Last night Norm paid a local man to sit guard over our vehicles throughout the night. I am not sure that this was necessary but he certainly carried out his part of the deal as he was still awake guarding us when we woke at 5:00 am this morning.

A quick breakfast and we were on the road at 6:00 am in the hope that early at the border would give a good outcome for Norm's friend. Unfortunately that was not to be - Irelanda could enter Costa Rica but not cross into Panama. We were all disappointed.

The border crossing followed the pattern of all our crossings. We waited while Norm did the paper work. First get out of Nicaragua and then the more complicated process of getting into the new country. There seemed to be a few less men offering to help at this border, and there were a lot more gringo tourists.

One interesting item at this border was the Ford Excursion we parked near while waiting at Costa Rica customs. It was black, just like Norms, was a little battle worn, had californian plates, expired tabs, and one flat tire looked like it had been parked there for many days. I assumed there was an unhappy story to go with it.

After the border we drove for about 25 miles to the entrance to Santa Rosa National Park, and decided to drop in and look at the park. We spent some time at a little museum made from a converted ranch house that had some exhibits about some battles that Costa Rica had fought with Nicaragua. The park was cool and the environment pleasant so we decided to stay the day and night in the camping ground. We were able to arrange lunch and dinner in the cafe that provided meals to the park staff. Both really nice meals.

At the camp ground we found a couple of Canadians Tyler and Ray who were backpacking and had been at the park for some days, they told us that they were carrying too much gear to be adequately mobile and were making arrangements to leave some with a local friend - I did not think anything of this until I saw that they had solar powered garden lamps to place around their camp; then I concluded they probably did have a little too much stuff -- no offense intended guys. They gave us the run down on the animals we might - if lucky - get to see. But unfortunately we did not get very lucky.

Nina and I took a walk after lunch down the road towards the beach but did not get far enough to see the beach just enough exercise to digest lunch and hot enough to appreciate the shade offered by the beautiful large trees covering the campground