Cartago is one of the seven provinces that constitute Costa Rica. Situated on the Atlantic side of the continental divide, the Cartago region stretches between the Reventazón River valley and the surrounding Irazú and Turrialba volcanoes to the north and Cerro de la Muerte and Mount Chirripó to the south.

 Founded in 1563 by Juan Vasquez de Coronado, Cartago was the first Spanish settlement in Costa Rica. Cartago was the capital of Costa Rica until 1823 but had to go forgo this privilege to San José because of its proximity with the Irazu Volcano that nearly destroyed the city in 1723.

 Visit Cartago and take a step back in time as you see the 16th century ruins that provide an interesting insight into the rich history and culture of the pre-Columbian inhabitants. The lush green vegetation that characterized the region was later cleared by the Spanish settlers who made the Cartago region their home. The picturesque villages in the Cartago region stand testimony to an era gone by.

 Cartago has much to offer the visitors, who come to experience its amazing past, explore its historical monuments, or marvel its natural attractions.

 Basilica de Nuestra Señora de Los Ángeles: This impressive Byzantine style basilica is dedicated to Virgen de los Pardos, officially known as la Virgen de los Ángeles (the Lady of the Angels). The church houses the miraculous La Negrita or Black Madonna, a statue known for its healing powers. It attracts pilgrims from across the world on August 2, the feast day of the Virgin of the Angels.

 Irazu Volcano National Park: The National Park is home to the active Irazu Volcano. The highest volcano in Costa Rica, the Irazu volcano has witnessed 23 eruptions since 1723, last being in1963. The major attraction in this park is the lake at Diego de la Haya Crater with its unusual bright greenish and yellow water.

 Parque Nacional Chirripó: Located in the south of Cartago, the Parque Nacional Chirripó is Costa Rica’s most famous mountain park. Visitors can climb Cerro Chirripó, Central America’s highest peak, at a height of 12,529 feet. The park is ideal for hiking and trekking and exploring the natural vegetation with its exotic wildlife. The climb is aggressive but rewarding.

 Orosi Valley: This scenic Orosi valley lies at about an hour’s drive southeast of San José, just beyond the town of Paraíso. The panoramic vistas en route showcase the best of Cartago’s natural attractions. The town of Orosi houses the country’s oldest church that dates back to the 1700′s. The church, which has survived many earthquakes, features altars and shrines beautifully carved from wood. There are several natural thermal springs in the valley, which are known for their curative powers.

 The Ruins: This archaeological site in Cartago contains the ruins of an uncompleted church that was destroyed in the 1910 earthquake. There is a garden with an interesting collection of flowers in the remaining walls. A major landmark of down town Cartago, The Ruins is a good place to relax and observe the local life.

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Barcelona is one of the most cosmopolitan cities in Europe. It’s a city that virtually has everything due to its privileged location on Spain’s north east coast.

When I say privileged I am speaking about the fact that it has sun, mountainous regions, sea and it’s just up the road from Andorra and France. Someone once told me that if they had all the money in the world they’d choose Barcelona to live in because of all these points I have just mentioned above and I must say he certainly has a point. Barcelona has so much going for it.

Getting to Barcelona these days has never been easier and the choice of transport is quite varied. There are two main low-cost airlines that fly here from most European cities and land at either El Prat, which is just outside Barcelona, or Girona airport, which is roughly an hour and a half away from Barcelona’s city centre.

So what are Barcelona’s hidden gems apart from its location? For a start, a stroll around The Barrio Gótico or Gothic Quarter, which is in the centre of the city, is amazing. Many of the buildings here date back from medieval times with some as far back as the Roman settlement here. The Barrio Gótico retains its labyrinth-like maze of streets, which are usually closed off to normal traffic just letting taxis and public service vehicles through. One of the most famous landmarks here is The Cathedral of Santa Eulalia, which was constructed throughout the 13th and 15th centuries on top of a Visiogothic church. It is dedicated to Eulalia of Barcelona a co-patron saint of the city. According to Catholic tradition Eulalia, who was a young virgin, suffered martydom during the Roman settlement in Barcelona.

