

The Golden Gringo Chronicles  
&  
Rudimentary Guide to Retirement in Costa Rica

True Stories from a U.S. Ex-Patriot  
Living in Latin America

Novel in Three Parts

This is Part One – Leaving the Homeland

By Bob Normand

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2014 Bob Normand. This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return toSmashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

The trilogy:
Part 1: Leaving the Homeland  
Part 2: Surviving in Costa Rica, the Early Years  
Part 3: Becoming Tico, Maybe
Contents

Synopsis – Part One

Chapter One – Decision Time

Chapter Two – Preparing for the Exodus

Chapter Three – Driving to Costa Rica

Chapter Four – Plan B

Chapter Five – Costa Rica or Bust

Chapter Six – Settling In

Chapter Seven – The First Weeks

Chapter Eight – Am I Tico Yet?

About the Author

Other Books by Bob Normand

Synopsis – Part One

This is a true story of a gringo in his sixties who visited Costa Rica eight times over five years, felt very comfortable visiting the country and decided to retire there at the age of 65. Our hero's name is Dudley Bodoh and his resemblance to the author is significant.

The story explains the reasoning process behind Dudley's decision to move to Costa Rica and why he decided to take up residence on the south central pacific coast in a small town called Quepos that is contiguous with a well-known resort area called Manuel Antonio. His love for the beach and the wildness that is the Costa Rican jungle, as well as the friendliness of the natives leads him to choose this particular part of a beautiful country. He analyzes his living situation in Florida and concludes that leaving behind all he'd known for ten years would be emotionally difficult but easily accomplished physically.

In a rush of enthusiasm, our hero decides to drive to his adopted country but runs into many obstacles that challenge his unbridled and unrealistic expectations. Problems mount further for Dudley when a new friend and expected travel companion who was fluent in Spanish, surprises our hero by announcing a few days before departure that he can't go _for legal reasons!_ Undaunted by this reversal, Dudley decides to drive to Costa Rica alone but encounters a fresh set of problems, some of which he created himself, that turn him back from the Mexican border.

Dudley then spends a whole weekend in Brownsville, Texas ruminating about his trip and the problems he is facing. He receives some unexpected wisdom from a chance encounter with a young lady on the beach at South Padre Island. And, after meeting some experienced Central America travelers (legal and illegal) in a Brownsville restaurant Dudley decides to reverse his decision to drive to Costa Rica, return to Sarasota and come up with a Plan B. Within two weeks he is able to sell his car and reduce his belongings to a couple of suitcases. The he accompanies three ladies on a trip by air to Costa Rica that he had planned months before, using an airline ticket he had planned to abandon.

Once there our hero took up residence sharing an apartment with an acquaintance he had met on a previous trip. Within a short time, that deal fell through and Dudley had to find a living place of his own. With help from friends and a great deal of good luck, he quickly found a place in downtown Quepos that would turn out to be his living abode for years to come.

Dudley spent the next few weeks trying to establish bank accounts, learning the ropes when it comes to where to go to buy anything and getting used to limited facilities in a small town in a developing country. He learned some things will have to wait until his residency was more formal, at least with the government.

But our hero still looked forward to melding into the community and enjoying his retirement without incident.

Maybe, amigo.

Chapter One – Decision Time

Dudley Bodoh was sitting on a plane that was just leveling off at 41,000 feet after a flawless takeoff from Juan Santamaria Airport, the main airport servicing San José, Costa Rica.

This had been Dudley's eighth visit to Costa Rica in five years. He was feeling melancholic about leaving the land of the "Ticos". He had this feeling before when he had returned to the U.S. from the previous trip, but this time it was stronger.

While in Ticoland he had learned that the nickname Tico came from the long-time tradition of Costa Ricans to reduce nouns to a diminutive form. A perro (dog) becomes a perrito or puppy, a gato (cat) a gatito or kitten. He learned that Tico diminutives could be applied to virtually anything; one Tico even called Dudley "Dudsito" because he had difficulty pronouncing Dudley so he wacked off the last syllable in favor of the diminutive ending. Dudley also learned that these endings are usually thought of as being a more affectionate way of addressing someone.

Before visiting Costa Rica for the first time in 2003, he had been returning from a business trip in the U.S. one day and sat down next to a gent in the smoking room at Atlanta's Hartsfield Airport. After lighting up his cigar, his favorite vice, Dudley casually mentioned to the fellow that he was going to Costa Rica the following week. The dude, about the same age as Dudley, looked at him strangely, leaned forward and quietly said: "Don't miss the Blue Marlin Bar at the Del Ray Hotel in downtown San José; it's a paradise for old fat guys". Speak for yourself amigo, thought Dudley.

Some "fishermen" in Sarasota where Dudley lived also talked about the Del Ray, so Dudley's first visit to the country called for a one night stay (stand?) at the Del Ray. What he found there was a thinly disguised whorehouse, complete with many roving Ticas and other Latin American girls making very public advances to the many men who were milling around the bar and casino area. The only concern for the hotel seemed to be that their man stationed at the elevators properly extracted an extra $10 per person for multiple occupancy.

Dudley came to learn that prostitution is legal in Ticoland but pimping is not (duh, how's that work?). In any event, the next morning Dudley was happy to move on to the Central Pacific coast and enjoy real fishing in the Quepos/Manuel Antonio area. But what made the first visit to Costa Rica a memorable one was not the Del Ray but instead boating some sailfish, enjoying the beach surrounded by jungle and experiencing the friendly Ticos.

There were two gents across the aisle of the Boing 757 in which Dudley was now riding back home and they were chatting about the upcoming presidential election in the U.S. between Senators Obama and McCain. They were taking opposite sides of the argument.

Dudsito paid no attention to the political conversation because he was absorbed in ruminating about his current emotional, professional and financial state and whether or not it was time to retire. He would be 65 in a few months, and while he was feeling good physically and loathed being totally idle, a state that he envisioned retirement would be like, the magnet that is called Costa Rica was having a greater pull on him than ever before. But what would he do about his roots in the U.S. if he decided to retire and move there?

About half way through the two and a half hour flight, the two gents across the aisle had been arguing louder and louder. Dudley and several passengers around these men avoided eye contact with them as they didn't want to be dragged into the conversation. After a couple of borderline disparaging remarks by both parties against each other, the conversation ended in a profound silence, which was welcomed by surrounding passengers including Dudley. The rest of the flight was quiet, smooth, on-time and what most flights should be; not memorable.

A half hour after the end of the argument the plane made a perfect landing in Miami and our hero processed through passport control and customs without incident or even a serious question. He made the connecting flight to Tampa with an hour to spare. A shuttle van from Tampa got him home to his condo in Sarasota by 10 PM. Q.E.D., as they used to say in engineering school, quite easily done (actually Quod Erat Demonstrato – that which was to be proved has been). He would enjoy a great night's sleep in his own, very comfortable bed.

Over the next week Dudley thought a lot about moving to Costa Rica for retirement. The main questions that kept reverberating in his noggin were: Do I want to put more distance between me and the kids? Am I really ready to stop working? Can I sell the condo in a reasonable time and for a profit? What about health care?

There was no need to worry about a wife or her feelings for or against living in a foreign country, because Dudley had been divorced for 15 years and was not in a serious relationship at the moment. A foreign language had been a question with the ex-wife before the divorce when they lived in Belgium for two and a half years where the wife always seemed a bit uncomfortable, particularly with learning French.

The kids, all three of them were now in their 30's and spread along the east coast from Pennsylvania to North Carolina. There were no grandchildren because the kids, for different reasons, had decided not to have any kids with their partners, at least for the moment (there always was that hope). So there would be more distance between he and them but it would not be overwhelming. He remembered that the air miles from Miami to Philadelphia were about the same as Miami to San José, Costa Rica. Flying from the east coast of the United States to Costa Rica was much easier than flying from New York to London.

With regard to the question of work, Dudley came to the conclusion it was time to slow down. For the past 15 years he had a number of jobs in various industries including financial services (insurance agent for three years, branch manager of a bank for three and a half years) and ended up doing business as a consultant for small to medium sized businesses. He did this first for a company based in the Chicago area and then started his own practice in Sarasota. The almost continuous air travel that the consulting job demanded resulted in his left knee deteriorating from lugging around a computer bag and luggage. There was no question that, if he didn't change his work habit, there would likely be an operation in his future. Slowing down his lifestyle was no longer just an option; it was the wise thing to do.

The financial questions were a little trickier. Although he had signed up for Social Security at age 62 rather than wait until 66 (just like the analyses he had shown prospective investors at the bank suggested), he wasn't completely sure that social security, plus a small pension he would be receiving from the first company he had worked for out of college would be enough to live on in Costa Rica. From what he could glean out of his first eight visits, renting a simple apartment there looked reasonable but food was as expensive as the States unless you ate rice and beans three times a day.

And he would have to pay for medical care as Medicare would not cover him in Costa Rica. So, if something serious were to occur, he might have to have his carcass shipped back to the States for treatment. A few ex-pats he had met suggested that private insurance was available at fairly low cost and that one could also join the national health care system but that was a fairly complicated for an ex-pat. So, with possible medical expense thrown in, living expenses were a bit of a question and a risk at this point.

The problem in disposing of the condo, however, was solved by the economy crashing and the housing bubble bursting. Dudley had bought his second floor, 1100 square foot, two-bedroom condo with screened in lanai overlooking a lake (that's a Florida word for small pond) for $65,000 two months after 9/11. By 2007, real estate inflation in Florida had increased its "value" dramatically as evidenced by another virtually identical unit in the same complex selling for $209,000. And not much more than a year after that, post bubble-burst, a realtor told Dudley that his unit was worth, at best, $130,000.

Even that would have been OK except for the fact that his mortgages, first and second, had been increased to $139,000 to provide funding for two business ventures he had pursued that ultimately went sour. Two times during those years he had been approached by lending institutions with incredible offers for remortgaging or for equity loans that had incredibly loose requirements for approval (like "no proof of income required"). As a former banker and loan officer himself he couldn't believe how willing these companies were to loan money without considering the usual risk factors like level of % equity, credit rating and proof of income. The availability of funny money abounded during that period and Dudley took advantage of it, albeit retrospectively, it was unwise to do so.

So Dudley could not see a good way to get out of the condo. He could try to sell the place at a somewhat better price ($150,000) than the current debt level so he could pay the realtor and fees but this was highly unlikely as the value was continuing to decline at a rapid pace each month. He could try to sell it short but to whose advantage would that work out? In the end he decided to make a present of the condo to the mortgage company. He couldn't help but chuckle a little bit, and perversely, at this decision when he thought about the banks getting what they deserved from making bad loans.

Of course, defaulting to the bank would destroy his credit rating but then again he wouldn't need credit for his new lifestyle anyway. No more properties to worry about. He intended to rent and live life on a cash basis. The simplicity of this strategy added to the attraction of Costa Rica.

So for the next few weeks, our hero mulled over these questions and kept coming up with the same answer. Slowly and deliberately the decision was made; he would move to Costa Rica and retire.

