Exploring the interior

I've always wanted to visit the indigenous communities in the Talamanca Mountains on Costa Rica's Caribbean side. Saturday, June 12th, afforded us the opportunity to one of them, The community of Bambu, which is sometimes labeled as Bratsi on maps, was holding their first Feria Organica to celebrate the success, personal and financial, of the community's transition to organic farming. We took the 9:30 AM Sixaola bus out of Puerto Viejo with plans to hope on the next bus out of BriBri heading for Bambu. Thirty minutes later we were in BriBri only to find out the next bus for Bambu would not come until noon. Anyone who has ever been to BriBri can tell you there is just not a whole of to do there. But luck was with us and we found a pizza-internet restaurant to hang out in. Restaurant Terrible, yes, that's right. However there is an accent mark in Spanish and the pronunciation is slightly different. Terrible is what the locals call the owner, an expat named Terry. Swapping tales and sampling their pizza, macaroons and brownies made the time fly by. On to Bambu.

Unlike the cushioned buses that come in and out of resort towns like Puerto Viejo, the bus to Bambu was very basic with hard resin seats. The 30 minuten trip was fun as we followed along the riverbank of the Suretka River (we actually thought it was Rio Sixaola at the time) opposite Panama. After passing the very, very small community of Chase (or Shasse) we began an uphill climb, over 3 flowing streams and onto the Bambu Cultural Center. The Center consists of a large traditional thatched-roof structure which housed most of the produce and artesians. There was also a small all-purpose grocery store, a bar-meeting hall, a public restroom and another small thatched roof building which was being used to cook tamales. There were gigantic organic avacados, lots of organic plantains and bananas, organic cocoa made into chocolate milk and all types of delicious homemade foods. We tried quite a few items and came home with some organic chocolate (no sugar). The pork tamale was one of the best I've tasted anywhere. The return bus came by at 3 PM and it was back to civilization for us. Wonderful way to spend a day.