Hola Beast Crew

The end of the Beastly Adventure?  Is three years of travelling around the world to end here, in Costa Rica the supposed most civilised country and tourist friendly location in the Central Americas?  Please don’t let it be so!  We are still in a horrendous limbo land at the moment as we are battling with customs to release our car as officially it belongs to the Costa Rican government at present…read on!

On a lighter, less depressing note - Greg is a published author.  For those of you that have given up reading these emails, you can read an exciting summarised version of our first half of our trip then buy his ebook online by going to BEASTLY ADVENTURE.

UK – San Jose (Costa Rica) – Punta Arenas – Puerto Caldera – San Jose – Puerto Caldera – Nicoya Peninsula – Puerto Caldera

22nd July – 2nd August 2007

We arrived in Costa Rica amidst all the wet season rains that empty from the skies at an alarming pace and wet you to the skin.

We headed to the shipping agents in San Jose that we had been referred to by our Ecuadorian shippers.  They at first did not acknowledge any existence of our car which had been imported on their ship, just under a month ago.  After retrieving the Bill of Lading (document of loading onto the boat), we paid up (generally a big no-no unless you see your merchandise first), paid for the customs clearance that they said they had done and headed to the Pacific coast and Puerto Caldera where our beloved Beast was waiting for us.

We headed to the port and were met by a greasy, little customs official, who we shall, for all intents and purposes, call ‘Weasel’.  We filled in the required documents, photocopied the required documents and even drove a 50km return trip to Punta Arenas and back to get the car insurance that Weasel required of us.  We returned to the customs desk to be greeted by Weasel again who seemed to have a glint in his eye.  Only one of us was allowed into the port so Greg waited for 2 hours at one of the most heavily guarded ports before he was given permission by Weasel to go in and see the Beast.  She was located in a bonded warehouse (officially a storage place) parked forwards, against a wall.  Greg did the perfunctory check of the inside and decided to see if he could start the car.  The battery was dead, there was evidence that they had tried to start the car but obviously not finding the batteries (they are in a separate compartment at the side of the car) they had just dragged the car forwards whilst it was in reverse. 

So whilst trying to get the car started little Weasel man, looks at Greg with a sly grin…and makes the international sign for money by rubbing his fingers together and says “Ooooo you are going to have to pay!”.

Now as we have found out we have found out you cannot import a British car, or right hand drive car, into Costa Rica.  But all we want to do is do what every other overlanding Brit/ Aussie/ Japanese/ Thai/ Kiwi/ Indian/ Bangladeshi/ Brunei/ Cyprus/ Fiji/ Indonesia/ Kenyan/ Malawian/ Mozambique/ Zambian/ Zimbabwean and all the other countries that drive with their steering wheels on the right have done if they drive through Central America is drive and see the other cultures.  But all we want to do is drive through in temporary transit on a temporary importation document. 

So our little Weasel decided when Greg came back to the office to tell us this, “There are a few problems, senor, you have a right hand drive car which is illegal to import and senor, your car is considered abandoned as you did not come here to pick it up 15 days after it was received in the port, senor.”  At this point, having spent 5 hours faffing about in 35 degree humid heat, Greg and I saw red.  We asked him all the logical questions, in a slightly irate manner, like, well how can we cross 25 borders, importing our car with temporary imports across the whole world and for it to all end here,.  How can our shipping agent not know that we can’t ship our car in and also we arranged to have our car stored… in a bonded warehouse… with our shipping agent until we arrived, a month later. An agreement was made with the shipping agents for about $10 a day.  We had also, if you remember, paid for our customs clearance. Greg asked Weasel if he could do anything further for us and his reply was ‘No, your car is now the property of Costa Rica’.  We left the Weasel with a parting, insane screaming comment of “Costa Rica is great!” and “Jesus!”. 

We then stormed off dejected and with boiling blood, throwing things in the car and went in the direction of the nearest hotel with a telephone and internet connection.  Alexis spent 20 minutes trying to get through to our shipper in Ecuador to see how she could help.  She gave a nonchalant “I will see what I can do”.  We contacted shipping agents, customs agents and very fortuitously we met a Brit, David Jacobs, who was staying in our hotel and trying to get his 30,000 tonne ship into port and had been trying for the past 2 months.  David pulled in his shipping agent, Ignacio, to help us out with trying to communicate with the correct authorities.  They have friends in high places including the head of the Ministry of Tourism, the Chief of Customs and even the President.  We were told by most of the people that the customs officer just wanted a bribe… those should be the people that you shouldn’t have to bribe!

Alexis’s Dad managed to drag the British Embassy in on the argument as well and they contacted the customs officer in Puerto Caldera on our behalf, who just quoted the law at them and didn’t offer too much of a resolution, except for the potential to drive up to the Nicaraguan border on the back of a flatback lorry or ship out to somewhere else, but officially wouldn’t allow the car out.  We wrote a letter to the port and customs authorities appealing to them to allow our vehicle out by putting it on the back of a flatback, but they returned it with a full quote of the laws, saying that we cannot take our car.  As it stands we will have to put it on the back of a flatback lorry to a garage anyway because of the knackered gearbox from them dragging the car forwards whilst in reverse.

So we are stuck in a bit of a black hole… we have had the car impounded because it was left in the port for more than 15 days (unbeknownst to us) without clearing customs and is now considered abandoned, we cannot temporarily import the car as it has been abandoned but we cannot import the car as it is illegal to import a right hand drive car and if we could import it, the Land Rover Forward Control 101 is not listed as a vehicle on their import tax list!  CATCH 22!  The past few weeks have been a rollercoaster of emotions with very few highs and a lot of very depressing lows.  The Costa Rican customs have offered us no resolution so far just impounding our car (for potential bribes)

Alexis had unwisely thought that she wouldn’t need more than a few days clothes to wear before she would be returned to her shorts and skimpy tops, but no 2 weeks later she is still wearing same clothes (although she has cleaned them in between!).  Let’s hope that the Beast is safely returned otherwise you will be able to smell her all the way back in the UK soon.

So is it to end here?  Three years travelling around the world, across 26 borders unhindered, travelling through amazing scenery, interesting cultures, meeting the most unbelievable people, through 4 continents to end in the country that is supposed to be classified as the most tourist friendly place in the world, Costa Rica??  We will keep you updated as we will hopefully find out on Monday after 2 weeks of negotiating!

Notes on Costa Rica:

• It is illegal to import a right hand drive vehicle into Costa Rica – according to our customs officials.
• It is possible to drive across the border (we believe) with a right hand drive vehicle.
• There are two ports in Costa Rica – Puerto Caldera and Puerto Limon.