You can start to make that shift pretty much anywhere–reading the local newspaper at your favorite expat cafe, exploring a crumbling castle, or talking politics with the guy who repairs your car with tin foil and fishing wire. But some places are particularly well-suited for contemplating history from a decidedly local perspective.

Covert ops hottie visits El Avion bar? Lovers of freedom should be so lucky.

An old plane sits grounded atop a lush hillside on Costa Rica’s Pacific coast. The battered Fairchild C-123, built in 1954 and now part of a popular open-air bar, is the perfect place to nurse a cold cerveza, watch the sunset, and remember a bizarre chapter in history: the Iran-Contra affair, which from this Central American vantage point would more accurately be called the Contra/Iran affair, with the illegal arms sale to Iran a minor chapter in the 80s-era U.S. covert funding of armed guerillas (the Contras) bent on bringing down Nicaragua’s Sandinista government.

Part of the Costa Verde hotel, the Avion Bar is the perfect place for ruminating on that 1980s arms-for-hostages-and-while-we’re-at-it-let’s-fund-some-paramilitaries scandal because the plane itself played a starring role in the fiasco.

The plane was dubbed “Ollie’s Folly” for its connection to Oliver North, chief architect of a covert operation—lodged firmly in the heart of the Reagan administration—that funded and provided military assistance to the Contras.

Though the U.S. government supported the Contras in the early 1980s, Congress cut off all funding in late 1984, afraid that Nicaragua would become the next Vietnam, and alarmed by reports that the C.I.A. had secretly mined Nicaraguan harbors.

Who needs Congress when you’ve got Ollie North?

Despite signing into law the bill cutting off all funds to the Contra’s paramilitary operations, Reagan ordered his staff to find a way to help the Contras keep ‘body and soul together,’ in his words. Reagan and his staff—especially those in the National Security Council (NSC), secretly raised $34 million for the Contras from other countries, with an additional $2.7 million from private contributors, and later, with funds from the illegal arms sale to Iran. This money was funneled into a private company called ‘the Enterprise,’ and put under the direction of Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North.

The Enterprise had its own operatives, Swiss bank accounts, airfields, and airplanes, including two Fairchild C-123s, one of which now holds up the roof of the Avion bar.

For 16 months in the mid-1980s, the Enterprise provided covert aid to the Contras—aid that the U.S. Congress had specifically prohibited. When U.S. and world press caught wind of the operation and reported on it, Reagan, National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane and other administration officials repeatedly assured the public (and Congress) that nothing illegal or untoward was going on.

The game is up.
But on October 5, 1986, evidence to the contrary fell to earth over southern Nicaragua. A plane carrying supplies to the Contras was shot down; the two pilots were killed, but Eugene Hasenfus, a former Marine from Wisconsin who’d been hired by the C.I.A., parachuted to safety, only to be captured by Nicaraguan government forces. Hasenfus’ capture was instrumental in uncovering the U.S. covert operation providing money and military help to the Contras. The plane shot down that October day was the sister plane to the one now reincarnated as a hilltop bar in Costa Rica.

Allan Templeton, owner of the Costa Verde hotel, was intrigued by the plane’s history and bought it in 2000 for $3000. Templeton had the plane moved, at great expense and trouble, to its current perch close to Manual Antonio,

'Fusilage suite' at Costa Verde hotel

Costa Rica’s most popular national park. The Costa Verde has a taste for giving old modes of transport new life—recently, they transformed a 1965 Boeing 727 into a high-end ocean-view suite. And they just opened what must be one of the few places in Costa Rica where you can get a Hebrew National kosher hot dog. It’s called The Wagon, and it’s housed in an old train car.

But let’s return to the 1980s for a minute. What happened in Nicaragua back then didn’t stay in Nicaragua. In fact, Ollie North had a secret airstrip built in Costa Rica to support his covert ops in Nicaragua, then got himself barred from Costa Rica for life for that and for his alleged part in drug smuggling to fund the Contra effort.

More information on traveling and living in Costa Rica.

For more information in the Iran/Contra Affair: U.S. Congress Iran Contra Committee: Key Findings in 1987

Photos: Costa Verde Hotel.

Not if you ask Gavin Newson, mayor of San Francisco, who helped bring carbon offset kiosks to that city’s airport. Last week, SFO became the first airport in the nation to offer air travelers a way to offset the greenhouse gases their flight will add to the Earth’s atmosphere.

A buildup of greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide (CO2), is known to cause global warming.