Now the question was, when and how.

Chapter Two – Preparing for the Exodus

Having made the decision in April 2008 to move to Costa Rica for retirement, Dudley Bodoh started formulating plans to exit Sarasota and head for Quepos/Manuel Antonio on the south-central Pacific coast of Costa Rica where he intended to take up residency.

For almost every one of his previous eight trips to Costa Rica he had ended up in Quepos/Manuel Antonio for at least part of the trip. He felt very comfortable there in the middle of the lush, green, tropical jungle with a view of the central spine of Costa Rican mountains in the background and the beach, ah yes, the beautiful, alluring beach in the foreground. Dudley had been a beachophile all his life, having grown up on a beach in Massachusetts as a boy and he had visited many other beaches in several parts of the world for over 40 years, many times. The easy availability of the main beach at Manuel Antonio was a good part of the magnetic force that was pulling him to Costa Rica.

He would be leaving behind one of the most beautiful beaches in the world, Sarasota's Siesta Key Beach, a beach that was often ranked in the top ten in the world and several times has been rated number one in the U.S. The beach at Manuel Antonio couldn't be more different than Siesta Key. No fine, white "sugar sand" here, just a somewhat coarser, light to medium brown sand. No turquoise Gulf of Mexico waters, just the deep blue of the mighty, mysterious Pacific.

But the beauty in Manuel Antonio Beach includes the aforementioned lush, green jungle that runs from the top of a small mountain behind the beach all the way down to the edge of the beach. And the view to sea is of several small and medium sized rock islands resting a half mile or so off shore. Dudley would come to learn the names of these islands later, as well as their nicknames such as Isla Elefante (Elephant Island) and Las Gemelas (the twins). It's the _wildness_ of Manuel Antonio beach that makes it beautiful.

The shore is pristine, despite significant visitor traffic at certain times of the year, and generously sprinkled with driftwood, some of which makes outstanding art. The water is clear, at least when you get out a few meters beyond where the surf breaks and churns up the brown sand. The surf can be rough and tumble, surfer country, typically in the winter or rainy season (June through November) or it can be gentle, like in the "summer" or dry season (December through May).

At a couple of spots along the mile+ Manuel Antonio beach there are large pools of fresh water just above the beach that result from rainwater drainage from the surrounding mountains. These pools in turn slowly drain into the sea. On an early visit to Manuel Antonio, our hero had been walking north on the beach when he spied one of these pools. Wanting to know more, he started walking towards the pool only to be drawn up short by a Tico gentlemen who said: "Amigo, no, no, no, cocodrilos!". Dudley looked again, this time more carefully, and saw the eyes and flat head of a crocodile moving ever so slowly across the surface of the pool making almost no wake. Dudley decided to walk on, cautiously giving wide berth to the pool.

So, with all these images and memories floating around in his head, Dudley began planning his ex-patriot move, getting more and more excited as time passed by. The term "ex-patriot" was not new to him, having encountered it in the 1970's while living in Belgium. He didn't like the connotation of the word and the implication that he was somehow no longer patriotic to his land of birth. But the term was widely used and there had been no good substitute offered then or now. So an ex-patriot he would be.

So amigo, should he take all his personal belongings? Beds, a desk, file cabinets, sofas, tables, kitchen equipment had all been collected since his move to Florida ten years prior even though he had liquidated most of his Pennsylvania holdings at that time. What he now had was a small container load or a large U-Haul-It truck's worth. The shipping estimate turned out to cost a significant percentage of the stuff's value and that was before any import duties were paid. He had heard that duties could add several thousand dollars to the shipping cost.

It was then that he started to think about driving himself and his belongings to Costa Rica instead of shipping his goods and going by air. When he told his friends he might drive to Costa Rica, the most interesting comments came from two buddies who said: "Dude, you can't drive to Costa Rica, it's an island". "No my friends, it isn't, you're thinking of Puerto Rico. Costa Rica is a country on the land bridge that is the isthmus connecting North and South America". "Are you sure, says one buddy?" "Check the map amigo".

Driving a rent-a-truck with all his stuff in it was a possibility that he soon rejected basically because he couldn't find a drop off center in San José for Hertz. In retrospect later he learned it wouldn't have worked anyway because both the rental companies and the six countries he'd have to go through, the U.S., Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica, rather frowned on crossing their border with a vehicle one didn't own. So it looked more and more that the way to go was to drive his personal car with only the belongings he could stuff into it or drag behind it.

Dudley owned a Honda which he bought new almost 10 years before and it still had a lot of life left in it. "Best damned car he ever owned", he would often say. The only mechanical problem he ever had with the car was when he had once decided to use it as a boat by plying the flood waters on Siesta Key after a major rain storm. The water was up to the top of the front bumper and he ploughed into it throwing a wake like a small fishing boat. The engine sputtered but did not stop (a tight ship). The only consequence was that he burned out the ball joints and had to have them replaced within a year. Other than that, the Honda still ran like a top, just by changing the oil every 3-4,000 miles and giving it the very occasional tune-up.

And, despite being almost 10 years old, the car had only 50,000 miles on it because there were several years during his consulting period where he used rental cars during the week and sometimes even on the weekend. The car was still in prime condition and Dudley could see himself having a lot of fun scooting up and down Manuel Antonio hill and other Costa Rican mountains using the Honda's stick shift to its fullest advantage.

Then a sober thought hit him. How would he drive there, what would be the route? He opened Google Earth on his computer and searched out maps for Central America. He plotted a route starting at Sarasota and going north on I-75, then west on I-10 through Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas, following the coast along the Gulf of Mexico and ending in Brownsville, Texas across from Matamoras, Mexico. This would be the easy part, as he had driven in all these states before and the whole distance was either interstate highways or four lane primary roads.

It must be said here of Dudley Bodoh that one of his major character defects is his penchant for creating unrealistic expectations in himself. Dudley's plan would have him cross over the Rio Grande into Matamoras from Brownsville and then, in quick succession (there you go again Dud); he would drive through Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and finally, Costa Rica. His rough estimate? He expected in to be about 3,000 miles, 6 days maximum.

Dudley then went to the AAA office in Sarasota and had them punch out a TripTik for this venture. Unfortunately, their TripTik only went as far south of the Mexican border as Guatemala City. A quick consideration and investigation concerning the use of GPS software was also abandoned as a strategy when he learned he would have to buy separate packages for each of the six countries he was going through plus the GPS projector, a total investment that would be nearly as expensive as the book value of the car.

So Dudley resigned himself to having a partial TripTik. Everything beyond that would have to be by Dudley's own reckoning. On this trip, he envisioned staying one night each in places like Veracruz, Mexico, Guatemala City, Guatemala, Tegucigalpa, Honduras and then somewhere in northern Costa Rica. The other three or four nights would be hit or miss along the route.

Then one day another sober thought hit him. A friend asked him about how good his Spanish was. "Non-existent", Dudley replied (he was being unusually modest here, as he could say "Buenos Dias" and "gracias", but wasn't sure about "Where's the bathroom", or "Fill 'er up"). So he thought for a while about what his friend said and came up with a new strategy. Why not find someone who spoke good Spanish and would like to drive to Costa Rica with him? He put an ad in Craig's list for a traveling companion for a retired gent moving to Costa Rica and he got three responses within a few days.

One of the responses was from a lady whose family, she said, was in Nicaragua. After three or four email exchanges, it became clear she was looking to be substantially compensated for her travel "services". The other two responses came from American gentlemen who also wanted to know how much Dudley would be paying them to travel with him. Nothing, amigos, Dudley was looking for someone who looked at this trip as an adventure and might even be willing to _share_ travel expenses. So the Craig's list approach didn't produce the results he was hoping for.

Then a couple of days later he met some friends at a Starbuck's for coffee and he was introduced to a gentleman named Louis Jimenez. Louis was about 45 years old, pronounced his first name in the Latino fashion (Loo-eese) and had been born in Medellin, Colombia, His family had moved to Florida when he was just six years old. English was his de facto native language but he had been raised in a Spanish speaking household so he was fluent in Spanish as well. During the conversation, Dudley mentioned he was moving to Costa Rica. To this Louis nearly jumped out of his chair yelling "I want to move to Costa Rica, I've wanted to move there for several years now!"

A few days later, Dudley and Louis met again by themselves and began to make plans on how to do the trip together. Louis owned a late model Toyota Tundra and the strategy they evolved was to piggy-back the Honda onto the Tundra and ride together in the comfortable cab of the Toyota. The two new friends estimated they would save $300-500 in gas costs by using the piggy-back method. They left their first planning meeting with the understanding they would both investigate hitches that would do the job. But an old quote from Mark Twain kept reverberating in Dudley's mind: _"I have found out that there ain't no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them"._ Dudley thought there was something unexplainable in Louis' demeanor.

A few days later the two future ex-pats got together again to report their findings. The results were not good. Dudley had gone directly to the local Honda dealer and they had recommended a certain hitch that cost $1,500. Louis more or less confirmed the same thing after discussing the problem with a couple of mechanic friends. It seemed silly to spend $1,500 to save no more than $500 in gas, so they revised their strategy; they would each drive separate vehicles but in tandem like a very short caravan. They set a target date for departure in the first week of September 2008, about a month away.

Dudley went about his business of liquidating all his possessions with the exception of his computer, his Blackberry, a few critical files of important information, all his clothes, some kitchenware and a few mementos. He estimated he had enough room in the Honda for these items and if he needed a little more room, he was sure Louis would let him use a little bit of the Tundra truck bed. He sold his bedroom suite, his favorite sofa with the two end recliners built into it, file cabinets, office desk, etc. He gave his son a couple of the office machines like the fax/copier and a desk printer. The rest that he couldn't sell or give away he donated to Goodwill or other charities.

So for the next three weeks Dudley's plan seemed to be coming together. From the sales of his biggest pieces of furniture, he realized enough to pay what he thought would be the import duty on the Honda (guesstimates from ex-pat interviews put that at 50-70% of book value). He reduced the items still in his condo to only those he would take along. He had a travel partner that could speak Spanish and he had a route selected to get to Costa Rica by road. To use the modern vernacular, he loved it when a plan came together like this.

But it wasn't to be amigo. About one week before the departure date, Dudley was arranging all his important papers like the car registration and title, personal insurance papers and the like when he noticed his passport was not in the pile of documents. His normal hiding/storage place for his passport was in the top left drawer of his dresser in the bedroom but the dresser had been sold along with the rest of the bedroom suite. A quick call to the buyers of the suite did not find the document. Another rifling of all the stuff strewn about the apartment in every room produced nothing.

Panic set in. He remembered there was a passport office at the Sarasota Country office building and went there immediately. Yes, he could get a replacement, on an "express" basis, in about 4 days. He ordered a replacement immediately, filling out a questionnaire and affidavit for the Federal clerk. Renewal of his passport a few years prior had cost $50 but "express" service came in at over $400. Yet he felt he had no choice so he paid the high fee. Without his passport, he'd be dead in the water no matter by what route he tried to go to Ticoland.

