Returning To Ride LA LINEA DE TREN

Discovering La Ruta de los Conquistadores greatly enhanced my experience in Costa Rica. After the ride up Volcano Irazu and around Volcano Turrialba (more here), the final section from Siquirres to Limón follows an interesting route along a semi-used railway track for 60 or so kilometres. Part of it is dirt road that runs along…

Into Panama and Bocas del Toro

My plan was to get to Cahuita that evening after finally arriving in the Caribbean. Unfortunately my puncture that took me an hour to fix (see last post) delayed me significantly and it was fully dark and I was still 10km from my destination. Locals warned me that it was dangerous to travel at night…

Railway bridges – Costa Rican Caribbean

This post describes my first attempt to cycle la linea de tren from Siquirres to Limón on a fully loaded bike; crossing the bridges was an unnerving yet exhilarating experience. After arriving from Turrialba in Santa Cruz I didn’t feel like losing more altitude so I  took an alternate route which climbed back up via…

Across San José to Tres Rios

It was good to leave the touristy La Fortuna and head on towards more volcanoes but I also had San José in my way. It’s never fun crossing Central American capital cities on a loaded (or unloaded) bicycle and this was no exception. I couldn’t find a nice route around San Jose unfortunately since I…

Peninsula de Osa, side trip

The Pensinsula de Osa sits on the Pacific side close to the Panamanian border and holds the largest park in Costa Rica: Corcovado National Park. Quoting Wiki, National Geographic describes it as “the most biologically intense place on Earth in terms of biodiversity”.  Since it was a few hundred kms to get down there and time was…