ANDREA CALANDRA
A Night In Puerto Viejo
Puerto Viejo is just a small fishermen village, which become over the years, a tourist destination, very popular especially by North Americans and overlooking the Caribbean Sea, a few kilometers from the border with Panama.
It is a very characteristic small village, because the inhabitants are mostly the descendants of Jamaican slaves, who were employed in the banana cultivation, very widespread in Costa Rica.
There is not much more to add, because like many places that have become popular tourist destinations, the small town has ended up adapting and offering what tourists are looking for, so dozens of little shops, all very similar, offering the same type of goods, which have Jamaican culture as a common theme.
However, if you have the patience to wait for the later hours, even if you have to be a little careful, once the shops and stalls for tourists are closed, the real Puerto Viejo comes alive: some small bars, clubs, emerge, without signs.
From inside comes, mixed with whiffs of smoke and alcohol, a very loud Latin American music. You can recognize it because many local boys meet in front of them.
Even the children, at least the older ones, remain to play in front of the house, on the street. People simply sit on the porch of the house.
photography
The small town came back to live with its true soul, without having to pretend. The atmosphere that is created is beautiful, you no longer see tourists around, no stalls along the sidewalk a few meters from the sea, where you can only see dim lights on the moored boats illuminated from time to time.
Tourism, for this small area of the country, is certainly a fundamental resource, however, sometimes one forgets that there is a price to pay, in exchange for a little Welfare.
This is a challenge and we, in Europe, have lost it in many places that have become mass tourism destinations.