Leaving Dominical

As we headed back down from the mountains to pick up the trailer that we left at the casita on the beach, we got a call about some tandems. Fred had 4 people that wanted to fly in Dominical. Grampa Ninja comes through again! We scheduled two rounds of tandems for the afternoon and decided to squeeze in a flight at Fox’s Leap with Nick in the morning. 

Fox’s leap was beautiful, with a high cloudbase and some nice thermalling. We soared around and played in the clouds until we had to spiral down and head back to work in Dominical. We had two great rounds of tandems with a nice family from Minnesota—great soaring, touching the clouds, and a huge low-tide beach to land on. We even saw toucans from the air! After our flights we had one last casado and licuado de piña at our favorite local joint—El Coco. We decided to head for Grampa Ninja’s in Caldera that night. We said goodbye to Jorge and Randall, our new friends that run El Coco, and promised to remember each other. 

There was one last thing to do before we left town—grab the trailer from the casita and drop off our keys with Julia, our abuelita landlord. Carlos came over to say goodbye and help us pull the trailer out of the driveway and get it hooked up to the van. As Cade was trying to reverse the setup to straighten out and pull out of town, his foot slipped off the brake and rammed the wheel well of the trailer into the side of Julia’s car. F. What followed was heavily reminiscent of the “Matador de Gallos” event back in Northern Mexico (for those of you just tuning in, refer here: ). Everyone felt terrible, no one knew what Julia’s bumper was worth, the sun was setting, and we needed to get on the road. We left Julia with some cash, many apologies and made her promise to get an appraisal and let us know if we owed her more. She was reluctant to take anything and just kept telling us “pero yo les quiero.” We pulled out of Dominical a little embarrassed, a few dollars poorer, and decidedly ready to get back on the road. 

We drove up to Caldera in the dark, fueled by the remaining organic chocolate from Canaan, and arrived at Grampa Ninja’s just as dinner was being served. Jenny, a Swedish volunteer schoolteacher and world traveler, has been spending her weekends learning how to fly with the Grampa crew. In the mean time, she’s also been cooking amazing meals at the B&B. This one was no exception. The following day, the strong East winds blew hard and made Caldera unflyable. A few pilots chased the sea breeze down to a site South. We forwent the backtracking and spent a relaxing afternoon catching up on interwebs and beating the heat in Fred’s awesome pool. Thomas kept us fueled on snacks, including Scorpion Pepper Chimichurri to complement Skip’s Moonshine (all the way from Colorado!).

 

We said goodbye to Grampa Ninja’s B&B and half the crew the next morning and hopped the ferry to the Nicoya Peninsula with Fred, his wife Giulia, and visiting pilot Matt. Rok was not very excited about his first ever ferry ride, but was easily distracted by all the seagulls that were soaring the side of the boat and catching cheetos thrown overboard by the local kids. I’m just about as easily entertained and took about 200 photos of seagulls and big black frigate birds on the one-hour ride. 

The site on the Nicoya is on private land (as most sites in Costa Rica are), owned by a friendly farmer, and accessed via a super gnarly 4wd track (almost all sites in Costa Rica are). Grampa Ninja was characteristically unfazed, and we’re hoping he bought the walkaway insurance from the rental agency after the drive up in his rental car. We had a fun thermalling flight, climbing up above the arid landscape with Zopilotes (black vultures) and more frigates. I flew a few kilometers down the range and happened to land across the road from a ceramic studio and hospedaje owned by a lovely Tico/British couple that invited me in for a tour. The rest of the group was already headed my way and we stopped in for fresh lemonade, a tour of their organic gardens, their ceramic studio, and fresh chocolate made from their very own cacao tree. Que Rico!

As we left the ceramic studio, it was also time to say goodbye to Grampa and Giulia. These guys have been incredibly helpful and generous during our time in Costa Rica. Fred is still flying strong despite being well into his 60’s and having Parkinson’s. His sense of humor and strong will are inspirational. He knows pretty much everything there is to know about flying in Costa Rica and can hook you up with great accommodation, transportation, and guide service. We would recommend his services to anyone wanting to see the country’s many sites and maximize airtime in Costa Rica.

We waved goodbye and headed across the Nicoya Peninsula towards Sámara. We found vegetarian restaurants and great beachside camping at Coco’s. Oceanfront property for reals. We backed Chomo in under a palm tree, said hello to our neighbors, a couple from BC in a Ford pickup with topper, and settled in for some relaxing beach time.