Episode 9 of our Costa Rican Road trip begins early with a flat tire, caused from the crazy drive the night before. Costa Rican roads are extremely bad in certain areas and driving at night changes things all together. Arriving after dark to Punta Islita, I noticed the tire starting to deflate while taking the bags out and decided I would fix the issue before anyone woke up. On may way out to the car, I heard a number of large birds squawking in the tree in the parking lot. It was bright and early and the birds started to increase in number.
I began the tire change and had some trouble with the stripped lock nut on the spare. The staff arrived and noticed my difficulty and helped me call Alamo to come over and assist later in the day. In the meantime, I ran back to the room to grab Samara. She is my bird lover and I wanted to show her the macaws that were going wild by this time in the almond tree by the car. She was so excited to see the birds, as was I. I had never seen these macaws in the wild and their colors and size were amazing. We stood watching the birds for an hour. They were close enough to touch and was way better than any zoo or nature park, we had ever been too.
The management of the hotel said it was not normal to see them and that this was the first time in over a year that they arrived. We took it as a sign and spent the good part of the morning watching and filming them.
We had lunch at the hotel with some basic burgers and nachos, while the Alamo representative arrived to fix the tire. Before lunch was finished they had me back on track and ready to roll, at no charge.
The rest of the day we explored this hillside resort by drone and foot. The only drawback to the hotel was that the main pool was designated adults only and we had to make our way down to the beach to the family area to enjoy some swim action. Eventually, we got over the pool situation and loved being by the beach, with the palms, grass, and wide open space.
Punta Islita is a very remote area about 10 miles south of Samara and is now accessible by car even during the rainy season. We wouldn’t find this out til the next day when we made the quick 20 minute drive north to explore the town for Samara. We learned this lesson the hard way and made a 2 hour detour to get here through Nicoya the night before, as we were worried about hitting another dead end river crossing adding even more time to our road trip south.
The evening ended with some relaxing beach time followed by dinner at the hotel. The prices were reasonable and since there is no other option in town it was our only choice for food besides more cup o noodles. On to bed and prepared for the next day exploring Samara’s Samara.