{jcomments lock}We’ve been getting a lot of emails from soon-to-be digital nomads planning to drive down the PanAm. Not that I’m complaining about emails. I love them. It makes me feel famous.
However, I have answered the same “what gear do you most recommend?” question at least three times this month and that leads me to believe there’s some people out there that would really appreciate if I’d put all our really awesome digital nomad gear, particularly for overlanders, in one neat little list. I do understand that reading through our entire Central American Packing List is not a fun experience.
This article is part of our Accommodation Listing series.{jcomments lock}
This article is part of our Internet and Phone Report series.{jcomments lock}
General Availability: High
Quality of Bandwidth: Medium-High
Frequency of Internet in Campgrounds: Rare – Most campgrounds are in national reserves. Don’t expect any internet unless there is an established hotel or restaurant.
Frequency of Internet in Hotels: High (we think). We only stayed at two hotels and both had internet.
We spent more than a month in Costa Rica and covered most regions with the exception of the Caribbean coast. A good part of our time was spent camping in remote areas. We started in the North at Bahia Junquilla, then went south into Nicoya to a few beach towns. We hit the heavily touristed areas around Arenal and Monte Verde, then we spent a week with family in Atenas, just west of San Jose. From the capital we headed south to Cartago, then spent a few days in the mountains on the Pan-Am Highway. We spent a night on the coast near Domical and then headed to Osa, first to Bahia Drake and then Carate.
This article is part of our Budget and Money Report series.{jcomments lock}
Our per diem expenses cover food, lodging, gas and other supplies and travel costs for three people. We travel in a 1997 Toyota 4Runner, tent camp in paid facilities roughly 70% of our nights and eat less than 10% of our meals in restaurants. This budget does not reflect personal spending money, which is mostly used to buy souvenirs and booze. We don't track this money, but we do know we have not come close to spending our budgeted amount of $10 per person per day.
Hooray, you've gotten to go at least six weeks without reading one of these! This time we're in Costa Rica, the most expensive country we've been in since leaving Mexico.
We set an aggressive per diem of just under $70 per day to cover food, gas, lodging and supplies. We had to work very hard to stay under this amount, but in the end we pulled it off. Just barely.
It's worth mentioning that a big reason we kept our per diem this low is that we had ten days of lodging paid for while our parents came down for a visit. We still paid our share of the groceries and gas, but for more than a quarter of our time in Costa Rica we had a free place to stay.
Start: May 22, Puerto Jimenez {jcomments lock}
Finish: May 25, Carate
Miles Hiked Through Jungle: 25
Bugs Measuring Over Four Inches Seen: 6
Rivers Crossed By Car or By Foot: 16
We had one helluvan adventure this past weekend. The proverbial shit got real, and then hit the fan. In which order, I'm still not sure. It oscillated. Something about a jungle, an 11 mile hike and crossing a dozen or so rivers by car and on foot while experiencing biodiversity the likes of which only exists in a handful of places on earth.
I've been looking forward to this trip since the day I started reading about Central America. Corcovado. This was a once-in-a-lifetime (aka, I'll never do it again) hike. You may have heard of it from such shows as Planet Earth, or Life, or something you would have see on the National Geographic channel before they started with the ghost whispering.
The experts estimate that Corcovado National Park is home to 5% of all life on the planet. Five percent. This park is tiny, you can walk across it in three days. There are more crazy critters packed into this place than you can shake a stick at. And trust me, I shook my stick at plenty of 'em.
Start: May 13, Cerro de la Muerte {jcomments lock}
Finish: May 21, Puerto Jiménez
Trout Successfully Speared in the Face: 0
Nights Camped for Free on Awesome Beach: 2
Scarlet Macaws Seen: About a Hundred
We've been in Costa Rica a bit more than a month now, and it's safe to say that we're beginning to understand the ubiquitous phrase "pura vida". Literally translated it means "pure life". In Costa Rica it's a way to say hello, goodbye or awesome! More to the point, it means "plenty of life" or "this is living".