On the day Dudley picked up his express passport, about an hour after having done so, his son called to ask a question. "Dad, I just lifted the cover of the fax/copier machine for the first time since you gave it to me and found your passport on the platen". Then he remembered that he had wanted to take copies of the front page of his passport as suggested by several people and he must have been interrupted by a telephone call or something else and forgot the document was on the copier. Now he was beginning to _act_ like he was 65 years old.

Three days before the scheduled departure date, Dudley got a call from Louis. "I can't go amigo". "What!, why not?" Louis went on to explain that two days earlier he had been pulled over in Sarasota by the Florida Highway Patrol. The FHP ran his license and registration and confronted him with the fact that he had an outstanding reckless endangerment driving charge in Orlando and that his license was invalid. They took him into custody and impounded the Tundra.

As Louis explained it to Dudley, a few years ago (!), he had been pulled over near Orlando for driving in excess of 100 miles per hour (!). This was during the time when he "wasn't taking his medicines" (!), he said. He was cited by the judge, his license revoked and then released on his own recognizance. That was when he decided to move to Sarasota (!) and he never did do anything about the initial driving charge (!). Dudley just kept listening to this story as it became weirder and weirder, while the red flags kept popping up. His emotions ran the gamut from anger to gratitude that he no longer had to ride 3,000 miles with this dude.

Appearing in front of the judge about this latest infraction, Louis saw fit to inform Madam Judge that he was moving for good to Costa Rica in three days (!). "Really, Mr. Jimenez; I don't think so". She took possession of his passport as well as the invalid license and ordered him to report to the court in person every week until early November when his hearing would be held. He was again released under his own recognizance but stripped of his vehicle and passport.

When Dudley hung up the phone from his conversation with Louis he was emotionally upset, to say the least. He was bothered as much by the fact that he hadn't foreseen the red flags popping up around Louis as by the fact his plans would have to change significantly. What should he do now? Delay the departure until he found a new partner? Scrap Plan A and fly down? He drove out to Siesta Key and found a quiet spot on the beach to think and watch the sunset, which always helped clear his head.

By the next morning, Dudley had concluded he would forge ahead by himself. He would load the Honda to the gills, follow the TripTik and the route he laid out and still get to Quepos/Manuel Antonio by late September in order to meet up with some friends who would be visiting then.

Costa Rica, here I come amigos, Dudley thought as he dozed off the night before leaving.

Chapter Three – Driving to Costa Rica

For a few days before leaving for Costa Rica, Dudley had been staying with a friend who was kind enough to let him use a spare bedroom at his home after Dudley's own bed had been sold. So Dudley left Sarasota from his friend's house early in the morning of Thursday, September 4, 2008 with a goal of arriving in Quepos/Manuel Antonio no later than the 12th of September.

The first day was a piece of cake, if boring, as he traveled the route he had planned; up I-75 to I-10 and then west. It was a sunny, hot day, with only moderate traffic the whole way. Nevertheless, Dudley kept his speed down so that he didn't exceed the speed limit by more than 10 miles per hour. He didn't want to attract any ambitious police who could considerably delay his journey. He pulled into Lafayette, Louisiana in late afternoon, completing the first leg of the trip as planned. He had been in Lafayette before and knew the general layout of the town.

One of Dudley's friends in Sarasota happened to be a retired Vice President of the Marriott chain and he had given our hero several family passes that allowed him to stay, at low cost, in any property owned by the Marriott chain. For Lafayette, Dudley checked into a Residence Inn and received a very nice little apartment for what amounted to a maid's fee and taxes, $30 per night. He had made another reservation at a Residence Inn in Brownsville, TX only a mile or two above the border with Mexico for the following night. He had even made a reservation at the Tegucigalpa, Honduras Marriott for three days hence.

After a brief nap, he got a recommendation from the desk clerk for a local steak house, went there, ended up having some delicious Louisiana jumbo shrimp instead of the steak and spied a Coldstone Creamery on the way back to the hotel that he did not have the will power to pass. This was another one of Dudley's character defects; rich, sweet ice cream after dinner. Before nodding off at around 11 PM, with the alarm set for 7 AM, he reflected on the day and how well it went. If he kept up this pace he'd be in Quepos well ahead of schedule.

He was up on schedule and, after gulping down the continental breakfast offered by the hotel, he was back on the road again by 7:30 with the objective of reaching Brownsville, Texas by nightfall. The traffic got busier and busier as he approached Houston and he missed his exit from the 610 ring road leading to Corpus Christi, but he doubled back and quickly corrected his mistake. Then, the more south of Houston he got, the more the road became less cluttered with traffic and the ride became boring again, except for passing through several small towns.

Dudley covered the almost 200 miles between Houston and Corpus Christi in about 4 hours, stopping briefly for lunch. After lunch he reviewed the TripTik and figured that he had only about 150 miles to go to reach Brownsville. He relaxed, thinking he could do that easily in three hours.

But just south of Corpus Christi, he encountered a strange phenomenon. All of a sudden the air became thick with locusts, or maybe they were grasshoppers, he wouldn't know the difference anyway. The air became so crowded with these flying creatures, some of which were more than two inches long, that their splattering against the windshield reduced his vision considerably. He reduced his speed and fought back with the windshield washer and wipers but the going was slow for at least 50 miles. Dudley thought he felt like Henry Fonda crossing the flat arid barren plains in the 1940 classic, The Grapes of Wrath.

As he got to about 50 miles above Brownsville, the swarm of insects dissipated and he could resume normal speed. He stopped the car briefly and checked the outside only to see what he suspected, the front bumper and quarter panels, as well as the windshield, were covered with squashed locusts and a gummy layer of their guts. He would have to run the car through a car wash in Brownsville not only to clean it but to remove that paste which would probably eat into the paint if he did not.

After the locust incident, things moved quickly. The signs rapidly progressed, "Brownsville – 30", then "Brownsville – 20" then "Brownsville – 10". He pulled into the Marriott about 6 PM, checked in and found a car wash nearby where he gave the old Honda a well-needed bath. He also learned that the highway on which the Marriott was located ran right into one of the two bridges in Brownsville that crossed the Rio Grande and the border into Mexico. He had done well, covering over 1,300 miles in two days. This trip was getting simpler and simpler, he thought (there you go again amigo).

There were a good number of restaurants up and down the expressway and Dudley had seen a sign for an Outback just before pulling off the highway to the Marriott. Outback's were always a staple of his existence when he was on the consulting road – if the town he visited didn't have an Outback he knew the food was probably going to be fat, greasy and unpalatable and the people in such a place probably practiced witchcraft and other black arts.

After a good steak and decadently treating himself to a brownie with chocolate ice cream, the kind that would have been deemed a venial sin in the middle ages, Dudley went to bed about 10 hoping to get a good night's sleep. Not to be, amigo. The knowledge that he was going into Mexico and traversing Latin America for the first time got the best of him and he slept fitfully, waking up every hour or so in a spasm of anxiety. Finally, he decided to give up, got up around 5 AM and checked out of the hotel after consuming a sweet roll from a vending machine and a cup of hotel coffee that appeared to have been left over from the previous day (it was too early for the hotel staff to have laid out their complimentary breakfast).

It was still dark out but it only took about 15 minutes to negotiate the remainder of the highway and arrive at the bridge. What's this? No barriers, no border guard, nothing. The roadway was entirely open and Dudley could see a lit-up sign about halfway across the bridge that said "Bienvenido á Mexico". Wow, that's friendly, thought Dudley, and he drove the car onto the bridge. As he went over, he could see why they called in the Rio _Grande;_ it was a very wide river on the order of the southern end of the Mississippi. It was still dark, but lights on both sides of the river played off the water and gave him a reference point.

When he reached the end of the bridge on the Mexican side, he found himself at what looked like a terminal where trucks were inspected. There also was a two story office building that was dark. Dudley had been told he would need a driving permit to pass through Mexico and he hoped that this was the place he could get it. The road south was also wide open and there were no barriers, police or border guards blocking the way. Dudley was very tempted to just drive on through but he had been told he would need a driving permit to get through Mexico, so he hesitated.

Then he spotted what appeared to be a border guard and two other men standing and talking in front of the building in the faint light of a street lamp. He drove close to them. It was 5:55 AM when he rolled down his window and offered "Good morning" to the gents not knowing if he would get a response in English. The two civilians were dressed like Texas truckers and their accent matched, but it was an intelligible form of English none the less. They told him this particular office didn't open until 8 AM, but the one over at the other bridge was open 7/24. Dudley thanked them and drove back over the bridge – his first visit to Mexico had lasted 15 minutes.

When he got to the U.S. side of the bridge, the gringo border station reception was completely different. As he approached the guard station, a small traffic light turned red and he stopped the car. When he did this, a flash at the back of the car confirmed that his license plate had been photographed. Then the light turned green and he advanced the car about twenty feet slowly, as the blinking sign suggested (demanded) to where the border agent was standing next to a guard house. Dudley rolled the window down and they exchanged pleasantries before the guard asked: "And what was the purpose of your visit to Mexico, sir?"

Perhaps it was the lack of sleep and nervousness that resulted from it but Dudley then said one of the stupidest things he could have uttered. "Oh, I just came over from the U.S. 15 minutes ago." As soon as he said that he knew it wasn't the smartest thing he could have said and from the look in the eyes of the border agent, he could see that he was now suspect, maybe of drug smuggling.

"Please turn off your engine sir." Dudley, of course, complied.

Then the agent asked Dudley to open the trunk and get out of the car. At the same time he signaled another agent to bring out the long handled mirror and the second man scanned underneath the Honda on all sides. The first agent searched the back seat of the cabin and then rifled the trunk very thoroughly, finding nothing in either location. In the meantime, the second agent brought out a German Sheppard hound to sniff the entire car, a determined looking mutt that eyed Dudley suspiciously.

After satisfying themselves that Dudley was neither a threat to national security nor a drug runner, they let him proceed with a very polite but perfunctory "Have a good day sir". Dudley had now spent more time at the U.S. border checkpoint than he had in Mexico. He drove off, turned left at the bottom of the ramp and followed a street that the two men on the Mexican side had suggested and which paralleled the Rio Grande. After about 10 minutes, he arrived at the other bridge.

Dawn was beginning to break as he reached the second bridge. Again, there were no impediments to diving onto the bridge from the U.S. side, so he pointed the vehicle toward old Mexico and proceeded to the other side. When he left the bridge he saw a similar building as before but this time the building was well lighted by outside floodlights and inside office lights. There also were a number of vehicles parked to the side of the building and there were several security guards dressed in army fatigues and carrying AK-47 type arms who had been posted at various positions around the building.

Dudley parked his car and proceeded into the building. Just inside the entrance he encountered a civilian fellow standing on one end of the large room he had entered. His clothes were definitely gringo but his complexion and hair coloring suggested he was Mexican or at least Latino. When he saw Dudley he said, with a bit of Texas drawl: "Watcha here for, friend?" Dudley told him he was hoping to get a driving permit at this office and...

