel Gloriana had the most impressively big bed I have ever seen crammed into a little room.



The next day we took another taxi from Montego Bay to our destination in Negril at the west end of the island. We are staying in a basic, but comfortable, and wonderfully situated little beach-side resort. For a few days now we have been slowing down to Jamaica-time, and I think we have pretty much got there now.

We have swum in the warm tropical sea, wandered into town to buy food, sat in the hot spa, drank beer in random, baech-side bars, and had fun bargaining with the local beach-sellers.



Yesterday was a truly wonderful day. Moe and I went into town, and tried the local speciality, jerk chicken. Our plan was to wander around the coast up onto the cliffs, aiming for the oft-mentioned Rick's Cafe for sunset. But we were easily side-tracked into a roadside coffee shop brewing heavenly locally grown and freshly roasted coffee.

We eventually arrived at Rick's long after dark, and had a look at the spectacular jump-off points on the cliffs where jumping and diving regularly takes place. On the way back to town we stopped off at a little bar for a beer, and enjoyed the real flavour of Jamaica.

Moe barganied hard with the taxi driver who took us back to our hotel, and he laughed and chatted with us on the way into town. As he worked the nightshift, we arranged to call him on Friday night to take us on our early morning journey back to Montego Bay for our return to Miami.

Back at the hotel, we grabbed a couple of beers from the fridge, and walked down to the dark beach, where the water felt so warm. We had the place completely to ourselves, and it felt so hedonistic bobbing around in the warm sea with a beer in hand.

I was amazed when I moved my arm at one point, and the water lit up. I have only seen this luminescence once or twice before, and never as brightly as this. There were patches where the phosphorescence was very bright, and when we moved legs and arms they glowed impressively under the water.

We stayed in the sea for perhaps an hour, perhaps more, I really have no idea, then when we started to feel slightly chilly, headed up the beach and plunged into the hot spa. It felt absolutely wonderful.

We really have relaxed into Jamaica-time now, but that isn't helping me to achieve the goal I came here to accomplish - have a "workplace romance". I haven't really done too much work yet!

Shuttle launch.

Linda, and her husband Brian, contacted me to say that they were going to be down in Florida at the same time as I was. I haven't seen them since October 2008, when Linda gave me the "Sopranos Tour" of New Jersey, and took me to achieve Goal Number 10 at Six Flags New Jersey, by riding the monster rollercoaster Kingda Ka.

Linda emailed and told me that they intended to go and watch the space shuttle launch on 14th May. I had no idea this was scheduled, and found out that after this, there are only two more shuttle missions before they are retired. I couldn't possibly miss that.

So after our last evening in Tampa, where we shared a lovely Thai meal with Cari and her husband Mart, we drove the next morning over to the east coast. There was alot of traffic, but we eventually found somewhere to park at Titusville, and found Linda and Brian among the crowds.

The build up to the launch was atmospheric, and at 2.20pm, as scheduled, to huge cheers from the crowds, the shuttle took off. We saw it first as the huge blast of the initial thrust appeared on the horizon. It was several second before we heard the sound!

It was pretty spectacular, the huge flame bright below the shuttle, an impressive vapour trail left behind as it headed skywards, accelerating quickly. Moe and I were both wearing, very appropriately, our t-shirts from Aurora Aerospace that Chip had given us the day before.



After a quick bite to eat, we said our goodbyes to Linda and Brian. It was lovely to catch up with them again, and I am looking forward to seeing Linda in New York again on July 4th for the 100 goals final day.

We then made our way down to Miami, arriving fairly late, and booked in to a cheapie hotel for the evening, ready to try to find some sort of Caribbean holiday in the morning.

Three goals in one day! Goals 85, 86 and 87.

When planning a couple of the more expensive goals on the list, I ran into a few problems. Initially I had planned to go to Russia to experience a weightlessness flight, and a flight in a MiG fighter jet. However, I ran into two problems. The first was that the flight in a MiG cost anywhere between $12,000 and $16,000, depending on the package chosen. Without a book deal signed yet, and without having done a stroke of work for over two years now, finances will no longer stretch to this, so it was back to the drawing board.

The second issue was that the plane that the Russians use for the weightlessness flights is currently out of commission, and not expected back into service until October!

So it was back to Google Search, where eventually I discovered Howard Chipman, and his Florida-based company Aurora Aerospace. Howard operates weightlessness flights in his Rockwell 700, and also has an L-39 fighter jet trainer, and offers a flight in this as an add-on to the weightlessness adventure.

