Last Bus Trip to Santa Cruz

Yesterday we took our last bus trip to Santa Cruz. During our last visit to Costa Rica we were told about the pottery in Guatil, which is 10km to the East of Santa Cruz. Guatil is famous for it's pottery. Here is a short blurb of Guaitil I copied from Planetware.com.
"This small community is famous for pottery making. About 100 families here engage in the pottery industry, most of them descendants from Chorotega Indians who once inhabited the area. The pots are made in a
variety of sizes and shapes from local clays. They are fashioned in the pre-Columbian Chorotega Indian style, and are painted using natural colors. Artisans sell the pots in front of their houses, and lucky visitors may be invited inside to watch the potting process. Most of the ceramics seen decorating homes, restaurants and hotels in the Guanacaste province come from Guaitil."

We got to Santa Cruz and the minute you step off the bus at the bus station they have these "taxi drivers" trying to get you to take their ride. Some of them are drunk, they all are smoking one after the other, and they look a little desperate. I had read in a tourism book to always take an official taxi. They are red and have the traditional taxi light on the top of the car. As I was explaining this to Jack, we decided to walk to the center of town where I was sure I had seen taxi's lined up in the street. Sure enough, we got to the main area and there must have been 10 or so red taxis waiting for gringo's like us. I walked up to the nicest looking taxi driver, who was sitting in his taxi, and asked him "Usted conduce a Guaitil? ¿Y si es así cuánto costará? "Si" he said and we loaded up in his taxi. It was 6 mil colones. $12 bucks. We could do that and I didn't feel like haggeling. As we were driving along this gorgious road up into the mountains, through beautiful fincas, looking at the vacas, we were also driving into a major rain storm. We got to the tiny town of Guaitil and it was pouring rain. Luckily, I remembered the umbrellas, which we only brought 2 for the trip. I kept meaning to buy 2 more but never got around to it. So, we had to share our little umbrellas and run to the closest house which was open with clay pots and tons of other handmade clay items. The Tico's who live here were all hanging out in the back of the store, which is where they make their clay pots. He brought us back to that area and proceeded to give us a demonstration on how they go about making these things. It was wonderful to get a little class on this. Plus it was raining buckets, literally, and we needed somewhere to get out of the rain. Lucky break. The one guy was explaining to us how they collect the clay and what it looks like when they get it. Then they ground it up into a super fine sand with this huge grinder that looks like a giant muddle. As he is explaining this to me I am trying as best I can to translate to the girls what he is saying. Then, this other guy is actually making a pot and showing us the process of that. He whips up this pot in no time. It was impressive. They also had 3 bowls of natural color that they gather from the earth. Everything is done by hand. It's very cool. We bought a pot before we left. We ran, in the rain, to his neighbors and the neighbor had many of the same stuff only designed by him and made by him and his family. His daughter was crafting as we were walking on their dirt floors looking around. It was messy with the rain, dirt and flip flops. Some homes even closed their doors. I don't blame them. We walked down the road to the next home and Jack and I are both thinking the same thing. That taxi dropped us off and there is not a car, taxi, person, bus in sight. It's raining and how the heck are we going to get back. We step into the next home and the elderly man is admiring my Jade necklace that Jack brought back for me from New Zeland. He goes into his living room and gets his Jade necklace and slips it around Jordan's neck. He wants us to buy it but we don't. I'm eyeing one of his pots though. I'm thinking it would be perfect for salsa or guacamole or some other condiment. I ask him how much and this time I try to haggle. No way. He stands firm, even as we walk out. Jack meanwhile, is talking to the man, about our age, on the front step. I walk back in and buy the damn pot at full price because I like the guy. We all get a chuckle out of this and we're all satisfied. Jack, this whole time, is asking the guy about taxi's and do they come back? How often? Etc. He tells us at 4:30 to go over to the corner over there in the green building and one will be there. We slowly make our way over to the green building and the guy our age is following us and whistling at us. We see him pointing to a guy with an umbrella and he's explaing to us that this is our taxi driver. We ask him how much. This time it's 5 mil. $10 bucks. He is the brother of the guy our age and his brother obviously called him on the cell phone and he came out of his house to make a buck. We go to his house and he's explaining to us that they are brothers and they live here together with their families and so on. Hannah goes into panic mode because THIS IS NOT A RED, OFFICIAL TAXI MOM!! Man, that girl is a sponge. Well, this guy was not drunk and he had a nice enough car that had the Virgin Mary stuck on the window and a picture of Jesus as well. Plus the rosary was hanging from the rear view mirror. I felt safe indeed. We chatted, small talk, he spoke no English as has been our experience here. I asked him to recommend a restaurant in Santa Cruz and he knew of a good one and dropped us off right in front of it. We thanked him and had a wonderful, cheap early dinner before catching our bus. What another great experience. We loaded the bus and got to sit right up front. I like the front seats so I can see the road and all of the things we are about to run over. It adds to the thrill. Hannah and I sat together and we were holding hands saying, "goodbuy Santa Cruz, goodbuy Panilla bus, goodbuy nice bus driver, goodbuy mean bus driver." It was sad and we were both feeling the sadness of our last bus trip into Santa Cruz. The bus smelled of fish and sweat and the guy didn't drive with the door open, unlike the other drivers. It was a stuffy ride back. The Tico's like to have the windows up during the night. I've noticed that they all put the windows up. One guy asked us, in Guaitil, if we were cold. I thought that was funny. It's all relative.
We got home at 7:30 and sat by the pool listening to the frogs. They were loud last night. They're loud every night. It was a fun day. I can't wait to see Guaitil again and actually spend some time there walking around more. My Mother would have loved that part.