This past week we have certainly done plenty of living! In the process, Costa Rica has been nearing the top of my all-time favorite list. I may finally have an answer when people ask me what the best place on our trip has been.
We started the week way up in the mountains of south-central Costa Rica, on Cerro de la Muerte (the hill of death), hanging out with our overlanding friends, catching fish and getting back into the camping groove.
From there we backtracked towards San Jose to visit an old friend of Kobus in Cartago, then went on to the location of our last great Costa Rican adventure: the Osa Peninsula, home of the Corcovado jungle.
Start: April 29, El Castillo {jcomments lock}
Finish: May 12, Atenas
River Crossings: One Big, Five Small
Consecutive Days Camping: 21
Nights Spent in Ridiculous Vacation House: 8
Birds Successfully Identified: About 30
The past two weeks have brought us through several extremes. First, we set a record for the number of consecutive days spent camping. Then we move into a vacation house with our visiting parents that may very well be the nicest place I've spent a night.
Our travels took us from the shores of Lake Arenal, along three hours of dirt road, through several rivers and eventually to the town of Santa Elena, situated high in the cloud forests of north-central Costa Rica. From there we dropped down to Atenas, a short hop east of the capital city San Jose, where we spent a very relaxing week with family; visiting, recharging and day-tripping our way around central Costa Rica.
Start: April 22, Junquillal Bay {jcomments lock}
Finish: April 29, El Castillo
Nights Campin' With Critters: All of 'em
Baseball Size Wasps Seen: 3
Costa Rica! Pura vida. We've been here for little over a week and have camped the entire time. Every day brings a new creature into our campsite, and every night we tuck in early to avoid the bugs, some of which are down right monstrous.
We started our Costa Rica experience on the coast, just south of the Nicaraguan border camped in a national park. Then headed to the Nicoya Peninsula and stayed five nights on the beach in three different places.
After becoming fed up with the heat we drove inland towards the Arenal region to see one of the world's most active volcanoes and picturesque lakes.
This article is part of our Border Crossing Report series. {jcomments lock}
Border name: Peñas Blancas
Closest major cities: San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua and La Cruz, Costa Rica
Cost to exit Nicaragua: C$67 Cordobas ($3 USD) per person ($1USD tax, $2USD for the stamp)
Cost for vehicle: CR$2175 colones ($4.50 USD) fumigation, CR$8365 colones ($17 USD) insurance
Total time: 2 hours
Date crossed: Saturday, April 23, 2012
Update September 2013: Please see the notes in the comments from Patrick & Marijke for the latest info on this border crossing. Thanks guys!
This is a long post. I'm sorry, but it's unavoidable. Before we get into this arduous process in detail, let's cover a few pieces of general advice. {jcomments lock}
There has been a rumor for about four months now that a ferry service is going to start up between Colon and Cartagena. Currently, first sailing is scheduled for July 2nd, but along with quetzals, I don’t believe it exists. The ferry has been delayed three times due to the bureaucratic permit process. Meaning it’s in the hand of corrupt officials and slow-moving government employees.
First-hand info about the ferry is being posted on Drive the Americas.
This article is part of our Budget and Money Report series.{jcomments lock}
Our per diem expenses cover food, lodging, gas and other supplies and travel costs for three people. We travel in a 1997 Toyota 4Runner, tent camp in paid facilities roughly 70% of our nights and eat less than 10% of our meals in restaurants. This budget does not reflect personal spending money, which is mostly used to buy souvenirs and booze. We don't track this money, but we do know we have not come close to spending our budgeted amount of $10 per person per day.
This country took our budget, grabbed it by the throat, and chucked it into a dirty Panama City gutter. Then kicked it in the ribs a couple times for good measure. We tried our best, for the most part, to keep things reasonable. Unfortunately, a combination of poor pre-trip budgeting and unforeseen events left us more than $600 over budget after our short stay of 19 days in Panama. Youch.
Panama's not a cheap country by Central American standards, but it's better than Costa Rica. We did great in that country, so it stands to reason that we could have saved money in Panama as well. However, we ended up doing quite the opposite.