Here’s how the three Climate Passport kiosks at SFO work:

• you enter information about your trip on a touch screen
• the computer calculates how many pounds of carbon dioxide (and other greenhouse gases) your trip will produce
• it suggests how much you’d need to donate to local projects aimed at reducing greenhouse gases in order to “offset” the damage your trip will inflict on the environment
• the money goes to renewable energy, energy efficiency, and reforestation projects, like Garcia River Forest and Dogpatch Biofuels
• The kiosks are after the security checkpoints on both sides of the International Terminal, and in Terminal 3.

How much does a clean conscious cost? According to the computer, a trip from Vancouver to SFO and back, for instance, would produce 1,186 pounds of carbon dioxide, which could be offset with a contribution of $7.26, while a one-way trip from SFO to Boston would produce 1,999 pounds of carbon dioxide, which could be offset for $12.24.

Naysayers: Carbon offsetting is a complex issue, and the naysayers are already out in force, with hundreds commenting on Sfgate.com’s article on the kiosks, most of the comments were along these lines:

• There’s a sucker born every minute.
• Fool + money = parted
• BUY THIS AND YOU ARE AS DUMB AS A STONE!!
• PT Barnum would have been proud.

Funny, yes,  but I think this one is actually more accurate:

“I betcha a lot more people have an idea of how much carbon their flights are producing after having read this story than before. Fighting global warming is a hearts and minds struggle.”

Want to know more about carbon offsets and what air travel does to the environment?

• Learn more about the carbon footprint of your flight.
• Wikipedia on how to become carbon neutral.
• Budget Travel defines carbon offsets and discusses whether or not they work.
• Ed Hasbrouck, round-the-world travel guru and blogger, has a great post on this year’s conference on aviation and the environment in Geneva.  He writes of struggling with the recognition that “all travel, and especially long-haul air travel, has adverse ecological consequences” while still believing that “long-haul travel, even by air, can in particular cases have a net positive effect on the world, mainly through the secondary effects of the permanent changes it can bring about in our worldview, which result in changes in how we go on with our lives.”

Intense training can be a risk in travel-related DVT

In hospitals, deep vein thrombosis (DVT) may occur after surgery, especially surgery below the waist, like hip surgery. And it’s true that you should avoid surgery for at least 30 days after air travel if possible.  But the risk factors for DVT on an airplane are very different from those in a hospital, and include recent intense athletic conditioning, particularly training for endurance sports like marathons.

According to Airhealth, the most common travel-related risk factors for DVT are:

1. Athletic training, especially training for endurance sports like marathons.

2. Recent surgery or injury. If you have just run a marathon, you probably have at least minor bruising that can trigger clotting. Kick-boxing also produces such injuries.

3. Personal or family history of DVT.

4. Cancer, heart disease, diabetes. Obesity is often cited as a risk factor, but probably ranks much lower than the preceding diseases.

5. Women who are pregnant or taking estrogen as birth control or hormone replacement.

6. Age over 40 is often cited as a risk factor; sometime age over 60 is cited. Butin Airhealth’s registry, over 80% of those suffering DVT while traveling are under age 60, and the majority are under 50.

See also How to avoid blot clots while traveling.

They're squeezing more and more passengers into coach these days. Photo from blisstree.com

Take heart, obsessive travelers: according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), more than 63 million Americans travel abroad each year, and the great majority of them never have any major problems.

Still, we need to pay attention to the risks of travel. A study released yesterday by doctors at Harvard University found that travel is associated with a 3-fold higher risk for blood clots, called deep vein thrombosis (DVT), with the risk increasing for each 2-hour increase in travel time.

The clots, which often form in the deep veins of the legs, may occasionally break loose and head for the heart or lungs, which may lead to heart failure or stroke (which may, in turn, lead to death). Lots of “maybes” in that chain of events, but still, we need to pay attention.

Any type of travel where you sit still for long periods can be potential dangerous, but flying seems to be especially problematic. It’s harder to get up and move around on a plane, your legs are often stuffed into a woefully small space (in fact, DVT is often called “economy class syndrome.”) And the air in planes is also very dry, raising the risk of dehydration.

Scary, to be sure. But the CDC offers some simple but effective steps to minimize your risk.

While traveling

1. When sitting for long periods of time, such as when traveling for more than four hours:

• Get up and walk around every 2 to 3 hours.
• Wear loose-fitting clothes.
• Drink plenty of water, and avoid drinking anything with alcohol or caffeine in it.

2. Exercise your legs while you’re sitting by:

• Raising and lowering your heels while keeping your toes on the floor
• Raising and lowering your toes while keeping your heels on the floor
• Tightening and releasing your leg muscles

Lifestyle changes that help you avoid DVT:

• Exercise regularly
• Maintain a healthy weight
• Don’t smoke
• If you have a family history of DVT, talk to your doctor about medication (anticoagulants) to prevent or treat DVT

At Airhealth.org you can download a handy wallet card that reminds you of how to avoid DVT.