Dudley couldn't finish the sentence because, all of a sudden, the man started talking in a voice that had increased by 40 decibels and the pitch had also increased upward to almost screech level. "These f....n' jerk-offs, they couldn't get anything straight if the end of the world depended on it." He even pointed to a lady in a dark blue border guard uniform and started in again" "That f...n' jerk is the worst of them all". Dudley wanted to shrink into the woodwork but then the man's voice dropped to normal and he asked: "Watcha drivin, friend?'" "A 10 year old Honda, "friend" Dudley responded. The Latino-Gringo then said: "No problem, friend, just talk to that man in the glass cage over there".

Dudley quickly and gratefully went over to the cage, all the while wondering what kind of vehicle the Latino-Gringo was driving and what kind of problem he had run into but Dudley didn't want to get further embroiled in more conversation with him, so he didn't ask him that question. The gentleman behind the glass window asked to see Dudley's passport and driver's license, both of which he quickly provided. From his desk drawer, the man brought out a pad of forms, carefully inserted two carbon leaves for copies and began filling in the form. Dudley took this as a very positive sign and expected to receive his permit, post haste. (Oh Dudley, will you never learn?)

When he finished filling in the form, the clerk had Dudley sign it, then did so himself with a big flourish, stamped it with three different stamps, ripped off the original for himself, removed the two carbons and handed Dudley the other two copies. He told Dudley to take them over to another glass cage to pay the fee. (I'm beginning to smell the tacos in southern Mexico now, Dudley thought)

The lady at the cashier's window, a very diminutive and beautiful Mexicana, asked to see the title on the Honda and told him that the fee would be $35. Dudley pulled out his critical papers file which he had extracted from the trunk of his car in anticipation of this question. But no matter how many times he flipped through the pages in the file, he could not find the title. Like his passport in the earlier incident, he had had that particular document in his grubby little hands only a week or two before and thought he had placed it in the critical file. He apologized to the girl and said he'd have to look in the car for the document.

Outside he discovered that the Latino-Gringo had parked right next to his Honda and was leaning up against the trunk of his own car. When he saw Dudley he asked: "How'd it go, friend?" "Not sure yet, friend, I can't seem to find the title." L-G's only comment was "Not good, friend." No kidding, friend.

While out hero continued to search the back of his car, he took the computer bag containing his laptop, portable printer and other paper files, rested it on the trunk of the car and dove back into the back seat to continue his search. L-G chimed in: "I wouldn't leave it there, friend". meaning the computer case. "Why not, there's a guard with an AK-47 standing less than 20 feet away, says Dudley." "He's the one that'll steal it, friend", says L-G. Dudley, not wanting to complicate this day any further, put the bag back in the car.

Now, emotionally quite upset and after a half hour of thorough searching of his vehicle, Dudley returned to the cashier and asked what he could do to correct the problem since he couldn't find the title, "I can accept the registration, seňor." Le Voila! Dudley always kept his registration in the glove compartment of this car. He went out, opened the glove compartment and extracted the registration quickly. Yes!

Returning to the cashier, he presented the registration card with his confidence and unrealistic expectations abuilding. "Sir, this registration has expired." Arrrrrgh! But he knew it had been renewed within the last four months. The clerk said: "I'm sorry sir, but I can't give you a permit without either seeing a valid title or registration. On the way out of the building, Dudley was thinking: "Did he forget to update the glove compartment? Did he misplace or discard it at home?" Who knows, _friend_ , but he was S.O.L. nevertheless.

He got into his car and drove over the bridge, crossing the Rio Grande for the fourth time in less than two hours. He suffered through a second 15 minutes of detailed search at the U.S. border, telling the border guard the truth this time that he hadn't been visiting Mexico, they wouldn't let him in because of missing documents. He drove back to the Marriott and checked in again, tolerating the perplexed look on the clerk's face. After he got into his room, he laid on the bed on his back counting ceiling tiles and thinking about his situation.

What would he do now?

In the future Dudley Bodoh would be asked if he ever visited Mexico and he would answer:

"Yes, I've been to Mexico twice" to which he would quickly add "for a total of 1½ hours"; it would always make for an interesting story and discussion.

Chapter Four – Plan B

After an hour of ruminating in his room, Dudley came up with some ideas and a possible plan.

He pulled out his laptop and got on line to the Florida Department of Motor Vehicles and then the local DMV office in Sarasota. It was Saturday and the office was closed until Monday morning. Copies of documents could not be ordered by email.

Then he called his close friend Ron in Sarasota with whom he had left a power of attorney and asked him if he could go down to the DMV on Monday morning, secure copies of the title and registration and fax them to Dudley in Brownsville. 'Sure, amigo, no problem" but Dudley could hear Ron chuckling under his breadth and thought he could _hear_ the grin on his face.

When Dudley hung up from Ron, a certain peace came over our hero. Although there was always the possibility of more screw-ups, he felt satisfied that he had done everything possible to "stay in the game". It was three o'clock on Saturday and he couldn't do anything else until Monday morning. The next feeling he got was a strong sense of exhaustion that caught up to him after two days of driving, lack of sleep the previous night and the emotional strain of his two trips to Mexico. He collapsed on the bed for an unusually long nap in the middle of the day. He slept soundly for two and a half hours.

When he awoke about 6 PM, Dudley was hungry. He had had no lunch and only the small sweet roll and day old coffee at five in the morning. He jumped into the car and headed for the Outback once more. He sat at the bar and noticed three gents that sat around the corner of the bar to his left. The boys were dressed like locals and that was reinforced by a slight Texas twang in their speech. When they saw Dudley, one of them said: "Howdy, friend". Dudley thought to himself that this "friend" thing must by a Texas peculiarity. "I'm good, friend, and you?" Dudley shot back.

Dudley ordered the biggest sized prime rib that they offered, along with a baked potato, "fully loaded" and while he was waiting for the food, it was easy to overhear the boys' conversation. Two of the three men were in their late '40's or early '50's while one of them looked well into his seventies. The two younger men referred to the older gent as Hank. They also deferred to Hank whenever he began to speak, showing an obvious respect for him.

They were reminiscing about trips they had made through Mexico, Guatemala and other Central American countries. When Hank saw that Dudley was more than just a little interested in what they talking about, he asked Dudley if he was just passing through. Dudley answered he was driving to Costa Rica to take up residency there. "Really?" said Hank, in that tone of voice that was a combination of surprise, disbelief and amusement.

Dudley then asked if he could tell them his plans and get their opinion. "Sure, friend." says Hank. Dudley then excused himself to go out to the car and find his maps, TripTik and notes. When he got back, the men were sitting in a booth, and four meals, including Dudley's prime rib, had been spread out on the table. They all agreed to delay the trip discussion until after they devoured dinner. Dudley consumed the prime rib with gusto and some horseradish sauce. The giant, loaded potato was also quite delicious and filling. Our hero was feeling much better.

As they ate, Dudley told his friends the story of how he had come to love Costa Rica, had made the decision to move there and also the frustrations he ran into that morning. In return, he learned that Hank had driven extensively in Mexico and all the Central American countries north of Costa Rica. He had a "business" during the 1960's, '70's and early '80's where he smuggled small appliances across the U.S./Mexico border using a low-flying, small private airplane. He then distributed the items to stores throughout several countries for twice the price he paid for them, making quite a bit of money over the years.

One of the other two men, a fellow named Jayden, was of a similar background except that he had done his smuggling in the opposite direction. He would gather up pre-Colombian artifacts that had been scavenged from Mayan and other ancient Indian burial sites and sneak them overland and across the U.S. border at remote locations. The antiquities would then be fenced to museums and private collectors. The scavenging had been done by dirt-poor Indians who were paid by disreputable local "businessmen".

The third man, named James, appeared to be the only one of the three who had had a legitimate job and actually still had it. He was a long hauler for a Brownsville based shipping company that specialized in delivering to Mexico and Central America. He had been as far south as Panama City and had used every major highway between Texas and the Panama Canal many times. During his career, James had logged hundreds of thousands of miles in this job and knew many of the border people, particularly the supervisors, by name.

After the dinnerware had been cleared, Dudley laid out the map and gave his presentation as if he were Caesar plotting his strategy to march through Gaul. "I plan on crossing the Rio Grande on Monday after I solve the little document problem I mentioned. Then down to Vera Cruz on the Gulf Coast to spend one night. The next day, I'll cross over to the west side of the country to pick up the Pan American Highway and find a place to stay on the Pacific Coast for the night".

When Dudley suggested he could traverse the breadth of Mexico from Vera Cruz on the Gulf Coast to somewhere near Guerrero on the Pacific Coast in one day, and then take one day more to reach Guatemala City, all three men did one of those involuntary reactions where their eyes first looked up and then focused on each other. They were doing everything they could not to laugh. Dudley squirmed a bit but continued talking (he was thinking hell; it's only about 280 miles _as the crow flies,_ across and then about 500 miles to Guatemala, what's the big deal?) There was no doubt Dudley was reaching a new pinnacle of unrealistic expectations.

After he completed his presentation Dudley turned to Hank, giving him the deference the other two had shown him. "Hank, what do you think of my plan?" Hank turned to Dudley, looked him straight in the eye and said: "Friend, sell the f....n' car and take a plane!" Jayden and James just smiled quietly; Dudley's heart sank. Jayden wondered aloud how many hours he allowed in his plan for being held up at borders. James added: "Let me see if I've got this straight, friend, you're driving alone in a Florida plated car, you have all your worldly possessions in the back seat, you have a blank passport and you don't speak Spanish. Do you think you might be a target, amigo?"

Dudley left the Outback dispirited. He would suffer another bad night's sleep. He resigned himself to thinking about his plan at least through the weekend. On the next day, Sunday, he remembered that some Texas visitors to Sarasota had told him that the beach at South Padre Island, which was close to Brownsville, was very nice. Dudley decided to go there and think about his plan. The hotel gave him directions and it turned out to be about a 45 minute drive. He would use the beach once more for meditation on a serious question.

The beach was very nice, not too crowded. It was even more developed, hotel and condo wise, than Siesta Key but, of course, without its sugar sand. And although he was basically on the opposite side of the Gulf of Mexico, the surf was considerably stronger than the mid-Florida Gulf. Nevertheless, it was a very nice beach and he relaxed on a towel he had expropriated from the hotel. He relaxed enough to fall asleep for 20-30 minutes and when he awoke two things were different; he was pink from the strong September sun and there was a young couple sitting not too far from him.

The young lady talked first. "We were about to wake you because you're starting to burn". That struck up a conversation. Dudley learned they were from Abilene and on the first day of their honeymoon. She was a second grade school teacher and he was a sales rep for a major pharmaceutical company. They were very talkative and he, in particular, talked about all their plans for building a house, having kids, traveling the world etc. Their enthusiasm brought Dudley back to the same period in his life when everything ahead seemed exciting and attainable.

After a while, Joe, the young man, offered to run up to a nearby restaurant and get some drinks for the three of them. While he was gone, Linda continued to talk and then said something that surprised Dudley. "I love Joe so much but sometimes he has very unrealistic expectations". That hit Dudley like a slap in the face. That's exactly what he had been doing with this trip intending to go through Central America. Wow, from the mouths of babes (when your 65, those in their 20's are babes).

