A day of firsts

Poor old Charlie had spent the past 36 hours with an unforgiving and relentless stomach bug. It had sapped him of his energy and rendered him useless until finally the cocktail of pharmaceuticals started to take effect. With this window of opportunity to move more than 10m away from the bathroom, Charlie was ready to get the hell out of Costa Rica and make a break for Panama  along with Tom, Alex and I.

We stuffed down another tasty buffet breakfast, packed our bikes, oiled the chains and planned our route towards the smaller Costa Rica/Panama border crossing in Rio Sereno. We had it from good advice that this was a much calmer, more relaxed and less bureaucratic way to exit and enter countries.

This was a bitter sweet moment for me. On one hand, my motorbike adventure was officially about to begin after almost a year of planning; on the other, I was genuinely nervous about what I was getting myself in for. 

As a convoy of 4 bikes, we left our hotel in San Jose and headed towards the Pacific coast. It wasn't long before the heavens opened and sent down a torrential rain storm. Needing gas, we found cover at a local gas station where we also took the opportunity to get our rain gear on. There was talk about waiting out the worst of the storm but it soon became obvious that we would be waiting a long wait. It was now or never.

Soon enough we were in 10,000ft altitude, soaking to the bone and traversing pot hole ridden twisty wet roads whenever we could actually see them through the fog. It didn't take long to start discovering the short-comings of my gear. My helmet in particular was failing spectacularly. Knowing I would only be riding during daylight hours, I bought my tinted visor. Not the best equipment choice when you're high in the mountains and in low light from the dark clouds above sending down thick, heavy rain. Put the visor up and my moments of clear vision were obviously interrupted with intense discomfort as needle like rain peppered my face like a blast from a shotgun. Visor down means an instant fog up and a Ray Charles type perspective of the road ahead. Most of my time was spent alternating between two or three visor positions to find the optimal balance of comfort and visibility. Oh well, you ride, you learn I guess!

About the time I started to lose the feeling in a few of my fingers, I saw Charlie (in the lead) pull over to a small restaurant somewhere high in the mountains. Funnily enough it was called "Charlie's Restaurant". We all followed keen to get escape from these conditions for a moment or two. 

I thought about the past few hours ride and just how mentally exhausting it was. My first day of riding in Costa Rica was also the first day I have ever ridden my bike fully loaded, the first time in fog, rain or altitude and all while on the opposite side of the road accustomed too. To be honest, I didn't have the spare brain power to love it or to hate it. I was just doing my best to continue living from turn to turn. 

Being my first day on the road with these boys, I wasn't in any rush to admit any weakness. These guys had been riding for months, who am I to have a whinge on day one. They however were well entitled to whinge and whinge they did. It wasn't just me finding these conditions challenging after all. We all had a hot drink to warm up, some sugary treats to boost morale and energy before changing gloves and for those that had them; setting our heated hand grips to max. 

We continued on down through the mountains passing a small town who's name escapes me and pushed on towards the coast. After another grueling 50km low vis mountain run, we approached a t-section where I could soon see the Pacific Ocean. It was now pushing on towards 5 or 6pm at this stage so we turned off into a small beach town call Dominical for the night. 

We were all wet, tired and hungry riders and more than ready for a remedy for all three. We found a place to sleep all 4 of us, and promptly set-up an arsenal of fans to try and dry our gear for the following day. While we pretended that would actually work, we found some food, had a beer and hit the sack to prepare for the border crossing the next day.

Exciting!