Limon, Costa Rica

The 4th stop on the cruise was on the east coast of Costa Rica...  at Limon.  Bill and I spent one winter outside of San Jose, kind of in the middle of the country, and another winter near Playa Coco, close to the beaches on the Pacific Ocean.  So we were looking forward to seeing what the east coast would be like.  I know the few hours the ship gives you to play tourist really isn't very long, but first impressions seem to stay with a person.

The docking area was only a short walk to downtown...  just walk along the pier, through the security area and the bazaars (typical tourist souvenirs - but a huge building full of booths), and out into the town.  We wanted to use our shore time to find an internet cafe...  and for the price of a couple of soft drinks, we got caught up on e-mail...  mostly deleting the hundred or so unimportant messages.

I don't know if these are meant to keep the shore from washing away in a storm or just what, but this area wasn't meant for lounging around under umbrellas on sandy beaches.

There was a very nice city park...  lots of statues and such.  Typical of many places we've seen in Costa Rica, the trees are white-washed up about 3' or so.  

There was an event going on in the downtown streets..

October is breast cancer month and Limon had an event to make folks aware....  a walk (mostly women, but a few males as well), informational booths, a stage set up for either speakers or entertainment....  it was most definitely a Pink day that Saturday morning!

Of course I had to find a geocache...

This was a "virtual"...  take a photo of yourself holding your GPS in front of the statue of Christopher Columbus (and you thought his only fame was discovering America).  

We spent a couple of hours wandering about the town.  I know shore excursions were available, but we were happy just to get off the ship and walk a while.  I wanted to have an Imperial beer (one brewed in Costa Rica), but we never got around to it.  Oh well...  next time.

On the way back to the ship we saw iguana hanging out on the rocks  along the edge of the water...

The colors and various textures of his/her skin  is amazing!

Look how long his tail is!

There was a huge pile of lettuce leaves nearby.  I don't know if the townspeople or the ship kitchen feeds these guys, but they sure had plenty to eat that day.

I did manage to get a pretty good shot of our cruise ship...

The Coral Princess

When we go ashore we often look around wondering if this is a place we'd like to come back to for an extended stay.  Maybe a few hours isn't long enough, and there really wasn't anything negative...  but it's not likely we'll return to Limon.

That's All For Today!