24 hours in Jaco

Jill and I were lounging around on Thursday afternoon lamenting that the volcano ash cloud had obscured our fantastic view for the better part of a week. We were also a little bored. I correctly diagnosed that we were exhibiting all of the signs of cabin fever so we set out to find a fun impromptu road trip. Our only constraint was that we needed to be back in time to pick up Non and D when their flight arrives tonight.

Since we had not yet laid eyes on the ocean this trip, we picked the beach town of Jaco as our destination. Jaco is only an hour from our house. It was surprisingly hard to find a hotel room in Jaco on short notice. So much so that we almost gave up on the mission. There are a number of super cute hotels with 6-10 rooms right on the beach where rooms are $60 to $70 a night, but those were all booked up. When we go back we are going to plan a little further in advance and stay at Hotel Perico Azul. We ended up finding a room at a larger hotel, the Oceano, about a half a mile inland for $200 including breakfast — and we would also happily stay there again.

Friday morning, we were up with the sun and had a leisurely breakfast and coffee. We threw together a change of clothes and our swimsuits and we were off! Because it’s all shorts and flip flops, the two of us were able to pack for one night in a single backpack.

We stopped on the way out of town to gas up.

The drive to Jaco was super easy. We took the magical Ruta 27 (the autobahn like toll road) in the opposite direction that we’d taken to get to the PriceSmart of the future earlier in the week.

One of the neat sights on the way to Jaco is the bridge over the Tarcoles River. The Tarcoles River is home to a very healthy population of fresh water crocodiles (not caymans).

With the stop to gawk at the crocs at Tarcoles we were at the overlook for Jaco Beach in about an hour an fifteen minutes.

We had no trouble finding the Oceano Boutique Hotel. The staff were super nice. We got there at 10:00, knowing check-in wasn’t until 3:00 so we changed into our swimsuits, loaded up on sunscreen, and headed for the beach straight away. The nice lady at the desk also said our room would likely be available before the official check in time.

We walked the whole beach at low tide and by then we were getting hungry. Jill found a great lunch place right on the beach called El Malecon.

A very common item on menus in Costa Rica is “Hamburguesa de Pescado” (fish burger). It’s generally a breaded fresh fish fillet on a fresh bun with some variation of cabbage and carrot slaw. El Malecon serves up a mean Hamburguesa de Pescado. We chatted in Spanish with Eduardo, our camarero (waiter) and made it through the entire experience without speaking English to him. Pequena victoria!

A thing to note about Jaco is that as long as you are on the beach or in the shade the temperature is very pleasant. If you find yourself a block or two inland in the sun you will be sweltering. After lunch we decided to head back to the Oceano via the shops along Jaco’s main drag.

A thing you may not know about Jill is that she finds a small inexpensive keepsake from every new place we visit (think refrigerator magnet, photo frame, etc.). A universal truth that I’ve found about souvenir stores in the tropics is that they are claustrophobic and un-airconditioned. Just because the keepsakes are small and inexpensive does not mean that the process to acquire these keepsakes is not exhaustive. The general order of operations is:

1. We visit every un-airconditioned souvenir shop we can find
2. Jill examines the wares while I swelter and try not to knock things over
3. Jill asks me to read the price tag on the bottom of the items while I swelter and try not to knock things over
4. Jill chats with the shop owner while I swelter and try not to knock things over
5. Unable to make a decision we withdraw, pledging to return later
6. Sometime later, after I am cleaned up, we return to make the actual purchase – whereupon I commence anew sweltering and trying not to knock things over
7. Jill makes her final decision and says (this is very important) “Please pay the lady”

We’ve completed this ritual all over the world and, while my grumbling about it is part of the ritual, I admit that I probably get as much joy as Jill does when I see these tiny treasures at home and they remind me of our adventures.

All of that is to say we completed Steps 1 – 5 above on our way back to the Oceano, where we took up our positions in repose by the pool.

We had such a fun and relaxing time at the pool at the Oceano that when the nice lady came out to tell us our room was ready we didn’t feel any compelling need to go upstairs. Plus, they kept bringing me coconuts full of rum…

We lounged by the pool until the heat of day broke, whereupon we adjourned to our room and got cleaned up for dinner.

We strolled back to the beach, stopping along the way to admire some street art and complete Steps 6 and 7 above.

Peak surfing yesterday must have been sometime around 5PM, because when we got to the beach to watch the sunset there were literally hundreds of surfers spread out across the full expanse of the beach. We watched them for a quite a while and some of them were REALLY good.

Dinner last night was at Ohana Sushi y Tapas. Trip Advisor said it was the number one spot in Jaco. Trip Advisor under promised. We fell in love with Ohana. The food was off the charts good and we made friends with Ignacio, the bartender, and Ryan, the manager. Ignacio is from Buenos Aires and Ryan is from San Diego. Rich Mosher will appreciate that Ryan is a big fan of Roberto’s and our experience with it gave us instant cred with Ryan 🙂

We had a combination of sushi and tapas and every bite was delicious. I could do a full review here, but our plan is to go back several more times during this trip so I’ll plan to cover more later.

We woke up this morning, enjoyed the complimentary breakfast at our hotel, then walked to the beach to get our toes wet one more time before we headed back to headquarters.

Because we were already afield, we decided to drive to the port town of Puntarenas (Sandy Point) on the way home. It’s where the cruise ships dock on the Pacific side. We’ve never heard anyone say one word about Puntarenas. Now we know why. Puntarenas is a long sand spit with cranes for offloading container ships and a dock for cruise ships. We don’t need to go back, unless we want to catch a car ferry to the Nicoya Peninsula.

We are back at HQ and will head to pick up Non and D in a couple of hours.

Final note: When we first came through Jaco on our way to Manuel Antonio this past October, our impression was that it was a gritty little town that was probably not for us. We’ve revised that opinion. There are indisputably a ton of bedraggled surfers who look a bit dusty and grimy out of the water, but they’re just killing time until it’s time to surf. When the waves start breaking they all head for the beach however they can get there. One of the more jaw dropping things we saw was surfers riding their bicycles or motorcycles with surfboards under their arms. The surfers seem to be a communal bunch, hanging out in clumps on the beach or at the taco places in town. I’ve come to the conclusion that they are all just trying to make whatever money they have last as long as possible so they can keep surfing. It was exceptionally cool watching all of them as the sun was going down behind them last night. We will happily go back to Jaco in the future and we will definitely eat at Ohana every chance we get.