Behind me, a cliff dropped to the ocean below. Across two lanes of asphalt, a sheer mountain face stood before me. Having spent the better part of two hours on the hunt, I had determined that this location would be the best spot to find her. Had I not already seen her once since being here in Costa Rica, I’d almost believe her to be mythical. Who is she? She’s a vintage Baja Bug.

Sadly, she didn’t appear that afternoon.

Hot Wheels

As is natural, I sometimes compare and contrast the life I know now to my previous one. Before moving here, I lived in South Beach, the land of luxury and excess. It’s the show and tell capital of the world. Exotic cars are so common there that the very term exotic loses meaning. Maserati, Ferrari, Porsche, Aston Martin, Lamborghini, etc… these are the everyday vehicles of South Beach. Live there long enough and you can distinguish, from sound alone, whether it’s a Ferrari or a Lamborghini gear-shifting its way through the city streets. And over time, you look at them with the same amount of interest as you would a Kia Sophia.

Of course, there were always the more rare vehicles making appearances in the city.

And sometimes luxury vehicles came with celebrities behind the wheel.

Beautiful pieces of machinery, no doubt. And if you are a young person with a love for exotic sports cars, I can’t think of a better job than working as a valet in South Beach.

Here’s a video of a Lamborghini on the streets of South Beach.

Style Points: Costa Rica

In Costa Rica, high-end exotics are a rarity. I remember one day during my second month here, riding my bicycle down the hill from Herradura and hearing, much to my surprise, that particular sound I had come to know so well. I looked up and a classic red Ferrari passed by the stop sign ahead of me before swerving its way out of sight. To date, it’s the only luxury sports car I’ve seen.

But all of that streamlined, high-powered luxury is traded for something equally visually stimulating: classic, vintage vehicles. Not the automobiles you’d see polished and put on display during Art Deco Weekend in South Beach. These are vehicles of form AND function. Vehicles of practicality, wearing out their treads throughout the land. Vintage Land Rovers. Classic Jeeps. VW Campers (less practical, but still supremely stylish). And the ever elusive Baja Bug.

While certainly it seems Costa Rica would be an excellent location for any high-end sports car, whipping around mountain roads, there is the actual problem of the roads. Before you take a trip of any distance in this country, the question comes up of the condition of the roads not to mention whether or not they’re even paved. Four-wheel drive vehicles are necessities in certain parts of the country.

Truthfully, I’m not a huge car aficionado. I like the power behind them. I like the aesthetics. And here, the aesthetics appeal to my senses. I fell in love with the rhythm of this country almost the instant I arrived, and it was in no small part due to the cars and the traffic. It was my childhood all over again. I remember walking in the streets of Khobar in my youth, horns blowing, dirty white Datsuns braking and gassing their way through traffic. Seeing it brought back to life in San José when I first arrived nearly brought tears to my eyes. The streets are filled with car makes and models not found in the US. From the four-wheel drive vehicles to the compact sedans to the miniature buses and trucks. All of it is so personally appealing.

This is what traffic looks like in San Jose.

A friend of mine posted a photo of a VW Camper recently and asked the general public when the last time was anyone saw one? My reply was a smile-all-over-inside “Yesterday.”

Yet one more slice of life in Costa that I so completely adore. More pictures of motorized vehicles can be found here.