I phoned the hotel from a pay phone in Heredia.
The line crackled so badly I could barely tell whether someone was speaking or whether the connection had dropped. Every sentence became a negotiation.
“¿Tiene… habitación?”
Static.
“¿Cómo?”
I repeated myself, slower this time.
More static.
By the end of the call, I wasn’t completely certain I’d reserved a room, but the voice had eventually said “sí,” and that felt close enough.
Somehow, it was.
~
A few days later, my brother, his girlfriend, and I rode a bus to Puntarenas beneath a hard tropical sun.
We were headed across the water to the cabin I’d reserved, but before we left I wanted to arrange the next leg of our journey.
I found a ticket window and stepped up to the counter.
The woman behind it sat beneath a small fan. It blew directly at the back of her neck, but sweat still ran down her face.
I held up three fingers in the sunlight.
“Monteverde.”
She shook her head.
“No buses.”
“Tomorrow then?”
I looked at the schedule.
There were no times I could understand. No buses I could identify. Just rows of Spanish words and numbers behind a sheet of scratched glass.
“Next day?”
She shook her head.
I turned toward my brother.
“Apparently they’re not going to Monteverde.”
He looked at the ticket window.
“Then when are we going?”
I turned back to the woman.”
She shrugged.
“Next week only.”
I stared at her.
“Semana Santa.”
Of course.
Holy Week.
Easter.
~
My brother collapsed into a patch of shade with his girlfriend.
“We’ll wait here.”
Then I wandered from storefront to storefront looking for another way into the mountains.
Rental cars were gone.
Shuttle companies were full.
One travel agency finally offered a solution—a private jeep.
It cost almost ten times as much as the bus.
I booked it anyway.
“Meet the driver here.”
The agent pointed toward the road beside the ferry dock.
“Three days. Ten o’clock. Morning.”
~
Three days later we returned to Puntarenas, ferrying back across the gulf exactly where he’d told us to meet.
I wiped the sweat from my eyes and checked the time—9:50.
There was no jeep.
We waited.
Every few minutes another shuttle pulled in, loaded passengers, and drove away.
Not ours.
Eventually I spotted a different shuttle with the same company’s name painted on the side.
My brother ran over before it could leave.
“You forgot us.”
The driver sighed, picked up his radio, and spoke for a minute.
Then he nodded.
“They’re coming.”
So we waited again.
The sun climbed higher.
The air was stagnant.
I crinkled my nose—it smelled like low tide.
Nearby, a restaurant opened its doors.
They weren’t selling food today, but the shade felt nice.
I found seats and watched the fan overhead chipping slowly at the humid air.
Through the window, my brother sat on the curb, having never left his post beside the wrong jeep.
When it finally appeared hours later, our relief lasted about thirty seconds.
The driver turned the key.
Something clunked beneath the hood.
He climbed out, muttered something I didn’t understand, and disappeared beneath the vehicle with another man carrying a toolbox.
We waited again.
Nobody seemed frustrated.
Nobody argued.
It was Holy Week after all.
The buses weren’t running.
The mechanics weren’t in a hurry.
We all went back inside.