The next hidden gem is another neighbourhood called El Raval, which belongs to the district of Ciutat Vella and next to the Gothic Quarter. This area of the city has undergone a major scrub-up campaign as it used to be quite infamous due to the crime and prostitution here. Now it’s an area where artists like to live along with its high immigrant population. You’ll also find numerous hip bars and nightclubs along with some fine restaurants. El Raval has two noteworthy landmarks – one of which is a favourite of mine – El Gat which is a large cat statue by Colombian sculptor Fernando Botero and can be found on La Rambla de Raval. The other attraction is La Boqueria Market – one of the best markets in Europe not just Spain. It has the freshest of fish and seafood on offer along with fine fruit and vegetables. It’s an experience in itself just to go into the market and have a look around. A word of warning though: keep your valuables close, as it’s usually full of pickpockets looking out for unwary awestruck tourists!

The last hidden gem I’ll mention is another neighbourhood in the Ciutat Vella district called Barceloneta. This area is known for its sandy beach and many pubs, bars and restaurants dotted along the boardwalk. This area was originally constructed for the residents of another neighbourhood called La Ribera who had been displaced by the construction of the Ciudadela of Barcelona by king Felipe V in 1714.

One of the best places to go is without a doubt is a place called Can Paixano on Reina Cristina 7. It’s one of the most amazing places to sample the cheapest Cava in Barcelona along with an array of sandwiches you never knew existed! It’s basically a rowdy cava bar where the most expensive Can Paixano bottle is a little over 5€. Don’t expect a seat, as there aren’t any! If you go at lunchtime, you’ll be able to find some space to enjoy your drink – but if you go at night, expect the place to be jam-packed! A firm favourite with the many English teachers who either reside in Barcelona on a permanent basis or who are just passing through. Amazing.

Incidentally, if you do decide to come to this great city why not rent an apartment in Barcelona – a lot cheaper than a hotel and definitely more fun!

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We were looking for somewhere to live. We had sold up in Bulgaria and were carrying all our worldly possessions with us when we landed at Tocumen airport in Panama City on Sunday evening. We had a month to decide whether it was the place for us as Bistra, my Bulgarian girlfriend, only had a 30 day tourist visa.

We had return tickets back through Jamaica and London Gatwick to Sofia but didn’t really want to travel back to the Bulgarian winter to hear all our friends saying ‘I told you so’.

Why Panama. When we decided to leave Bulgaria, because of its corrupt nature, our first idea was the USA as Bistra is the holder of a green card, but on further reflection we did not want to get caught up in the rat race again and end up doing another office job. A year earlier a friend had upped sticks and left for Costa Rica, never to be heard of since I may add, so that got us thinking about Central America and one evening over several bottles of wine in the Sofia Radisson Hotel, Graham (a relic from colonial times) said that Panama was a good place to visit.

The mention of Panama immediately brings to mind the Canal, hats and cigars but at this time it was also in the news because of a British man faking his death and disappearing to Panama only to hand himself into the UK police five years later – safe and well. So the next morning I entered the Internet with anticipation and rather than going straight to CardiffCityMad.com I entered Panama Investment into Google and I was very pleasantly surprised.

A major project to enlarge the canal so that it could handle the biggest ships of today compared to 100 years ago had just started, Panama City was a mixture of Singapore, Hong Kong and Manhattan and there were a selection of residence schemes available so that for a minimum investment we could settle. 

 A taste of what was in store occurred two weeks before we were due to leave when our newly appointed lawyers told us that our first full day in Panama City had just being announced as a public holiday and, by the way, the following Monday was non-working as well!