After another hour at the beach, Dudley wished the couple the best of everything in their lives together, excused himself and drove back to the hotel. He had reevaluated his thinking and Plan A was dead. Plan B would be just as Hank had suggested; "sell the f....n' car and take a plane"! When he got back to the hotel, Dudley called Ron in Sarasota and told him not to bother going down to the DMV in the morning and told him about Plan B. "Now you're cooking with gas, amigo", Ron said. He also emailed the Tegucigalpa Marriott and cancelled that reservation.

Now, the irony in this whole scenario hit our hero. Dudley already had a plane ticket to go to Costa Rica on September 21 with three friends from Sarasota. He had bought the ticket months before to get the best fare but then planned to abandon the non-refundable ticket in favor of his car trip. So now he didn't have to set up a new itinerary and it was an e-ticket so he didn't even have the opportunity to lose or misplace it like he had done with the car documents and passport. The ticket would be waiting for him at the airport on the 21st.

So, on the next morning, Monday, he checked out of the Marriott and headed north to Houston. Two things were different on this return first leg than before. At about 20 miles north of Brownsville, Dudley encountered a checkpoint and was pulled over. There was a U.S. customs agent, a homeland security dude and what looked like a Mexican border agent as he was dressed similarly to the ones he saw on the Mexican side of the bridge in Matamoras. Their questions were cursory as was their search of the trunk and, after Dudley told them the whole story they smiled and let him go on. He did learn however, that there is a similar checkpoint 20 miles south of Matamoras and had Dudley gone on without papers as he had been tempted, he most certainly would have been turned back or maybe arrested.

On the approach to Corpus Christie he encountered a few insects but nothing like the swarm of locusts or grasshoppers he fought on the way down. Guess they were passing through, he thought, or maybe they had exhausted the food supply (crops) and moved on. As he got closer to Houston, making better time than the trip down, he decided that he would drive through Louisiana and shoot for the west end of the Florida panhandle to stay overnight. That would put him about five or six hours from Sarasota.

As he crossed the state line into Alabama, Dudley's cell phone rang. The phone identified the caller as Louis Jimenez. Naw, couldn't be thought our hero, Louis must be in a state facility, either mental or penal, by now. When he answered it, Louis blurted out: "Dudley dude, I fixed (!) my problem in Orlando by paying a $460 fine; I can go to Costa Rica now! I plan on leaving one week from today on the 15th." Dudley slowly and carefully told Louis about his experience during the last five days and that he was returning to Sarasota to sell the car and go down on the 21st by air. He wished Louis a safe trip and good luck but there was no way he was going back to Plan A, Louis or no Louis.

Our hero stayed at a Red Roof Inn that night as he didn't fancy wandering the countryside looking for a Marriott. He made the last leg in five hours the next day and arrived back in Sarasota on Tuesday, September 9. He concluded that the only thing he got out of this trip was a sunburn and perhaps a little better understanding of his principle character defect, unrealistic expectations.

Dudley had called his friend the previous day, the one that let him stay at his house on the way out of Sarasota and asked if he could have a couple of weeks more. The friend was a bit hesitant so Dudley offered to pay rent and they quickly came to an agreement on a fair amount.

Ticoland, I'm coming, just be patient!

Chapter Five – Costa Rica or Bust

For two weeks, Dudley had to endure the jokes from all his friends about his trip to Mexico and subsequent consequences. Ha, ha, ha, LOL amigos.

Dudley spent most of the time working on Hank's Plan B. He was able to sell the car within a week to a teenage girl whose parents thought it would be a good starter vehicle for her and who had it thoroughly checked out mechanically. He rented a car to stay mobile during the critical last days in Sarasota.

He reduced his personal belongings to one large roller suitcase, appropriately over-stuffed, one large duffle bag, one computer bag (with his computer and all the important personal files he would need – please God make that true) and one backpack filled with medicines and incidentals. His baggage would be deemed significantly overweight by the airline but that still would be considerably cheaper than the cost of gasoline he had expected to pay by driving to Costa Rica. By the 21st all there was to do was to make the plane departure on time.

On the 17th it occurred to Dudley that Louis should be on his third day of travel and nearing or maybe even well into Mexico. Louis had told him he had relatives in New Orleans so that made it the logical mid-trip stop on the 15th or 16th. He decided to call Louis on his cell and, if he didn't answer, it probably meant he was in Mexico beyond range of his cell.

Surprisingly, Louis answered after the second ring. He was in Mexico but being held up at a checkpoint 20 miles south of Brownsville (the one that Dudley had heard about). The team of agents there included a representative of U.S. Homeland Security. Louis had been there for four hours at that point. "Did you pick up a driving permit in Matamoras?" asked Dudley. "No, the road was wide open, I just kept driving" said Louis. It was Dudley's turn to chuckle, _quietly_. Then Louis related what had happened.

As Louis recounted the story, Dudley remembered that Louis at one time in his career had been a deputy sheriff. He hadn't done any sheriffing in recent years but he still owned three pistols. Louis wanted the pistols with him when he went to Costa Rica and thought he had carefully secreted them in the bed of his Tundra, but the agents at the checkpoint found the guns. Despite having U.S. documents on the firearms, the agents were suspicious that he might be running guns into Mexico or might be a violent criminal trying to escape from the U.S.

Louis's Plan A did not have the benefit of a Hank's Plan B. Louis had done something else that Dudley found strange when they were planning the trip. He announced that he had gone to Miami to the Colombian Consulate to get a Colombian passport. Having been born in Colombia it wasn't a difficult thing for him to get. "But why, my friend?" asked Dudley. "The officials where we're going will respect a Colombian passport more than a U.S. one" answered Louis. But, evidently the empty Colombian passport didn't impress the Mexican agents and the U.S. Homeland Security guy at the checkpoint. For the first time, Dudley thought he might not be the only one with unrealistic expectations.

Dudley would learn later that the agents questioned Louis for over eight hours. They checked with U.S. Homeland Security, the FBI and Florida State Police but all they could turn up was the old reckless driving charge that had been satisfied by paying the fine. The agents even called Louis's ex-wife in Sarasota to get confirmation that he was who he said he was. Finally, they cleared Louis but directed him to return to Matamoras for a driving permit or return to the U.S.

Dudley learned months later that instead of following the agents' directions at the checkpoint, Louis went north for some miles and then cut west to traverse the mountains of Mexico. The story goes that he went from village to village throughout the mountains of central Mexico and, after about two weeks, he had possibly misplaced, forgotten somewhere or simply run out of his medicine. He went psychologically bonkers again and only resurfaced after another two months in Southern California at another of his relatives. Dudley learned all this from mutual friends in Sarasota.

The three friends accompanying Dudley on the airline trip were women. One was a close friend from Sarasota and the other two were friends of hers, one of which was an acquaintance of Dudley's and the other was a lady who lived in Miami. Only one of them had been to Costa Rica before and they were all looking forward to a 10-day "getaway".

The flight to Costa Rica on September 21st left from Ft. Lauderdale. Dudley and two of his three friends flew from Tampa to Ft. Lauderdale early in the morning to connect with the 11:30 departure from FTL destined for SJO (San José). They met up with the third friend, the one that lived in Miami, and the four of them boarded the Spirit Airlines flight to San José on schedule. Because of the time difference in Miami versus San José (Miami is + 2 hours in summer time), they arrived at the local time of 12 PM. Processing through, passport control, baggage claim and customs was a little slow, about 50 minutes, but there were no problems.

The options in getting to Quepos from San José airport were: 1) rent a car, 2) take a semi-private van from a company like Interbus that hauls 9-10 people at a time, 3) take a public bus and 4) fly. Dudley's friends, two of them on their first visit to Costa Rica, did not envision driving their first time in Ticoland. Dudley had come to the same conclusion on his first visit in 2003 but came to learn in subsequent visits that driving in Costa Rica is relatively easy, particularly when compared to other places he had lived, like Brussels, Belgium. But since he had no plans to return to the States, he didn't think the car option fit him either.

The public bus was inexpensive, something less than $8 but, because of some unexplained logic, the direct public buses only stopped at the airport on their way _to_ San José from Quepos but not on the return from San José to Quepos. The airport is west of the city and Quepos is far southwest of the airport, so to use the public bus system meant taking a local bus or taxi (they'd probably need two taxis at $30 each with all they were lugging) into San José center and then coming back over the same territory on the bus, past the airport and on to the coast. The bus was cheap, but getting to it was not and lugging all their belongings around in that scenario was just simply too much of a pain in the neck.

The private van (Interbus) was available for $45 per person but for some reason (taxi union?) they couldn't pick up at the airport so another taxi transfer was necessary to get to the van from the airport, although the distance was short. So, after considering the options in their planning meetings, the group decided to fly into Quepos from San José because it was the easiest connection and way of handling all the baggage they were bringing. It was also only about $15 more than the van.

Dudley and entourage were booked on a 2:30 Sansa flight. Sansa is the Costa Rican domestic division of TACA, the Central American Airline. The Sansa terminal was located about 100 meters west of the main terminal. Unfortunately the two terminals don't connect by concourse so, after passing customs the group then had to exit the terminal, walk down a ramp and over a long sidewalk to reach the Sansa terminal. Fortunately, it was a beautiful day and they didn't have to negotiate this trip during one of those famous rains Costa Rica is known for.

The clerk at the Sansa check-in desk gave a wary glance as she saw the entourage approaching with all their luggage. But she did something that pleased Dudley. Instead of imposing the weight limit individually, she added everyone's baggage weight together and then announced the total overage would cost $30. Dudley was happy to pay that as he probably would have paid in the neighborhood of $100 if she hadn't grouped their luggage.

At 2:20, a couple of Sansa employees wheeled a large cart holding their luggage out to the plane, a twin-engine turboprop of unknown origin. Dudley had flown this plane, or one of its sisters, twice before and wasn't able to determine the make and model from the safety sheet in the seat pocket. His guess was that it was a type of Embarcadero produced in South America. Dudley liked small planes, thinking they felt like he was "really flying".

The flight to Quepos (QPO) from San José's Juan Santamaria Airport (SJO) takes only 20 minutes compared to the three hour car or bus trip. The route is straight over the central spine of mountains, probably a distance of no more than 40-50 miles as the toucan flies. As the bus or car goes it's about 160 kilometers or 100 miles.

The first time Dudley took this flight on an earlier visit the plane was fully booked, like it was today with the ladies. That meant all 11 passenger seats had been purchased. With the pilot and copilot the total human complement was 13. On that first flight, after they had buzzed down the runway and taken off, Dudley read the altimeter that indicated they were just over 4,000 feet and the horizon thingamajig indicated they were still climbing slowly. Dudley was sitting on a bench seat right behind the copilot and there were no doors or even a curtain between him and the pilots in the cockpit. Dudley got a feeling he could reach out and fly the thing himself. He was watching the control panel so intensely a couple of passengers were a bit nervous.

