OnTheBall Travels
Experience with Pura Vida
Anything humans made, looked awful–Anything nature made, was beautiful
Arrival
If you’re already in Latin America, you’ll find that San Jose (capital) is relatively well connected. Mostly nobody stays here though given the level of crime, infrastructure and general unpleasantries. Costa Rica does have domestic airlines to fly to many areas of the country–wherever you go you’re sort of “off the grid”, which is neat.
We noticed that the immigration officers were very skeptical of us and not flexible at all. We were given the exact number of days we were booked in for with a decent number of questions. Once we got through that we were swarmed by people yelling at us for a cab. People never felt the need to leave us alone despite saying ‘No, gracias’ repeatedly. They had a system where one finds the person, who walkie-talkies over to someone to get the luggage who calls the driver on by. They demand tips for helping you with your bags & apparently split the earnings.
You’re going to want to read what happened when we were leaving! Follow Twitter for updates
People
People were nice. What was really noteworthy with the people there is they were truly determined to assist our trip and tell us where to go, what to see, where to stay, it was like every Uber/Taxi driver was also our tour guide. This was a common trait—it was common to hear “es muy bonito, muy muy muy bonitooo” when describing a place, too. [If you follow OnTheBall Travels you’ll know that we like to get off the resort or main touristy places to get a better sense of the place].
We made some friends, to the point where after a quick conversation we had someone take us practically all over the country in his car. We stopped off near his house with his family who owned a shop and they were very welcoming all-in-all. This openness was not seen in Panama (Is Panama a place for you? FIND OUT!)
Other people however were not so kind. We were attacked, yelled at, and a sweater was swiped at us for ignoring a homeless/druggie man that was previously mocking us but we out-raced him. It was certainly nerve-wracking. While I wanted to ignore him a second time on our walk home, my girlfriend saw he was determined to attack us and said, “back to the Rooster!” (a restaurant we just ate) and we took cover at least with witnesses around. For sake of imagery, he was someone who had nothing to lose.
To my knowledge, prostitution is legal in the country so we did encounter some hookers making small talk. Marijuana fits nicely into the Pura Vida lifestyle & while we did feel safe, we did see prostitutes and received a few offers to buy weed which made my girlfriend a little uncomfortable.
We didn’t have any other experiences of being attacked but it may have been only a matter of time and place. We saw people clearly intoxicated holding up traffic, fighting in the middle of the street, harassing people, acting loco basically as we drove by. When we got out of the car we both looked at each other and said “let’s go get some coffee there, stay inside and then leave as soon as we finish”. Change of plans basically. This came as a great shock for me because I thought it was extremely civilized and safe but the sixth sense went off a couple of times.
Impression
Costa Rica is not a place for cities– all the cities we went were not very impressive. I felt that anything ‘man-made’ was an eye-sore, poor quality and showed a level of poverty & dysfunction while anything nature-wise or untouched was absolutely stunning and amazing.
I received a call from a friend while we were there and he asked, “How would I describe the place?” and I immediately replied, “It’s a beautiful, shit hole”. Beautiful– nature wise. Infrastructure wise– it’s pretty rough. However that is what the place is all about–I’ve mentioned that it’s very “off-the-grid” in nature so it certainly has a draw to many people seeking that.
In the grocery stores there was certainly a lack of quality of items and a lack of options. I went through every isle of a grocery store about 3 times just looking for ‘what else’ we could eat. The vegetables and fruit in 2/3 grocery stores were disgusting and it was not uncommon to see birds fly in and out of the store from the roof. There was a fair amount of agricultural land, although this land was central and not always easily accessible. I hadn’t seen many beach front locations for sale. This varied by location of course, so I’m sure you may have not experienced this but bottom line, optionality was not a thing.
At this time, face underwear (masks) were a thing throughout Latin America, but nobody wore any in Costa Rica, even in the airport which was liberating to see (as sad and pathetic as that is to say). Costa Rica hardly closed their border during the whole charade. In fact, that’s one reason why I had gone to investigate it. Costa Rica did have a rule where businesses could either accept 100% clients who were vaccinated or accept 50% of clients were both unvaccinated and vaccinated. It’s nice to know that an overwhelming of businesses and restaurants chose the latter. The general vibe is to let and leave alone, which is interesting in a time when authoritarianism spreads in developed nations.
Additional details
- Costa Rican Colones are probably the most beautiful bills i’ve come across in the world–it’s a shame they’re rapidly deteriorating in value. Many people are willing for you to pay in USD and Colones, with the former preferred.