After a few emails back and forth we worked out a date, and this morning Moe and I turned up at the St. Petersburg/Clearwater airport, where we eventually found Chip and his partner Veronique, and started preparations for my L-39 jet flight.

GOAL 85 - Fighter Jet Flight

While not quite a MiG, the Czech-built L-39 is a fighter jet used by many airforces around the world as a trainer for the MiG, and has many similar characteristics. It is a beautiful, sleek machine.

Kitted out with flight suit and a helmet, I was briefed and we headed out to the plane. In the cockpit I had a further briefing, and paid particular attention to how the ejector seat worked. I kept my hands well away from the big red handles.



The L-39 sounds just as good as it looks when the jet fires up, and we powered up and taxied out to the runway. Takeoff was fast and smooth, and the climb to height was impressively quick.



After a few easy turns Chip handed the controls over to me, and I tried a few turns. The controls were light and responsive, and it seemed very easy to turn quickly. We moved on to rolls, and after a couple of demos, I managed a reasonably satisfactory effort, followed by a much more confident roll. The plane handled so well, and was such fun.

We did a couple of stalls, and a steep climb to a stall called a tail slide, which results in a spectacular fall into a steep dive.

As we headed back Chip asked what else we should do, and I asked him to show me what the plane was capable of. Wow! He threw us around the sky through a series of linked manoeuvres that was like the fastest rollercoaster ever. The G-meter in the cockpit showed maximums of +4.1G and -0.5G, which Chip seemed very pleased with.

We finished with a low pass along the beach, dropping down to around 200 feet, and then did a fast low pass over the airport, followed by a steep final climb. What a stunning experience the whole flight was.

I have lots of video, and will try to get around to editing as soon as I can.

GOAL 86 - Weightlessness Flight

After lunch Moe and I were briefed for the weightlessness flight by Veronique, who would be our instructor and assistant. We were flying in a Rockwell 700, apparently one of only 30 of these planes still flying. It was carpeted and fitted out very nicely, but almost completely stripped of everything in the rear for floating around in.

The weightlessness flight involves taking the plane up to height, putting it into a dive to build up speed, then pulling it back into a very steep climb. The G-force at the bottom is around 2G. At the top of the climb the plane is pushed over towards another dive, and at the top of the parabola, there is a period of zero gravity for around 10 seconds.

I went first, and tried a sitting position, then kneeling on the second parabola. Lying flat on my front, and then on my back were fun, and the next two I tried with a couple of other small objects floating, and releasing some water from a water bottle, which was fantastic. The final parabola was a summersault, assisted by Veronique.

I strapped myself back into my seat, and it was Moe's turn. Looking out of the window, I was amazed at the incredibly steep angle of climb. And then watching Moe seem to magically lift off the floor of the plane was amazing. I hadn't really appreciated how odd it must look when I was doing it. She followed the same progression, and it was very entertaining to watch.



For the last couple of parabolas we got to lay together and float up at the same time. Once again, what an extraordinary and incredible experience.

GOAL 87 - Mile High Club

Although not one of the usual experiences on offer, Chip agreed to fly straight and level at around five and a half thousand feet for 15 minutes or so, and with the curtain to the cockpit closed, goal 87 was achieved too, in much more comfort and luxury than the more common commercial airliner lavatory location. No further details or description needed or available for this goal, I'm afraid!



On the return to the airport, we discovered that the excitement of the day wasn't quite over, as one of the three landing wheel lights refused to come on. We didn't know if the wheel hadn't come down, or if it hadn't locked into place, or if the light was at fault. A test of the light indicated that all was fine there, the problem was more serious. Chip told us that a gear-up landing may be necessary, but that people "usually walked away from them"!!

Eventually the problem was resolved by some sort of manual back-up system, but the landing was a little tense, and Chip put the Rockwell down very lightly, putting as much of the landing impact on the right wheel, not the suspect left one, and all went well. The whole incident was dealt with incredibly calmly and professionally, and Moe and I felt very much at ease in such capable hands.

What an incredible day! Huge thanks to Howard and Veronique at Aurora Aerospace for their incredibly professional and friendly service. What an amazing couple, very inspiring. Thanks too to Moe for being a wonderful partner on these goals. One in particular I couldn't have achieved on my own!

After a quick shower we met again with Cari, and her husband Mart for a lovely celebratory Thai dinner at the lovely little restaurant right next to our hotel. The perfect end to a brilliant day.