Dudley couldn't control himself any longer. He reached over the copilot's seat and tapped the youngish man on the shoulder. "What's happening, amigo?" says our hero. Dudley wasn't sure if he'd be ejected into the clouds in mid-flight or, more likely, be arrested at the termination of the flight as a possible terrorist. But instead the copilot turned his head, smiled and said: "Oh señor, lemme show joo".

This very friendly dude then proceeded to tell Dudley that they'd be leveling off at 6,000 feet and the mountains they were flying over were about 4,000. That corresponded well with Dudley's observation that they seemed to be heading directly into the top of one of them. After Dudley got a two minute course on what all the gadgets were used for, he noticed they had leveled off and that there was a large formation of dark clouds that seemed to be bunched up on the other side of the mountain they were pointing towards.

"What's that amigo?" said Dudley pointing to the clouds.

"Oh senor, we goin to haf a leetle rain, no problema".

A couple of minutes later the plane entered the cloud bank and the "leetle rain" turned into great shards of water slapping against the fuselage. The turbulence tossed the plane back and forth with enough gusto to solicit muffled "Oh's" and "Ah's from some of the passengers. The passengers assumed white knuckle mode and grasped at their seats. Fortunately the adventure lasted only a couple of minutes before the plane broke out of the cloud bank and the sun returned, as did the smooth flight. Dudley could see the Pacific shore ahead and the vast plantations of palm trees where, he would later learn, palm oil dates were grown as the main cash crop. They landed without incident at Quepos in the middle of the palm plantations.

So these memories were flashing back to Dudley as he and the ladies took off from San José. But not everyone in the group held the same positive opinion about small planes that Dudley had. One lady had a fear of small airplanes and had been a subject of considerable discussion amongst the ladies when they were making their travel plans. She kept pleading with them to take the bus or even a taxi from San José airport to Quepos (typically, $130+). Finally the other ladies put their foot down and said they were going by and she could do what she wanted to do. Evidently she found it more frightening to find her way to Quepos alone than to fly in a small plane with companions so she relented and accepted the flight.

Dudley sat across the aisle (1 and 2 seating arrangement) from the nervous one and was determined to try and make her as comfortable as possible. As luck would have it, they had the smoothest, turbulence-free flight yet experienced by Dudley on that route. They didn't even encounter the cloud bank at the mountain top nor significant updrafts.

As the reader might expect, Quepos Airport is not JFK or O'Hare. It consists of a rather wide strip of asphalt running east/west for about a half mile or maybe a kilometer. The tarmac actually follows the contour of the land and there is a small hill about two-thirds of the way towards the east that departing pilots take advantage of to "leap" into the air on takeoff.

The only interesting (read questionable) thing that happened on the flight with the ladies was that on their approach to Quepos, when Dudley felt like he was helping the plane stay on the "beam", they dropped suddenly about 50 feet. Dudley attributed it to an air pocket but the nervous one wondered if it might have been caused by the pilot, who she claimed had been chomping on a wedge of fresh pineapple at the time!

They landed easily and taxied to the west end of the strip where the airplane was parked half turned around to be ready to take off again. The baggage was delivered the whole 30 meters from the aircraft to the "terminal" quickly. The terminal consisted of a building with a roof but without doors or windows and open to the atmosphere. It also contained a Sansa desk and a snack bar.

Taxies were waiting and the group engaged a red, van-sized one with a yellow triangle on the side that could handle all their luggage and four people. Dudley had learned on previous trips that the red taxis with the yellow diamond on the side that contained their registration number were the official and regulated ones.

Finally, our hero had made it to Costa Rica.
Chapter Six – Settling In

The contingent comprised of Dudley and three ladies arrived at the hotel in Manuel Antonio and were ensconced in their rooms by 4 PM. It had been a fairly long day for Dudley and two of the three women travelers as they had risen at 5 AM. All agreed that a nap would help and they targeted five o'clock as a gathering time to decide about dinner.

Since Dudley had been to the area eight times before, the ladies deferred to his judgment regarding restaurants. He suggested a two-part adventure for the evening. First they would walk about 10 minutes from their hotel to another hotel nearby and have "tapas" or "bocas" (snacks or hors d'oeuvres) and drinks while watching the sunset into the Pacific.

The upscale restaurant/bar Dudley chose for hors d'oeuvres rested on top of one of Manuel Antonio's highest peaks. From the street level they took an oversized golf cart up a winding, paved road to a large building at the top of the mountain. The building there was three stories and housed, on the first floor, the hotel's spas where one could get an all-chocolate massage (personally Dudley would rather eat the stuff).

Dudley knew there was an open-roofed observation deck on the third floor and Dudley took the ladies up to it via the elevator. When they stepped out onto the deck, the vista was stunning. They were standing in the middle of a lush jungle covering hills and mountains as far as they could see. Looking east the local jungle melded into the mountains that run up the central spine of the country. The mountains ran north and south as far as the eye could see.

Turning around and looking west, the view in the distance was of a several mile long beach running north, and with a foamy surf that separated the jungle from the Pacific. The Pacific in turn ran endlessly to the horizon. The sun had turned into a giant golden, fiery ball hanging a few inches above the ocean, or so the eye perceived. The view enticed "Ooh's" and "Ah's" from the ladies and camera shutters clicked for several minutes.

Just before the sun hit the water, Dudley took the group down one floor to where the restaurant and bar-lounge were located. This area was open to the atmosphere on the west side so they could continue to see the beach running north as well as the sunset while they ordered and consumed several different types of hors d'oeuvres with their drinks.

After the sun went below the horizon they were treated with the grandest display of reflections on the high thin clouds prominent that night that one could imagine. It was as if the sky had been stained with a mosaic of bright red and gold paint, except no artist would be able to capture the intensity of feeling that one experienced by personally being there. It was difficult and unnecessary not to feel a spiritual connection.

After an hour or so they were looking out over a very deep blue Pacific that faintly reflected the early moon rising and a velvety black jungle occasionally punctured with a street light or faint glow from a house. Dudley suggested they move on to dinner at another restaurant because the one where they were enjoying the bocas was rather expensive and he presumed it would be beyond the budget of at least two of the women. (Later he would learn that the group as a whole liked to throw caution to the wind when on vacation and were always looking for adventure, be it in restaurants or other places to go; money was important but secondary to adventure)

They took the golf cart service back down the mountain and quickly caught a cab. Dudley brought them to a restaurant in Quepos where he had dined several times and which had a good reputation, an eclectic menu and a moderate price level. There was a wide selection of Japanese and Chinese appetizers, Mexican plates, some standard American fare such as spaghetti and burgers and a sampling of local dishes like casados and rice with fish, beef, pork or chicken. They selected a broad array of dishes and everyone seemed happy with the result.

The group returned to the hotel around 9 PM and sat around the pool for an hour or so chatting about the day and the area. As they did so, frogs, crickets and other jungle creatures began issuing their nightly love calls and the orchestration of sounds made a nice backdrop to their conversation as well as a strong affirmation that they were in the Costa Rican jungle.

They all retired to their respective rooms by 10:30 quite tired and quite grateful for the day. It was then that Dudley realized that this had been the best day of his move to Costa Rica (certainly it had been a lot easier than the Mexico adventure). The short incident of that day, the one where the plane dropped suddenly on approach to Quepos, hadn't been taken seriously. It became an interesting story and light-hearted reminiscence about the plane captain who ate pineapple to help him navigate.

The day as a whole was a complete success. "Just take the f....ng plane" as Brownsville Hank had suggested had indeed been good advice and a good strategy.

When the dawn came the next morning, the sounds of the night gave way to howler monkeys reverberating across the jungle in their deep base growls while toucans emitted short screeches peculiar to their species, a sound that helped them find each other. On Monday morning the group gathered for breakfast in the hotel. All had slept well and were anxious to get on and see more of Costa Rica. The sentiment ran toward going to the National Park in Manuel Antonio until they learned that the park is not open on Mondays.

So they decided to make the day a beach day as Dudley had talked up the beach all along the trip from Florida and the one lady who had seen Manuel Antonio before seconded the motion. So after breakfast, Dudley led the group to the nearest bus stop and introduced them to the cheap and efficient bus system serving Manuel Antonio and Quepos. In about 10 minutes they were on the beach talking with a Tico about renting a chair and umbrella.

They lighted in front of a currently extinct night club called Mar y Sombra (Sea and Shade). The place had been a noisy meat market for the interested and lonely that Dudley had visited once on a previous trip but somewhere during that period of Dudley's first eight visits, the night club was suddenly closed and never reopened. But locals, annual snowbirds and perennial tourists knew exactly where to go when you said May y Sombra.

Dudley would later learn that the owner of Mar y Sombra, a man who still sat out each day on the ocean side of the building talking with friends was the brother of the owner of a restaurant called Balu situated only 50 meters from the Mar Y Sombra and right on the beach. In fact it still is the only restaurant right on the shore line. This fact had become a matter of contention between the owner, citing his grandfathered rights, and the city that wanted to completely enforce the new rule about building anything commercial within 100 meters of the high tide mark. Dudley would also learn later that this family, Ramirez by surname, was one of the pioneering families in the early development of Manuel Antonio, the padre of the clan having moved his family there in 1948 to get away from the civil war then ranging in the country.

The group was set up with lounge chairs, umbrellas and plastic tables about 10 meters from the breaking surf by a fellow named Peluca who worked for the Balu restaurant. The surf was moderate that day, about one to one and a half meter waves. After they had distributed their belongings around their base of operations, carefully secreting valuable belongings to discourage thieves, they all jumped into the water. The water temperature was estimated by beachophile Dudley at about 82+/-2 degrees Fahrenheit. Dudley remarked that during his previous visits there the water was always 82+/-4 degrees, the lower end of that range (about 78) being in the rainy season and the higher end (about 86) in the heart of the dry season. The water was always warm, year round.

The hawkers on the main beach in Manuel Antonio at that time offered the group an almost continuous supply of a large variety of products for their comfort and entertainment, including beer and soda, fresh pineapple, coconut water from a whole coconut opened with a machete, little bags of extracted "pipas" (the water/juice of a fresh coconut), Colombian pastries, beach towels, snow cones (Dudley's favorite when mixed with sweet syrup and condensed milk), sunglasses, cigars etc. There were beautiful, glazed ceramic bowls and pots offered by what seemed like a dozen different sales people, but they all carried a similar design (turns out they're all made in the same factory in Nicaragua).

You could (and still can) get a full lunch delivered to you at the beach from one of the restaurants up at the street level for a small added fee to the runner. Then there are the massage tents and the various concessions such as the jet-skis, parasailing, snorkeling and kayaks. At the time there were also a few impromptu restaurants operating from shacks near the National Park offering grilled chicken and ribs (Dudley thought them very good). The entrepreneurial spirit was alive and well along the beach; but not everyone in the area was happy with the beach vendors.