We were met at the airport and taken to the luxury apartment we had rented for the month which was situated on Panama Bay. What we weren’t informed of before booking was the construction of a new elevated highway running along the coast which was behind schedule so the workforce was working around the clock to finish it before the Presidential elections in May ensuing many sleepless nights

I had arranged to meet  ‘a friend of a friend’ in Panama on our first day so that we could have a bit of orientation not knowing that this man was very well orientated around the bars of Panama City so a very interesting evening was enjoyed by all. This help was especially appreciated as most of the Panamanians we had met had so far could speak about as much English as I could Spanish.

Tuesday arrived with a 9 o’clock meeting at the lawyer’s office. I had done as much research as I could before but, as usual, most of the issues do not materialise out until you meet face to face. One by one our long list of residency options were whittled down to a solitary choice – we both had to invest individually $300,000 to stay in Panama which was slightly more than the $302,000 joint option we had discussed via email for the last 4 months!

Anyway, we now knew the situation and had to set to work deciding if this was the place for us or another long winter in Bulgaria beckoned.  

We had been working with Esteban, a real estate agent not the Columbian drug baron, for several months trying to locate suitable locations to live in. We knew that we wanted to be in the centre but nothing could prepare us for the traffic problems in Panama so it was not really a difficult decision that we wanted to be in the real centre. The place we selected was called Los Congrejos, the crabs!, which is a mini mixture of Soho in Manhattan and Covent Garden in London, full of trendy bars and restaurants.

This location created and solved a problem as there were not many apartments that met our criteria (new, luxury and cheap) so that we had viewed them all by the end of the week and decided which one to buy. Many an agent tried to persuade us that other for sale apartments were in east, west, north or east El Cangrejo but if any place was more than five minutes walk from our new favourite bar it was off the list.

We bought two apartments, one to rent out and one to live in, directly off a builder for a total of $250,000 which nearly solved one residency requirement (a Certificate of Deposit for $50,000 would top it up to the $300,000). Buying off the builder did not endear us to the estate agents but one has to look after ones best interests.

Now, after a weekend of drinking and visiting more top restaurants, the search was on for the other investment. Esteban had mentioned that he had nearly bought a shop fronted office but couldn’t get the finance together, so I figured if a realtor wanted to buy this place it was probably worth a visit. The office was bang right in the centre of the famous banking area called Obarrio. It was the right price at $300,000 and there was a shortage of available quality places to rent – so that was the end of residency requirement number two.

You may think that this was all a bit impetuous but we had a lot to achieve in a month!

Now that we had decided to stay, our lawyers said that the next thing to do is to register our passports as the start of our residency application process – and what an experience that was.

We were taken to the immigration office at eight in the morning to meet the girl who had been there a six in order to get us a good early ‘number’ for the queuing system. We got numbers 39 and 40 and at 8:30 it was announced that if you didn’t have a number by then please come back the next day.

The immigration office was in stark contrast to the shiny skyscrapers in the city centre. It was an old building designed to handle 50 people at a time but there must have been 500 in there. I don’t know where they all came from but we were the only two non-Spanish speakers in the place. Three hours later we emerged with our little bits of paper which meant that we had only to come back here four more times if we were ever to achieve full residency.

Now it was full speed ahead to complete the transaction by the end of the month before Bistra’s tourist Visa ran out but there was another problem in the way – Christmas. Panamanians enjoy a much more relaxed style of life than us Europeans, which is a good thing, but coming up to Christmas they are only concentrating on one thing – and that was not getting our transactions completed. We were told that there are only three main holiday periods in Panama – November, December and February!

We were ready to complete the property transaction on 26th December, a working day in Panama when no-one wanted to work at all, we managed to get the lawyers and developers together at 14:00 and we signed the paperwork that would allow us to get the utilities connected before our moving in date of 31st December.

But there was still much to do in the intervening five days. We had to buy all the furniture and electrical goods and get them installed. Everyone said ‘forget about that crazy plan’ but with a bit of encouragement our suppliers did the impossible and we moved in at 6 pm on 31st December exhausted but still ready for the big night out to celebrate our achievement.

Panama is a fantastic country and we have now set up our own company – Panama Investment Vacations – to help others make the transition in a more orderly manner!

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