This article is part of our Internet and Phone Report series.{jcomments lock}
General Availability: High
Quality of Bandwidth: Medium
Frequency of Internet in Campgrounds: Average. Camping in a hostel or hotel, there will be internet. Camping at a national park, there won’t be any access.
Frequency of Internet in Hotels: High
We spent just under three weeks in Panama, and although that seems like a long time we didn't see much of the country. We spent a few days in Boquete, a few more in Santa Fe, and then headed to the Azuero Penninsula. We stayed a week on Playa Uverito near Las Tablas and then went to Panama City for a few days to arrange the shipment of our car to Colombia.
In general, internet is available everywhere. There were small internet cafes in every town, and several in tourist areas. Some restaurants and coffee shops had internet, but not as many as you’d think. Surprisingly, in the town of Boquete which is known for its huge selection of coffee shops, we drove around for more than an hour looking for one that internet without luck.
Start: May 25, Boquete, Panama{jcomments lock}
Finish: June 13, Panama City
Dirty Dancing Devils Seen: hundreds
Words Written: ~75,000
From the heat of the Osa Peninsula in Costa Rica we beelined for the mountains of Boquete, spent a few days enjoying the cool mountain air, before searching out a better camping spot near Santa Fe.
Then we headed out to a beach house on the Auzero Penninsula to get caught up on work and to get a few big projects underway. We took the time to cook a few delicious meals and to take part in Panama's totally crazy Corpus Christi festival.
This article is part of our Border Crossing Report series. {jcomments lock}
Border Name: Paso Canoas
Closest Major Cities: Ciudad Neily, Costa Rica and David, Panama
Cost for Visas: $1 per person for Panama entry
Cost for Vehicle: $15 for insurance, $1.60 for copies
Total Time: 1.25 hours
Date Crossed: Monday May 28, 2012
{jcomments lock}This article is part of our Accommodation Listing series.
{jcomments lock}Finding decent places to tent camp has been an ongoing struggle since leaving Mexico. Sure, there are plenty of empty parking lots, gas stations and restaurants we could pull in to, provided we could sleep in our vehicle as most overlanders do. But we prefer not to spend our nights in a tent pitched on gravel next to the highway.
Colombia has been a welcome relief from campground-sparse Central America. Not only are there plenty of campsites, there are more amazing places to spend a night in a tent than we've yet experienced on this trip. We normally publish a listing of where we spend our nights in each country, but after staying in over 60 campgrounds, we feel these five deserve extra attention. Super-friendly owners, free coffee, honor-system beer coolers, spectacular scenery and more amenities than we've seen anywhere else. You can't go wrong.
{jcomments lock}This article is part of our Internet and Phone Report series.
General Availability: High
Quality of Bandwidth: Medium
Frequency of Internet in Campgrounds: Medium-High
Frequency of Internet in Hotels: High
We went in loops in Colombia. It’s a huge country and after six weeks we barely scratched the surface. We started in Cartagena, then spent some time in the north around Tayrona National Park. Then we headed southeast to the mountain town of San Gil and to Villa de Leyva.
From San Gil we headed through Bogota to the Zona Cafetera (Manizales & Salento). We backtracked north for a week in Medellin before driving south through Cali to Popayan, Pasto and finally into Ecuador.
Internet availability is excellent. Almost every hotel, hostel and guesthouse had some type of connection. Most of the places we camped also had a hotel and restaurant attached. Usually the hotel or restaurant had wifi that we were allowed to use. With the exception of national parks, all of the campgrounds we stayed at had some sort of internet.
{jcomments lock}This article is part of our Budget and Money Report series.
Our per diem expenses cover food, lodging, gas and other supplies and travel costs for three people. We travel in a 1997 Toyota 4Runner, tent camp in paid facilities roughly 70% of our nights and eat less than 10% of our meals in restaurants. This budget does not reflect personal spending money, which is mostly used to buy souvenirs and booze. We don't track this money, but we do know we have not come close to spending our budgeted amount of $10 per person per day.