A couple of years later, after Dudley had been a resident for a while, many of these vendors would be put out of business by the national police. The restaurants and stores at the beach not only supported this action but demanded it because they thought it unfair for the beach vendors to be able to sell their wares untaxed and unlicensed. Fair point, but instead of authorities mounting a campaign to license the vendors and collect taxes they simply sent in the Fuerza Publica or national police force who used backhoes to destroy the shack operations. They also arrested a few of the vendors to make the point. That next week and for some months to come all the vendors had disappeared. Slowly they came back but never to the previous level or with as great a variety of offerings.

Some visitors bristle at the almost constant solicitation provided by the entrepreneurs of the sand but Dudley liked the attention and banter of it all and it gave him the opportunity to practice his feeble Spanish. Eventually he would come to realize that just bantering with the vendors, though a lot of fun, would not progress his knowledge of Spanish at a sufficient pace; he would have to take lessons as well. He very much disliked not being able to communicate his thoughts effectively and also being left out of a conversation.

On Tuesday, the group went to the National Park in the morning, having been told that the morning is the best time because the heat of the day has not yet peaked and the animals are the most active in the morning. The Park entrance fee was only $10. They hired a guide who wanted $25 a head but Dudley negotiated a group rate of $50.

The guide was very knowledgeable about the animals and pointed out three types of monkeys (the Titi or squirrel monkey, white face or Capuchin and Congo or howler). He also found sloths, toucans, other tropical birds and a variety of other creatures for the group to ogle at. The guide had a telescope which allowed them all to see animals in the canopy one couldn't see by the eye alone, like white bats and also small animals on the floor of the jungle, like poison dart frogs.

For the rest of the week that the ladies were there, they went back to the beach two times with Dudley but they also split up to take various excursions that interested them individually, like the canopy tour, white water rafting, butterfly garden and spice/herb farms. By the end of the week the ladies had well sampled the diversions of the area and all seemed happy as they departed on another adventurous Sansa flight on their way home.

Now Dudley had to get serious about finding a more permanent place to live. He had gotten a lead from a friend that had a friend who was looking for someone to share an apartment in Quepos. He had scheduled a meeting with him for the afternoon of the day that the ladies left for home.

He needed to settle in for the long haul.

Chapter Seven – The First Weeks

The ladies had left Quepos on the morning of Sunday, September 28. Dudley met with his new potential roommate that afternoon for coffee and discussion of the possibility of Dudley moving into his two-bedroom apartment. They got along well and came to a quick agreement on a fair rent beginning on the first of October, three days hence. They walked to the apartment, which was only a few blocks away from the coffee shop. Dudley would learn that everything in Quepos is a few blocks away from everything else; you could walk from one corner of the berg to the opposite in 15 minutes.

The apartment building was situated at the end of a short alley off one of the main streets about three blocks from the bus station. At the head of the alley on the main street were a Super 2000 market and a Banco Popular with an ATM that accepted his debit card without charging a fee. Both locations would prove to be very convenient as Dudley learned the ropes of living in Quepos and Costa Rica.

On his first inspection of his new home there was little noise around the apartment which was situated on the second floor of the building. But it was Sunday and Dudley did notice that across the alley from the apartment building was an open lot with piles of gravel, sand and what appeared to be a cement mixer. He also noticed a large building about 25-30 meters away, as the pelican flies, across a couple of private lots from the back of the apartment building. He would learn that the mystery building fronted on the main road out of Quepos near the bay. It would turn out to be a nightclub called the Arco Iris, another meat market particularly for tourists and sort of a smaller version of the Del Ray in San José, but without hotel rooms.

Both the construction company across the alley and the night club were noisy operations. The construction company started loading heavy trucks and mixing cement at crack of dawn, 5:30 or 6 AM at the latest and continued their activity through the business day. The night club on the other hand started playing loud music that reverberated through the neighborhood about 10 PM and continued until three or four in the morning. The good news for Dudley, however, was that his bedroom was positioned in such a way on the opposite side of the apartment building from both noise generators that neither operation bothered him.

On the third day after their meeting, October 1, Dudley checked out of his hotel, dragged his luggage into a taxi and ten minutes later arrived at his new digs. His roommate helped him haul his stuff up the stairs and Dudley satisfactorily unpacked and arranged his belongings in a couple of hours. His new roommate gave him a short tour of the kitchen and allocated a certain space in the fridge and cabinets for his personal use, but Dudley had decided beforehand that he would eat his meals in restaurants for a while until he was better settled (gringo nervousness). His first night's sleep in the new apartment was quite restful despite the nightclub in the background.

Dudley's first order of business when moving to a new town, which he had done more than a handful of times during and after college, was to open a checking account in a local bank. On his first day as a resident in Quepos he set out to do just that. He had noticed a rather modern building in the heart of Quepos that purported to be a bank and was called BCR or Banco de Costa Rica.

Dudley went through their security into the main customer hall but did not encounter the cordoned off lines waiting to see a teller or platform agent he was so used to seeing in U.S. Banks. Instead, a guard helped him push the right button and obtain a ticket from the take-a-ticket system, with the right code on it indicating he wanted a platform agent to open a checking account. He would learn that take-a-ticket systems were the favorite mode of queuing up customers in many of the larger businesses in Costa Rica.

Now, Dudley had been a banker for a few years with a major U.S. retail bank in Pennsylvania and Florida, both as an investment officer and a branch manager. He was curious to see how Tico banks operate and he watched the teller and platform activities with interest while he waited. Nothing looked particularly strange except that there were only three tellers working the five windows in the teller section despite a queue that was at least 30 sitting in the waiting area. For the platform area, the queue was about ten people long with only two agents serving in the four stations.

Dudley wouldn't have tolerated that situation as a branch manager; he would have gone onto the platform himself and started serving customers and he would have called someone from the back room to come in to help the tellers... whoa, cool it Dud, you're Americansky is showing. Remember, you're _not_ managing anything anymore and the pace of life here is much more casual. Chill out dude.

It took a half hour before Dudley's number was called. When it was, he had his passport in hand and approached a very pretty young lady agent at "poh-zi-see-ohn see-eh-tay" or position seven. He recognized the right position only because it was also posted on a monitor above as well as called out on the public address system. To the lady agent he presented the document and asked, in English of course, to open a checking account. He was getting excited about getting into the swing of things but that didn't last long when she said: "Señor, may I see your said-joo-la?"

"What's a 'said-joo-la'?" our hero asks. "A cédula, señor, is your document of residency in Costa Rica". "Er, I don't have one of those yet, señorita." He remembered people talking about them but thought he could do it later. In previous years one only had to show a passport to open a bank account but evidently that policy had changed and one now had to have the cédula first. All of a sudden her English became flawless: "I'm sorry sir, but I can't open any account for you without a cédula." To Dudley, she seemed a little too pleased with herself for delivering that information, probably because she had gotten a chance to practice her English.

Dudley thanked the agent for her time and left the bank disappointed. He just kept thinking that this was Mexico once more; always missing some document. Experience was showing that it would not be as easy to get the basics accomplished in his retirement country as it was in his native country. In addition, locals would not accept U.S. bank checks as payment for goods or services because of the long times required to clear a check across international borders and banking systems. Sometimes that was more than a month.

If you wanted to use dollars it would have to be in cash; many local vendors liked cash for the bigger items. Landlords in particular liked cash dollars because the exchange rate had been changing in favor of the dollar for some years and would likely continue. When he came to Costa Rica on his first visit in 2003, the exchange rate was 360 colones to the dollar. By 2008 it was close to 500, a 39% appreciation for the greenback in five years. To landlords that helped reduce the impact of the country's higher inflation rate (10-15% per year during that period).

Dudley resigned himself to working out of his Sarasota checking account using the debit card that went with it. So what's the big deal, studley Dudley, the card works in just about any ATM here, withdrawing in either colones or dollars. There really is no financial penalty in doing so. He had already determined that the exchange rate the banks used was fair and there was no extra fee in most banks at that time for using his particular card (a major bank issued Visa).

He expected that living by the card would prove to be easy as long as he was careful to safeguard it. He believed that if he did that well, little could happen that would cause him difficulty. He expected he would have his cédula within a short time and life would be even easier. He expected and he expected and he expected; Dudley was again thinking in terms of unrealistic expectations. Hank's effin ghostly spirit hung over our hero.

Next Dudley went to the local post office serving Quepos, Manuel Antonio and the surrounding area, also known as the Canton (kind of like "County") of Aguirre. He was joined by an acquaintance who had become a new friend, a Gringa (a lady born in the U.S.A.) who would become a close friend as time went on and who had lived in Bolivia as a missionary for 23 years. So she was fluent in Spanish and helped him get a post office box in about 15 minutes. The annual rent on the box was about $7 at that time. But at least he now had an address to give people.

Speaking of addresses, he quickly learned that the streets in Quepos, like much of Costa Rica at the time, carried neither street names nor numbers. Even in San Jose, cabbies navigated by dead reckoning and landmarks. Tell a taxi driver you wanted to go to 5th Street and Second Avenue, talking like you were in New York and he'd look at you very puzzled. Tell him you want to go to the Ministry of Health, or "Caja (cah-hah), the driver would have you there, at 5th Street and Second Avenue, in a few minutes.

Sometime later, after a few months had passed, Dudley had begun writing a kind of a monthly report for friends and family in the States. He dubbed himself the "Golden Gringo" and his monthly newsletter the Golden Gringo Chronicles. He found he liked writing as a hobby in retirement and that it also gave him an opportunity to learn more about his adopted country. In one of the early additions, Dudley took it upon himself to name several of the streets in Quepos as a suggestion to the local government. The Canton was not impressed by his naming system and didn't run out and post signs as he suggested.

Slowly our hero fell into a routine. He learned where to buy certain foods and what markets had the best price, offered the widest variety or carried the special item not found anywhere else in Quepos. There were, of course, a significant number of things that he couldn't find _anywhere_ in Quepos; this was to be expected in a small town. The items he couldn't find would become a short list that he would take to San José 2-4 times per year where at least half of them could be found. The items he couldn't find even in San José often became stowaway requests to visitors coming from the States if they weren't too bulky or too heavy to slip into a suitcase. "You do whatcha gotta do" said a new friend and long-time resident.

After about a month and a half, Dudley's life was moving along rather smoothly until his roommate suddenly announced that he wouldn't be "renewing our arrangement" at the end of November, only two months after it had started. They had not become real, close friends during that time but interaction with each other was polite and courteous even if it was rather superficial.

The reason offered by the roomie was that he wanted to hold open the second bedroom for another use. But Dudley felt that this was his way of saying he no longer wanted a roommate. Dudley had learned that this was the first time he had had a roommate and the problem was probably small stuff, like putting the dishes away in the "wrong" place, mounting the toilet paper in the "wrong" direction or maybe, forgetting to put away a half squeezed tube of toothpaste. He had always had the same issues with his wife who was now an ex-wife.

In any event Dudley only had a couple of weeks to find new lodgings. He needed new digs by December 1.

Something that one of his friends in Sarasota used to say flashed across his mind:

"If you want to hear God laugh, tell him your plans".
Chapter Eight – Am I Tico Yet?

