Our routine every time before leaving a place is for Justin to completely go over the truck and look for anything wrong and get it ready to go. It was the morning before everyone was due to leave when Justin went out to the truck to do his thing. At first glance everything appeared normal. He unlocked the drivers side door, got in and noticed a sliver of light coming from the back door. He then got out, went to the door and noticed that the key tumbler was in the wrong position. When he reached for the handle the door opened on its own.
Not Good.
Inside he found the locks on the steel boxes were gone and the latches to the box were open. Upon looking inside of the box that holds all things land rover, he realized that the large tool box was missing.
Not Good At All.
At this point he hurled out a very loud string of curses and slammed the door which brought out the neighbourhood.
So they got our tool box that contained pretty much everything needed to assemble and disassemble a land rover and to service a mercedes engine. They also stole our highly coveted gearbox oil. Anyone who regularly reads our blog, knows that this oil was excruciatingly hard to find. They also stole Justins body board bag - probably to carry everything in. (Luckily, the night before he brought his board inside because he was going to use it the next morning.)
They cracked the back window - it is now being held together by the window tint. They bent the back door - it doesn't close properly now. The canopy and the box of the truck don't line up anymore and they put a series of gouges and dents in the rear panels inside the truck.
After adding everything up we lost well over $2000 worth of professional grade tools, about $200 worth of oil (replaced in San Jose), who knows how much in repair work needed for the land rover and the worst of all - time.
Anyone doing a trip like this knows how important security is. You have your life in your vehicle. When you're travelling one of the top priorities is keeping your vehicle safe. You find secure parking lots, gated hotels, make sure theres guards and ask around. If a spot doesn't feel right you move on. Even when we go into a restaurant we sit in a spot where we can watch the truck. When planning this trip we tried to think of the different ways we could be broken into and what we could do to minimize the risks. Everything is either locked, chained down or difficult to access. We left knowing that a break in was a definite possibility. We knew that if someone really wanted to get in, they could, so we made it as difficult as possible. But as much as we would like to, we can't drive in a Brinks truck.
So the rest of the day was spent dealing with the condo owner, the security company of the condo complex, the manager of the unit, the general manager of the complex, dealing with the police and talking with other residents of the area. It turns out there were other break ins that night and some attempted ones the next day. We've learnt a lot about crime in tourist towns and how crime rings work in Central America. These are things we have no interest in knowing about. We figure this was either an inside job (there was a security guard on duty and he had a clear view of the parking lot and as well the complex is tiny) or the security here just really sucks. One of the security guards here was arrested last week after he was found inside someones unit.
So it was a really crappy day, filled with lots of yelling and lots of swearing. I was called very vocal by the property manager here - he may of meant loco (ha ha!). It is so frustrating that we thought our vehicle would be okay because there was security here, but it wasn't. When we think back to all of the places that we've stayed, we are really surprised it happened like this.
So now we are still in the same condo in Tamarindo (the owner is being really amazing to us and letting us stay here for free until things get worked out). We have oil being shipped to us from San Jose and tomorrow we have a meeting with all parties involved to possibly be compensated by the security company for the loss of the tools - not holding our breath but worth a shot. We don't want to leave until we have at least some tools because as you know land rovers do sometimes need attention. We've had a lot of support from other over landers and travellers that has made us feel better. We are especially thankful for the fact that our family was here to support us. We're sorry your last day here was spent listening to us rant!
We know its just your run-of-the-mill vehicle break in. Nothing unique about it. It won't change our trip at all except for time and money. Just another part of the adventure - okay venting is now over.