Colombia surprised us in many ways. Most were good: great people, spectacular campsites and beautiful scenery, but it came at a cost that we were not entirely prepared for. That's not to say we did bad, in fact if it wasn't for higher than expected costs related to importing our vehicle, and a $200 Amazon.com resupply run, we would have pretty much broke even.
A bit of Googling would have better prepared us. We relied too much on our horribly out-of-date Lonely Planet Colombia book when coming up with the budget for this country. We found food and lodging costs to be at least 25% more than the listings from 2009. Couple that with the $600 we were over budget in Panama, and we had to seriously pinch the pennies to stay on target.
Start: July 6, Salento {jcomments lock}
Finish: July 28, Pance
Fantastic Campgrounds: 5
Hours Spent Repairing Our Tents: 7
Cups of Great Coffee Drank: Dozens
Cardboard Boxes of Rum Drank: 2
It's been nearly three weeks since I've given y'all an update on our trip. Not because we've been busy, quite the opposite. Our pace has slowed considerably. Many days have been spent relaxing; sipping some of the world's best coffee, cooking good food and meeting tons of friendly Colombians.
Colombia is an easy country to get sucked into. In the past month we've stayed at half a dozen places that I could easily rank in the top ten of this trip. Our stop in Salento was number 100, and a couple days ago we clocked 300 days on the road. With less than a week left to spend in Colombia, I can honestly say I will miss this country more than most.
{jcomments lock}Why? That is always the question. Why do you like bugs? What is it that you like about them?
Well honestly I do not know. What I do know is that I like em all. Little ones, colorful ones, big ones, hairy ones and even the scary ones, I like 'em all.
When I was young, very young, I used to collect spiders of all kinds. I would pick them like ripe fruit from window sills, nooks and crannies, under leaves and in trees. I would find them and toss them all in one big glass jar. I had my very own ultimate bug fight club.
Start: July 14, Atlanta {jcomments lock}
Finish: July 21, Santa Elena
Number of PowerPoint Slides Seen: Thousands
Number of Prescription Drugs Received: 4
Number One Question of the Week: “Why is Jessica in Atlanta?”
Number Two Question of the Week: “Hey Jessica, aren’t you supposed to be in South America or something?”
Hi friends. I know I don’t write many trip updates, but I was alone on this venture, so here it is, coming to you from the great state of Georgia.
Before I became a digital nomad a good part of my freelance business was designing onscreen graphics for big conferences. Part of this job entails traveling onsite and being available for last minute changes. My biggest client is, of course, Microsoft.
This year, I was contacted to work onsite again at the biggest show of the year. They offered to fly me from wherever I was in South America, and even covered an extra night hotel accommodation so I could buy things, like business appropriate shoes. (Yes, my clients are awesome.)
Start: June 24, Tyrona National Park{jcomments lock}
Finish: July 5, Guatavita
Elevation Gain: 10,000 feet
Super Friendly Colombians Met: Dozens
Colonial Towns Visited: 3
Wineries Toured: 1
The past ten days have taken us nearly 1,000 miles from the Caribbean coast to the central highlands of Colombia near the capitol city of Bogota. We've spent quite a few long days on the road and have seen plenty of spectacular scenery along the way.
It's hard to say I'm surprised about how great Colombia has been. Between fellow travelers and a long-time colleague of mine (hola Miguel!), I've heard plenty of good news about this country.
But it still feels a bit unexpected. Coming from the US, this is not a country with many positive stereotypes. Granted, we don't pay much attention to that stuff anyway, but it still affects your expectations whether you want it to or not.
{jcomments lock}Here we go again. As if you didn't have enough fun reading the last 3,500 work article I wrote about part 1 of the shipping process, here is another 3,500 word post on part 2. I hope that someone out there finds this helpful, otherwise I'll be sad about all the time I wasted when I could have been drinking cheap Aquilas and prefecting my chocolate banana pancake recipe. Here we go...
Start: June 13, Playa Uverito, Panama{jcomments lock}
Finish: June 23, Tayrona National Park, Colombia
New Continents: 1!!!
