trip planning and the internets

These days you have to be quite internet savvy to plan any sort of trip. It's never as easy as you think it'll be. You start on one site, click on a link here - a link there - and soon enough, you have webbed yourself so far off from where you started, you have to press the "back" button until you remember what you were searching for in the first place. Buses, private shuttles, hostels, reviews, the distance from one place the next (so key!)... the information you need is NEVER all in one place.

All the traveling I've been doing lately makes me think more and more about starting a truly handy travel website. The handiest site I've ever found was travelfish.org - which I used when planning for South East Asia. Thus far, I haven't found anything that handy for Costa Rica.

What DOES help when planning, though, are friends who have traveled or lived there before! Yay friends! Handy, indeed. My friend, Matt Mcgorty, has hooked me up with some of his local Costa Rican friends in Heredia - a town about 30 minutes outside of the country's capital - where I plan on starting my trip. His friend, Carlos, has already been extremely helpful in recommending hotels - and even offering to take me our for drinks and pick me up at the airport? Unreal.

I'm hopefully going to stay at this place, appropriately called HOTEL AMERICA. (If that isn't right up Mike Morrell's alley, then I don't know what is.)

Photo from http://www.hotelamericacr.com

Making a reservation there is so far proving to be difficult, as their site doesn't seem to work properly. But I'll make it happen. All of your fearing people out there ("What? You leave on Sunday and haven't booked anything? Be careful!") can rest knowing that I have a shuttle bus reservation from Heredia to Arenal - and I have a hostel reservation (Arenal Backpacker's Resort) for Arenal as well. It has great reviews, a pool, and best of all - (supposedly) beautiful views of the Volcano!

Photo from arenalbackpackersresort.com

OmgI'mGettingExcited.