Cartago: 1st to 2nd June

01/06/09

After spending the first four days of our trip in San Jose, on 1st June we moved on to Cartago, which was the colonial capital of Costa Rica for almost 300 years. After the relative luxury of our hostel in San Jose, the accommodation we had reserved in Cartago was a bit of a shock, but it's all part of the adventure I guess :)

Cartago itself does not have much to offer in the way of sights or things to do. We spent most of our two days in the surrounding countryside, which is very beautiful and a breath of fresh air after the dirt and noise of the capital, but more about those later.

The two things of note in Cartago are the basilica, which is breathtaking, both inside and out, and the ruins of an old church, which house a beautiful garden. You can't go inside but you're able to view the garden from various gates around the outside. We visited the basilica twice and both times managed to catch a service, which in spite of not being able to understand, I really enjoyed. The first time we were there, we were surprised when towards the end of the service a family of four shuffled past us on their knees along the centre aisle towards the altar. We had never seen anything like this before and were checking for other peoples' reactions to this strange sight, but it seems to be the norm here, for it wasn't long before the family were joined by several other worshippers. It was an incredible sight, and like proper tourists we were at the back taking photos. Well, actually, the first day I made Vic take them because I wasn't sure if it was allowed. He took two photos, one good and one not so good, and later on in the day, I accidentally deleted the good one, which is partly the reason we went back again the next day, when we took more photos and a video :)

Aside from that, the time spent in the surrounding areas of the Orosi Valley, Paraiso, Cachi and Ujarras, and the various people we spoke to along the way, made the couple of days in Cartago truly great. More details and photos to follow in the next post :)