Days Without Our Car: 8
Hours Spent Waiting For Something to Happen: Hundreds
Average Temperature in Cartagena: 32C (90F) with 110% Humidity
We had a saying at my last job: hurry up and wait. It is quite possible that the bureaucratic nightmare of working in IT for a hospital on a military base prepared me for the past two weeks. Then again, I doubt anything could compare to the hassle of shipping a car 150 miles from Panama to Colombia. Mostly because of how simple this process could be, and how expensive and convoluted it actually is.
But it's over. The dirty business is done and we shall speak of it no more except in the presence of strong alcoholic beverages. Truth be told, it could have been a lot worse. Our experience was certainly not as bad as others, but I'd still not wish it on anyone.
{jcomments lock}This article is part of our Accommodation Listing series.
{jcomments lock}This article is part of our Budget and Money Report series.
Our per diem expenses cover food, lodging, gas and other supplies and travel costs for three people. We travel in a 1997 Toyota 4Runner, tent camp in paid facilities roughly 70% of our nights and eat less than 10% of our meals in restaurants. This budget does not reflect personal spending money, which is mostly used to buy souvenirs and booze. We don't track this money, but we do know we have not come close to spending our budgeted amount of $10 per person per day.
The past two countries (Colombia and Panama) have not been very kind to our wallet. Fortunately, after two months of overspending, Ecuador allowed us to recoup some loses. Not much, only about $50, but it's a start!
Ecuador is well known for being a budget-travelers dream. Along with Bolivia, it's said to be one of the cheapest countries in South America for overlanders. Much of this is thanks to the phenomenal gas prices - $1/gallon for diesel, $1.50 for regular and $2 for high-octane.
Start: August 10, Cotopaxi National Park, Ecuador {jcomments lock}
Finish: August 25, Mancora, Peru
Ebooks Published: 1
Ceviches Sampled: 2
Deep Dish Pizzas Made: 3
Nights Camped in the Amazon: 1
The past couple weeks we wrapped up our time in Ecuador. By all accounts one of the most scenic and ecologically diverse countries we've visited. From our two-mile-high campsite in the shadow of Volcan Cotopaxi, we head through the Ecuadorian Altiplano and into the Amazon jungle for a brief (and wet) one-night stay.
From the jungle we head back into the high plains, cross the Andes and arrive in the Peruvian desert, pictured above. Our stay in Ecuador was short, just shy of three weeks, and the huge variety of landscapes, climates and people we met made the time fly by.
This article is part of our Internet and Phone Report series.{jcomments lock}
General availability: High
Quality of bandwidth: Medium
Frequency of internet in campgrounds: Medium
Frequency of internet in hotels: Medium-High
We spent three weeks in Ecuador, mostly in the highlands. We covered a good bit of the country except for the coast. From Otavalo we went south through Quito to the Quilotoa loop and then west to Baños. From there we headed further south to Macas near the Amazon basin. Then we looped back through Sangay National Park to Cuenca before heading to Loja and across the border to Peru.
Like Colombia, internet availability is excellent. Every hostel we stayed in had internet and only one hotel in a small town did not. Internet cafes are so prevalent you’ll get sick of them, but be careful because not all cafes have wifi. One even refused to let us unhook the ethernet cables to use our own laptops. In big towns you’ll be able to plug in a wifi extender and find an open network. But it’s not likely you’ll need to do that, every hostel around offers free wifi.
Start: July 29, 2012, Las Lajas, Colombia {jcomments lock}
Finish: August 9, 2012, Cotopaxi National Park, Ecuador
Fish Caught at 12,000 Feet: 0
Llamas Ridden: 1
Meals Made With Dutch Oven: 6
Hemispheres Driven In: 2!
The past week we wrapped up our time in beautiful Colombia and headed south to the mountains of Ecuador. In the process we visited a very unique church, crossed our first South American border, went fishing at 12,000 feet and camped below one spectacular volcano.
It's tough to leave Colombia, a country that quickly found its way to the top of our list of places to return to. But we're excited about Ecuador. From the Andes to the Amazon, it looks to be a very diverse country with plenty of great campsites and wilderness to enjoy. Bring it on!