Camping at Ollies Point? You Can’t Camp at Ollies!

That’s what they said when me and 3 of my friends decided to take a boat trip up to Witches Rock and Ollies Point.

For those of you not familiar with either of these spots, they are probably the most well know surf spots in the northern pacific coast region of Costa Rica. In order to get to either spot you need to take a boat. Typically what most people do is drive up to Coco beach from Tamarindo and hop a boat from there. Coco is about an hour from Tamarindo by car. The boat from Coco to each spot is about an hour to an hour and a half. Below is a map that will help provide better detail.

View Ollies & Witches Rock in a larger map

So I got the call that we were headed to Ollies point and that we were going to camp out up there. Camp I thought? As far as I knew you couldn’t camp at Ollies. You could camp at Witches Rock, but Ollies was off limits. Any ways, my buddy Judd picked me up and we were off to Coco to get our boat.

We arrived in Coco about 45 minutes later. We picked up our boat captain at the local fried chicken joint to take him to the boat. We informed our Tico boat captain that we intended to not only surf Ollies Point, but to also camp there. His face was priceless. There was a long pause followed by a long “Ummmmm no camping at Ollies”.

I’ve been here coming on 2 years and I never seen the look of concern this Tico gave us over our plans to camp at Ollies. Ticos are pretty cavalier about everything down here so to see how this guy reacted was enough to make me realize this was a bad idea. After about a 10 minute debate with this guy my partners talked this poor soul into coming along for the trip.

We packed up the boat and headed off for our trip.

Our first stop was Witches Rock. It’s about 45 minutes from Coco Bay. Witches Rock got it’s name from the local fishers. Not sure where I read this exactly but apparently when the winds blow offshore, which they do frequently at an hollowing 15 to 25 mph, the rock makes a sound something like a Banshee.

Witches Rock is a high tide break with Ollies being a low tide break. Depending on what the tides are doing will dictate where the boat ends up taking you first. However, in our case it didn’t matter because we were camping at Ollies do or die.

Below are some pics I took of the rock. I’m also including an EPIC picture taken by Aaron Chang that I had hanging on my wall for 5 years previous. I always wondered if I’d ever actually see it in real life.

We only did a drive by at Witches and headed straight to Ollies Point. It’s another 30 minutes from Witches to Ollies. Ollies Point is named after Oliver North. During the 1980’s the US military was secretly supporting the Nicaraguan Contras vs. the Sandinistas. The CIA helped setup a secret airfield, in Costa Rica’s Santa Rosa national park just south of the Nicaraguan border, to help supply the Contra resistance. The break was spotted during landings. After the conflict ended (which still sorta continues today) retired serviceman returned to surf it.

We arrived around mid day. The surf was pretty decent. The waves were around waist to chest high. We surfed for about 2 or 3 hours. After our surf session we setup camp for the night. Below is a picture of our site as well as picture of Ollies from the camp site. The picture isn’t exactly the best angle of the wave.

After setting up camp we decided to cook up some dinner. It was nothing special just some rice and baked beans.

The rice and beans were an excellent compliment to the lays potato chips and oreo cookies we had on hand.

The rest of the night was fairly typical of any camp site involving 5 dudes out in the middle of no where. Lots of reliving the past day, past monster waves conquered, BSing about happenings in town, plans for the future, etc. It was a festive time filled with a lot of laughter.

Around 10ish both Ian and Brian decided to hit the sack. Ricardo ended up going to sleep a few minutes after Ian and Brian leaving Judd and I to hold down the fort. Judd and I stayed up for another hour or so talking. Most of that time I was resting by lying on my back looking up at the stars, my feet were pointing toward the ocean. Judd meanwhile was sitting in the only chair facing down the beach towards cove.

For whatever reason, I decided to sit up for a few minutes to get my barrings. When I sat up I looked down the beach, as stated before Judd was facing in one direction down the beach. I was looking over Judd’s shoulder in the opposite direction when I saw a black figure moving towards our camp. Then I saw a second figure. Was my mind playing tricks on me? I closed my eyes. When I opened them again the figures were now closer to the camp. Before I could warn Judd they were on top of us.

Next thing I know I hear what sounds like a machine gun being cocked. Both Judd and I froze instantly. 4 Men draped in camouflage were now standing over us pointing automatic rifles at us yelling in Spanish. With the darkness, guns, strange men dressed like commandos, and people yelling in Spanish we both needed a minute. Finally Judd stepped in and asked the men who they were in Spanish.

His response was classic. Judd replied “O they are only police”. Ha! I thought only police! Has this dude dealt with the cops here yet? Let alone dealt with police at night, camping illegally in a national park, 5 hours by foot to the nearest sign of civilization?

Thankfully Judd is fluent in Spanish. He began the process of talking our way out of whatever trouble we were in at this point. They immediately stomped out our fire. While Judd was talking to what seemed like their captain, 2 of them walked around looking through our stuff and particularly our tents. What I found out later was that Ian slept in his tent completely naked. So I’m sure these dudes got a surprise when they were prying in through the top of his tent. Too funny.

After a 30 minute conversation with these guys, they let us go. They were pissed, because we were obviously camping illegally and we didn’t have passes. Second, there is a lot of poaching in the area that these guys take seriously. The hunters are extremely dangerous and shoot anything that moves including the park rangers. They initially thought we were hunting hence their harsh treatment. They told us we were free to go and needed to get out of dodge the first thing in the morning.

The next morning was even more ridiculous. I could write another blog post altogether about the trip home. I’ll try to sum it up in 5-10 sentences. Basically we woke up to 35 mph winds. We had a 2 hour boat trip back to the mainland. O and we were on 20ft ponga death trap. The seas were absolutely ridiculous The whole boat ride home we drove about 5 mph for fear of capsizing. The best line of the trip was when I turned to Brian and asked him if he’d ever seen it this bad. Brian is an experienced surfer who’s lived in Costa Rica for over 5 years and been to Ollies multiple times. Brian replies with a little smirk “Not even close bro!”. After a 3.5 hour boat trip,that should have taken 2 tops, we were home. Man what a ridiculous trip.

I’ll leave you with my favorite sunset to date. It’s a picture of Ollies Point with the sun setting. You can see the wave breaking in the right hand corner.

3 Responses to “Camping at Ollies Point? You Can’t Camp at Ollies!”

1. Kristina says:

   August 5, 2009 at 5:42 pm

   Next time we camp at Witch’s or we take a boat to Ollies and stay on the boat!!!!! Any takers?
2. Carlos says:

   October 20, 2009 at 1:44 am

   The ugly americans who think they know better. They should have put you in jail.
3. admin says:

   October 21, 2009 at 3:22 pm

   Hey why do we gotta be ugly? I think we’re a pretty good looking bunch.

   At the end of the day lesson learned!

   P