- We were cautioned about “gringo pricing” at times and many little tiny scams of overcharging or robbing you.
- We were cautioned of power outages & the Pura vida pace of getting something done (very slow).
- We stayed in a nice house in a gated area–but we hadn’t seen homes that were very spectacular. Some properties belonging to well-known investors were undeniably gorgeous but the homes themselves were not jaw-dropping relative to what you may see in North America
- It never felt touristy really. If you fly into Saint Martin, Cancun, Miami, it’s all there for you, you can see the tourists–didn’t get that feel for things here because of everything spread out.
- Crime committed that doesn’t hit a certain value of stolen items will not be investigated or persecuted. Someone took your favourite CDs and record player? An antique type writer? A painting of yours? Chances are it’s not going to get the judge interested.
Further Impressions
Costa Rica has been described as a third world country with first world prices and while that is somewhat true, I have the opinion that it isn’t that things were expensive they were just reduced quality. It felt that things were overpriced, but not highly priced. If you go to Zürich you may be eating a 20 CHF hamburger but perhaps it’s ‘fairly’ priced for the restaurant, quality, market, location, etc. Costa Rica felt like it was too expensive for what you get. This was especially true for real estate; everyone from drivers to lawyers cautioned that prices were at an all time & you’re paying a premium for lots of land/real estate right now.
Despite 30 plus years of being gringo’fied, the effects were honestly hard to see. Again, our expectation was a country more ‘1st-world’y’ but it didn’t provide this feel too much.
It’s Future from it’s History
Costa Rica has been a neutral country since 1949 with currently no standing army. One reason for this is that it has been born into neutrality more less. When the Spanish were exploring the Americas, Costa Rica was uninhabited so it’s populations are largely descendants from Spain without any ethnic conflict in its history. The Spanish were also seeking gold but hadn’t found any so they peacefully settled as opposed to having wars on their soil. This likely explains their dominance as being the safest country in Latin America (this might be changing as the east coast is increasingly being utilized to traffic cocaine to Europe). Costa Rica particularly scores high in freedom indexes, press freedom, internet freedom on a global scale ranking extremely high every year. That’s Pura Vida for you.
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So, who is it for?
From a Latin America sense, I believe why it’s more pricey relative to the region is because you are paying for 3 different things. 1) Safety: even with some increasingly crime rates in certain areas of the country, it remains one of the safest in the Ibero-America. 2) Tourism: Costa Ricans know they have beautiful nature and capitalize on this. Their eco-tourism brings lots of money & significantly supports the economy every year but with this causes elevated prices. What are you going to travel all way to the rainforest and then not pay that extra $25 dollars? 3) Taxes. There have been some new taxes on new residents unfortunately but as it stands now, Costa Rica operates under a territorial tax rule where foreign-sourced income is not touched. There’s a question if you’re “controlling” a business from Costa Rica, but this is appealing for those who are hands off or surviving off passive investments from rentals, pension, dividends or interest.
Closing
In closing, I came to Costa Rica with expectations of it being a 1st world country. I expected more English, more civility, more modernity, more development and generally more quality. What I found was a place somewhat in between that and a poor-place. The place itself is a mellow hideout with many spots in the rainforest and the people enjoy it like that. Everything is so lush and green that it’s something really spectacular to witness–but don’t expect to see tall rise buildings or great architecture. If you can avoid the homeless or criminal-types, Costa Rican people are very welcoming and friendly. Costa Rica still remains a great retiree place, if you’re open to the realities of living in the wild and you have the chequebook. In other words, Costa Rica is really slow pace of life is sort of a retirement paradise that makes sense for the right type of individual.
I’d definitely go back, perhaps when the real estate/agri prices recede a little to take advantage of tobacco, coffee plants or plentiful fruit trees.
When I compare this to other locations outside of Central America, I’m not sure it’s numero uno on my list though–from a professional point of view I believe Uruguay and Panama are superior and I think Mexico offers more safety (in the right areas) for far cheaper, with far more items & selection, better flight connections & overall more variety. Argentina also has ultra low prices right now because of their high inflation.
Comparing Mexico to Costa Rica you can say that there pretty much are the same landscapes, less critters, better food and can an offer to live indistinguishably from another 1st world country (again, in select places). Mexico taxes and bureaucracy are especially awful, but with the money saved by living here part of the year, it opens the possibility to obtain a more tax friendly residency giving you two residencies as opposed to just one. Either way, Pura Vida amigos.
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