Costa Rica - San Jose & Silvestre

I slept badly after overeating, so I was up well before my alarm for our 7:15 departure. We were already docked, although it’s a very stripped down port and I didn’t even see the dock when I went outside. We did a quick Lido breakfast, got our stuff, and were at the World Stage by 7:13. We were just about to sit down when they said, “for those of you who are just arriving, we just called the San Jose and Silvestre tour. So we headed right out and got on the bus. This was a larger group than our Cartagena tour – 25 people – so we had a short bus rather than a van, with unusually narrow seats and vicious air conditioning. Our guide, Geovanny, (I’m 100% home grown Costa Rican, he said, but he does love pasta and pizza) was funny and informative. Our port, Puntarenas, is in a big inlet on the Pacific side, and San Jose, the capital of Costa Rica, is about two hours inland, in the central valley. So we rode in the bus and Geo told us about the history and geography and we watched the gorgeous scenery go by as we climbed up to about 3,000 feet above sea level. It was partly cloudy, dry, and cool in San Jose and I fell in love with the city. 

We spent about an hour in the National museum looking at various exhibits, including pre-Columbian artifacts, including both ornamental and functional metates, and then it was time for lunch. The main point of this tour is to visit Silvestre restaurant, and at several points along the way Geo had done his best to get a headcount of who was eating what. The choices didn’t sound very exciting – ceviche or beef tartare for the appetizer; lamb or mackerel for the main; and sorbeto or pudding for dessert.

We got to the restaurant and it’s in an old colonial-era home, with a beautiful garden in the middle. We had a room to ourselves and the food was stunning in every way – how it looked, the textures, the flavors. Dave and I had opted to get one of each and swap plates halfway through, so we had a most wonderful meal. They were also pouring a Chilean Sauvignon Blanc (our third this trip) and a tempranillo of unknown provenance, and they were both very good as well. I am prepared to move to San Jose immediately. (Notice in the right hand picture below the delicious beef tartare served on a metate)

After lunch we got on the bus and stopped at a chocolate shop, where they had small servings of hot chocolate for us to try, and we also bought a couple taster size bars. We got back on the bus and started back towards the ship. There was supposed to be a stop at a souvenir store, but fortunately the traffic was bad and we had to skip it. As it was we got back to the ship about 5 minutes after we were supposed to be on board. We weren’t worried, since it was a HAL tour – if we’d missed the boat they would be responsible for getting us back on, and maybe we could have gone back to Silvestre for dinner.

I took a quick shower and then came out to the verandah with Dave to watch us depart, and then we went to dinner (because we hadn’t eaten enough today).  We had an interesting table; the couple closest to us had a sweet story of being childhood friends who kept in touch and are now together, but she was very hyper and a little exhausting. Beyond her was Jean, who I have danced with before, but we didn’t get to talk much since she was on the other side of talkative Barbara.

After dinner we spend some time on 6 forward looking at the stars. I think I’ve mentioned before how cool it is to have a place on the ship that’s actually dark and we like to take advantage of it. For the first time there was another couple out there. Then we went to the show, a compilation from the BBC’s show 7 worlds one planet, with music augmented by the ship’s classical duo. It was very beautiful and the music was very pretty, but overall just fluff. I fell asleep for part of it.

It was Orange night, and many people were out wearing orange. My plan was to go to the Ocean Bar after the show and dance up a storm, but we ended up going back to our cabin and I fell right to sleep. I didn’t bring anything orange anyway so it was just as well.