The Island of the Lonely Men

On Sunday we went on our final excursion of our extended stay in Costa Rica.

Last week we went to our friend's holiday apartment on the pacific coast for some sun and swimming. On Sunday we returned to the pacific coast, this time as part of a day trip to Isla San Lucas.

We were picked up by the Samantha tours bus from the Rosti Pollos restaurant near the airport. As the bus was picking us up at 7:30am on a Sunday morning, we decided to catch a taxi down to the pickup location. This proved to be no problem and the 20 minute ride cost 5000 colones.

The bus was certainly the most luxurious we have been on in Costa Rica with reclining soft seats, air conditioning and a WC. There were about 20 or so others on the bus, 99% of them ticos. This was most likely due to the fact that the tour operator runs the tour at discounted rates for residents on a Sunday (if you are not a resident, you may still get a special deal if they have spaces left for a Sunday tour).

After about 45 minutes on the bus, we stopped just after San Ramon for some breakfast. It was the usual rice, beans and scrambled eggs and, despite us already having had breakfast before we left, it was very tasty.

After about another hour on the bus we arrived at the port town of Puntarenas to get on the boat which would take us to the island. We were met by Craig (although all his Costa Rican employees seemed to call him Greg, maybe Craig is not easy to pronounce for Spanish speakers) the owner of the tour company who was originally from Orkney. Throughout the course of the tour, Craig and his fellow guides were very attentive, frequently asking if we needed anything to drink, providing us with information on the surroundings and even checking that we had sunblock on!

The boat ride to Isla San Lucas took about an hour, during which we sat on the open front of the boat enjoying the sun, views and the free fruit and natural fruit drinks that were on offer.

For over 100 years San Lucas was home to Costa Rica's largest and most brutal prison, often compared to Alcatraz and Devil's Island. The prison closed in 1992 and had until very recently been off-limits to visitors. It is still not frequented by large numbers of visitors as Samantha tours operates the only tour of the island, and the only other visitors are usually volunteers and researchers from charities and universities.

At the dock there are the remains of two small holding cells where prisoners (often in unfeasibly large numbers) would be held until they were allocated to cells. There was a large tarantula sitting in the corner of one of the holding cells when we visited.

The road up the small hill to the prison is very straight and you pass the remains of the old infirmary before reaching the main administration building and the church. Many of the buildings look ready to fall down, and indeed we were advised against going up to any higher floor levels because the flooring is collapsing in many areas. We were also advised not to use flash photography inside many of the buildings as there were lots and lots of bats - many of which took to flying just above our heads while we were going in and out of rooms!


It is the prisoners cells that are the most interesting, mainly due to the graffiti that the prisoners have left on the walls. There are many pictures, phrases, names and dates. Although despite the age of the prison, the graffiti seems to only date from the 1960s onwards. The prisoners had no paints or inks so they made their own from soot, ash, stones and blood. It was rumoured that the red dress of one of the pictures was made from the blood of a nurse killed here. Some of the pictures include cartoon characters, jesus, pele, and women in various states of undress.
After the prison tour we walked back to the boat and enjoyed a delicious lunch of grilled fish (mahi mahi), rice and vegetables washed down with sangria (or soft drink). Then we left for a walk through the forest, via the old prison laundry, to get to the beach (playa el coco). After the walk, which was in quite stifling heat, it was very, very nice to be able to submerge ourselves in the cool (but not too cool) waters of the pacific ocean. The only problem we found was burning our feet on the hot sand prior to reaching the water. After our dip, we took a walk along the beach before heading back to the boat.

On the cruise back to the mainland, we sailed around the other side of the island which gave a great view of the many other islands that lie in the gulf of Nicoya. The bus ride back took much longer than the one in the morning because it seemed that half of Costa Rica was also making their way back along the road from the coast to the central valley. Regardless, we had enjoyed our trip to prison, but grateful that we could spend the night back in our comfortable home in Heredia and not in the heat and brutal conditions of Isla San Lucas.