So, for the next few days Dudley started canvassing friends and acquaintances and scoured the local press, like Quepolandia magazine, for places to rent. December 1 was the start of the high season in the area and rental prices were beginning to reflect that. Some landlords changed their rates by as much as 50% upward during "the season" to make up for the slow months when they often had no renters.

One day, Dudley was sitting in a restaurant/bar called Sargento's in downtown Quepos having a Philadelphia cheesesteak and a coke for lunch. He had found Sargento's at the suggestion of a gringo friend. The place was owned by a fella from Philadelphia, a former U.S. Army sergeant about the same age as Dudley who was affectionately known as "Papa".

Having lived in the Greater Philadelphia area (Allentown) for almost 20 years, when Dudley first met Papa he felt required to test his credentials for making a cheesesteak. "Where in Philadelphia are you from Papa?" Dudley was careful not to use the term "Philly" as most natives there dislike the diminutive term. "Twenty Second and Allegheny" was the response. Couldn't get much more Philadelphia than that thought Dudley.

However, his best credential was the product he served. Many restaurants in the U.S. offer something they call a Philadelphia cheesesteak, but they are more often a weak imitation. Even in Allentown, which is only 50 miles from center city Philadelphia by Interstate, they often managed to bastardize the idea, adding sweet peppers and/or tomato sauce to the sandwich. The result was a tasty sandwich but not an authentic Philly Cheesesteak. The classic cheesesteak is an art form, yet simple in design.

Papa produced the real McCoy. Take very thinly sliced quality beef (eye of the round if you can get it) and grill it on a regular short-order grill, chopping it roughly as it cooks. On the side, grill some chopped onions and work them into the beef. Shortly before the mixture is completely cooked, throw on a very thin slice of mozzarella and let it melt for ten to fifteen seconds. Scoop the beef and cheese into a 6" submarine roll with a crisp top and soft inside that was also toasted on the grill using a little oil/butter combination. In Philadelphia the best rolls usually come from the Amoroso bakery. Now that's classic.

I'm very sorry to say Papa has since retired and the Sargento's grill has been closed, but the taste back then was great while it lasted.

There was one other thing that made Sargento's different. Papa had set up a bank of six to eight rocking chairs positioned in a rectangle in a section of the dining room in good view of the sports screens. It was also great for cross talking, very similar to the old cracker barrel set up that many corner grocery stores had in days gone by.

There were always regulars at Sargento's and often irregulars who drifted in. For a period of a year or so, Dudley became a regular. He could spend one to two hours there, two or three days a week bantering with the guys over Tico habits and practices, politics, major sports games, where to buy different stuff, how to renew a Costa Rican visa and any other topic that seemed appropriate or even inappropriate.

One day, Dudley was sitting with the cracker barrel cronies when a visitor had joined them who was distinctively Asian in appearance. His name was Aiman Adik and Dudley learned he was from Kuala Lumpur. At first Dudley couldn't remember whether or not that was a country or a city in a country. Aiman quickly assured him that Kuala Lumpur was the capitol city of Malaysia and Dudley had a flash back to a picture of two huge building towers that once were the tallest in the world (the Petronas Towers of Kuala Lumpur) until they were overtaken by the towers in Dubai and other Asian capitals.

When Dudley introduced himself to Aiman by his full name, Dudley Bodoh, there was an involuntary smirk on Aiman's face and it was obvious he was holding back laughter. When Dudley pressed the Malaysian on why he found his name interesting, Aiman apologized for what he was about to say and said in perfect, unaccented English: "You see, the English equivalent of 'bodoh' in Malay is "dumb ass". The room erupted in laughter while Dudley kept thinking the boys in Brownsville would love that one. He was also thinking 'if you think my name is funny amigo, have you thought about what your last name sounds like in English (ah dik)!'

Sargento's was a great place to get tips from gringos that had lived in the area for some years and who knew the ropes. The day after hearing he would have to move from his current apartment, Dudley was sitting in Sargento's having a cheesesteak and he mentioned that he was looking for a new place to live. One of the older gringo gentlemen sitting in one of the rockers said that there was a one bedroom apartment for rent in his apartment building in Quepos, located about five blocks across town from the restaurant. Would Dudley like to see it? Yes indeed, said our hero and, after they finished their lunches the man led Dudley through the streets of Quepos until they arrived at his home.

What Dudley encountered was a gated compound containing a villa occupied by the owners of the compound and two buildings. One of the buildings had four apartments and the other had three. He was introduced to the landlady, a petite Tica lady in her late forties who was very polite, friendly and who had a strong smile. She spoke no English. As Dudley was trying to figure out if they were going to communicate by charades, she yelled across the house in Spanish and her son immediately appeared. A 15 year old named David (pronounced Dah-veed in Spanish) smiled and said, in perfect English with only a slight accent, "Can I help you?"

David was completing his second year in English in a local private high school and obviously was quick in absorbing language. He had two brothers, one 10 years of age in primary school and another 20 years old studying pharmacy at University of Costa Rica in San José. Through David, his mother invited Dudley to see the apartment which was located on the second floor of the building with three units. It was the only unit in that building on that floor and it consisted of a large kitchen with dining area, a large bedroom and a bath with shower as well as a balcony outside the unit.

The apartment had A/C and three windows that kept it bright during the day. The view from the kitchen window was of Quepos and roofs of nearby houses but also a good view of the hills leading up to Manuel Antonio. The apartment was mostly furnished, having cooking utensils and dinnerware, a kitchen table, stove and refrigerator. The bedroom had a bed, a TV and a computer table. Actually the bedroom had two beds, a double and a single. Dudley would later refer to the double as his _master_ bedroom and the single as his _guest_ bedroom.

When Dudley asked about the rent, the landlady responded with a number for rent and a deposit and they quickly came to an agreement. "When do you think I could move in?" says our hero. David translated to his mother but Dudley got the impression she had already grasped the gist of what he had said. David turned back to Dudley and said with a smile: "This afternoon if you'd like".

Nuff said, thought Dudley; he promised to return the next day with his belongings, money for the deposit and the first month's rent. So, on November 22, 2008, eight days ahead of his deadline to leave his roommate, Dudley moved into his own digs free of a roommate for the first time.

Dudley was in a good mood the day he moved into his new home. He would remember the date because it happened to be the 45th anniversary of John Kennedy's assassination. Dudley had been a junior at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell and crossing the Textile Bridge on his way home that day when the radio blared that Kennedy had been shot and killed. Like most people who were alive then, Dudley would not forget where he was and what he was doing that day. The same would hold for September 11, 2001.

Dudley had arrived in Costa Rica in the middle of the rainy season. But even in the rainy season most of the mornings were warm and sunny and provided ample opportunity to go to the beach. One could see the rain clouds slowly move from the south/south-east towards the Quepos area and by mid-afternoon or early evening the showers hit. This was a similar pattern to what he had gotten used to in Florida but the difference was that the rains in Costa Rica could be much heavier.

Later, Dudley would make a brief study of rainfall in his new land versus where he had lived in the States. He learned that the Boston area where he grew up gets 40-45 inches of rain per year, Sarasota 80-85 and the tropical rains of Costa Rica averaged 240-280 inches per year. During the rainy season, mid-May to mid-December, the rains are pretty much daily and can be torrential in the afternoons or evenings. The interesting thing was most mornings were still clear or somewhat overcast but normally rain free. There were very few days of total rain like in the Asian tropics.

For the remainder of 2008 and a few months into 2009, Dudley went to the beach on the order of five days per week but, despite the beauty of it all and the camaraderie with the beach vendors and others, it got old fairly quickly. While he would always be a beachophile, he needed something else to occupy his retirement time and challenge what was left of his bodoh brain.

He had begun sending home periodic email reports to family and friends in the States because he had several inquiries about how he was getting along in Costa Rica. He began writing periodic reports on the happenings and his experience in Costa Rica in general and Quepos/Manuel Antonio in particular. The numerous rainy afternoons and evenings provided added time to work on the Chronicles and he came to enjoy the writing process as well as the added incentive to learn about the country.

As time went on and he had more experiences, the reports morphed into something that looked more like a newsletter. Eventually he started calling it the Golden Gringo Chronicles; the "Golden" signifying both the fact he was in his golden years and also that he had been lucky enough to have found such a great place to retire.

When he moved into his current apartment, his first thought had been that maybe it would last only a few months or perhaps a year. He would remember that first thought some years later on the fifth year anniversary of his moving in. By that time his landlady and her family had virtually become his Costa Rican family.

He was just about approaching one year living there when Dudley was in an intimate conversation with David and his mother on their patio one night. David was translating as usual, when Dudley said:

"You know that I have three adult kids but no grandkids, don't you?"

"Yes".

"I think your three boys have become my grandkids." David repeated this to his mom in Spanish with a smile.

"Yo se" (I know), said mom.

He now knew he had finally settled in. There would be more challenges ahead, obtaining official residency for example and also unknown difficulties like a serious health problem, but for now he could say he had finally come to grips with the move and could look forward to a good retirement that included learning more about Costa Rican culture and its society in a beautiful, natural setting.

Welcome to Costa Rica Dudley, you're slowly becoming Tico.

The End – Part One
About the Author

Bob Normand grew up in Massachusetts, lived in Pennsylvania twice for a total of 17 years, Ohio for 12 years, Belgium for 2½ years and Florida for 10 years before moving to Costa Rica. In 2008, at the age of 65 he retired to Costa Rica after having visited the country eight times and falling in love with it.

Mr. Normand graduated from Villanova University with a master's in Chemical Engineering and worked in the plastics and chemical industry for 17 years. Later he founded several small businesses in computers, computer supplies and office furniture. During the last 15 years of his professional career he acted as principal management consultant to over 110 businesses and founded the Institute for Smart Business Management, a consultant firm based in Sarasota, Florida that offers online management guidance (www.isbminc.com) for small and medium sized businesses.

Writing and teaching have always been of interest to Mr. Normand and his teaching credits include several semesters as an Adjunct Professor of Small Business Management at Northampton Community College in Pennsylvania. During this time he wrote a book to help struggling entrepreneurs called: Entreprenewal - The Six Step Recovery Program for Small Business (soon to be available on Smashwords).

After settling into his new life in Costa Rica, he found himself writing periodic reports to family and friends back in the United States about his experiences living in Costa Rica. Before long these reports evolved into a monthly newsletter he dubbed "The Golden Gringo Chronicles". He specifically picked "golden" to signify his golden years of retirement and how lucky he was to have been able to retire in such a beautiful and wild place.

As time went on the circulation of the Chronicles increased to the hundreds as friends and acquaintances discovered the newsletter. The Golden Gringo Chronicles continue to be published every month and can be found by Googling "Golden Gringo Chronicles", clicking on the "Archives" page and then on the latest edition. To add your name to the newsletter, simply send an email requesting such to bob@bobnormand.com.

Other Books by Bob Normand

The Golden Gringo Chronicles, Part Two – Surviving in Costa Rica, the Early Years

The Golden Gringo Chronicles, Part Three – Becoming Tico, Maybe

Entreprenewal, The Six Step Recovery Program for Small Business

