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hello everyone. we have made it down for our vacation-trip to check out costa rica to see if we want to move here from the US.
It truly is a beautifull country. about the roads from quepos, to manuel antonio, i think we all know the roads here are more full of pot holes than cement. we have even seen tires used to plug up some of the pot holes, or even small trees ,so that no one will drive head first into them.
after saying that, the worse thing about the roads, are the bridges. at times you have to laugh at yourself for taking a chance crossing them. one lane, with see through floors, no sides on some, spaces between the driving area and the walls of the bridge so big, you could drive the front of your car into them. even so, tourist busses, semi’s , farm equipement, and lines of passenger cars are all lined up waiting to get across. one was so bad, you could truly see the wave in the bottom of the bridge.
so, don’t worry about the roads, just worry about crossing costa rican bridges. it is all bad, beautifull country, beautifull people.
My 70 year old parents had the same complaint. But you know I never thought about it . Just one of tose things you acepts when you accept a central american country.
Very true, the bridges are part of the adventure I guess is the way we look at it. You obviously see there are less safety standards than in the U.S., but what we have found since moving here is that we don’t see any more accidents because of what most would consider laxed safety standards. The people aren’t sue happy if they slip on a bad board crossing the bridge either……somebody would probably just say “dummy, why did you step in the hole”? We figure if we watch a semi pulling a loaded trailer across, our little pick should make it.
Yes, the bridges in Costa Rica can be a real adventure. But rest assured that if the road is paved some VERY heavy trucks have crossed that bridge before you. And if the road is unpaved and wide it is probably maintained by the local fincas and crossed by heavy agricultural trucks.
My friends live in a place with a low water ford that floods regularly during the wet season (sometime for weeks) and must access the property by foot across a swinging bridge about 100 feet long. The ford is a fine dry concrete construction that is often dry. But recent fllods dropped a few tons of rock on it that had to be removed. . .
My first day in Costa Rica my friends took me for a local tour and we crossed a swinging bridge with an automobile. . . A bridge that I would have thought several times about before crossing on foot. It rocked and bounced just like a swinging rope foot bridge! Small tractors pulling carts of sugar cane crossed this bridge regularly.
The next day we went to look at a piece of property and the public bridge built of two huge logs with a wood deck was half fallen and had been so for a couple years. One end of one log had dropped down and the bridge was twisted to a 45 degree angle at one end. The family that lived on the property (including small infants) crossed the bridge on foot every day.
On the road to Cuidad Quesada there is a new bridge next to a large road side grotto (Catholic Shrine). To the side and slightly below the new bridge is the old bridge which you can walk out on and look down from. The innocent highway bridge that seems to cross a small river in a typical tree filled ravine in fact crosses a narrow gorge that must be over 300 feet deep with vertical sides. In places you cannot see the bottom. If you missed the guards at the end of this bridge you would easily just dissapear and maybe not be found for months. . .
This year we went to look at a property that I had visited last year. At that time we crossed a very narrow but well travelled wood and earth bridge on what appeared to be a public road (it is hard to tell public from private roads in Costa Rica but private ones are often better than public). This year the bridge was missing and replaced with some scrap lumber that a resident was now hand carrying everything he needed across and up the road on his back. The earth the boards were supported on was crumbling. . . His truck was blocking the end of the road and surrounded by fuel and water containers that he was apparently hauling by hand. Life in rural Costa Rica. . . All I could think of at the time is that maybe the land I looked at would be cheaper since it lacked access. . .
And yes we crossed that major highway bridge in Limon on the road to Cuhuita where part of the concrete highway deck is missing and you can see the river below. . . looks scary but the bridge is structuraly fine.
In the three weeks we were in Costa Rica this time we traveled some 1500 kilometers and crossed hundreds of bridges. Most were good. Many were narrow and many needed maintenance or replacing. However, none except the two farm bridges on roads marked as horse and cattle paths on topographical maps were out. In a country where it often rains 200″ in a year in places bridges are numerous and old ones often wash out. When they do Costa Rica puts in new bigger bridges. It is part of the cycle of life in this country. You learn to take it in stride.
I worry more about meeting cows head on in the dark (a common and serious hazzard) than the pot holes or bad bridges in Costa Rica.
I love this discussion. We are so spoiled with DOT standards in the USA is isn’t funny.
We travel as tourists in a foreign land, zip through canopies on UNREGULATED wires, surf, dive, do touristy things near crocodiles, eat food w/o health department oversight, etc. All of which is several hours away from the nearest CIMA or Clinica Biblica hospital…
And then we complain about the bridge when the commercial truck in front of you has just made it, we wonder if our little rental is going to as well.
Just follow (to the centimeter) EXACTLY the track of the SUCCESSFUL guy in front of you, and you PROBABLY will make it, too. LOLOLOL
(Unless the gross vehicle rating (LOL) of the structure has just been exceeded in its duty cycle by that car in front of you!)
TRANQUILLO!!!! PURA VIDA!!!
I’ve crossed those bridges between Esterillos and Quepos — the first time it was hair-raising, after that, it was just part of the routine. Our bridges in the US aren’t as safe as we would like to think — we have fatal accidents all the time; last year a family of 3 were killed when a girder fell off an overpass on I-70. Their cas was crushed beyond recognition. Thank you very much, I’ll take that rickety old bridge over the alligator pond any day — and speaking of alligators, remember when that train crossing some delapidated bridge over a river in Louisisana collapsed and several dozen people were killed and/or eaten by the alligators below??? In reality, we may only be a trifle safer in the US.
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