Purging

I've donated all of the books we've read and the clothes we have decided not to take back with us. It filled up 5 grocery bags full. The gal who works at the store down the road had been so nice to us and always gives the girls little candies or some kind of treat when we go there. We usually get milk, eggs, coffee, bread. Just the essentials. She's sweet and likes to learn English words. She'll ask me what a word is and I'll ask her. We communicate as best we can. She is always singing along to the radio and is so cute. I decided to give the items to her since I like her. I figured she could pass them on or keep whatever she needed. Or sell them. It lightened up my load. I also purchased a few dozen pencils and have given them away to students. I have to go through our things one last time and my give away pile is slowly getting larger. I won't take any of the flip flops home. Things like that are hard to come by here and they don't last long. Hopefully someone will get some use out of them. Another reason to shop at thrift stores for us. I don't feel compelled to hang onto the clothes I have purchased. Sometimes I get this greedy feeling that if I have spent a bunch on something I need to keep it and get my money's worth. Now, my Chaco's. I keep.
I'm bringing home coffee. I'm going to miss the coffee.

My Blog Spot

This is where I blog now.

Jordan and the Beach Cruiser

We almost made it, the entire summer in Costa Rica, without anyone getting hurt. Almost. Jordan took off this morning to visit Idan, who crashed on his bike yesterday. After seeing all of us riding and realizing how easy it is to go do things once you have a bike he asked Jack if he could make his bike ride able. Jack went over there a couple of days ago, pulled it out of the garage and did a few things to it. He got it to run and it only had a front brake so Jack made Idan promise to be careful and he’d need to get a brake cable in order to have a back break. Yesterday, he was riding to get that brake cable and was going down a hill and slammed on the only brake, which is his front one. He flipped over and crashed and got a bunch of road rash. Jordan wanted to see how he was doing and headed over. She was gone the entire day. Jack, Hannah and I swam in the pool and enjoyed the day here doing some chores and we got to thinking we should go and see how Jordan is doing. It looked like rain any minute with the sky becoming dark. Hannah and I were upstairs getting changed and Jordan came screaming in yelling for me. Her leg was bloody and she was lying on the floor crying. She was coming down the hill to the first bridge, the one that always floods over when it rains hard, and since she was on the beach cruiser, had to brake with her feet. She braked too hard and crashed and landed in the dirt on the bridge. Thank God she didn’t fly off the bridge into the creek. It’s quite a drop. She was hurt, bleeding and crying and now she had to put her chain back on since it fell off. She put it together and rode home. Once she saw me the tears really flew and we got her all fixed up. She banged herself up pretty good. She’s going to be sore for awhile. I’m glad she didn’t hurt her head since we ride without a helmet. I still shake my head at that one. And shudder. We have that awesome first aid kit, if you remember; I even took a picture of the contents. It’s got everything in there. She is now in her jammies and its 4 p.m. Looks like an early bedtime tonight.
Jack and I got our plans for leaving wrapped up today. We lined Wilson up to pick us up here on the 17th at 10a.m. He recommended a place for us to stay 10 min away from the airport. I called them today and booked a room. It sounds wonderful and the pictures of the property are beautiful. They call it a B&B so it includes breakfast. We’ll spend 2 nights there and do some sightseeing around the area. I’m now looking forward to it. They’ll give us a ride to the airport the morning of the 19th and we’re off. Glad that’s settled. As I was making my reservation I was speaking to him in Spanish. He kept asking me what I was saying and as I was spelling my name out, in Spanish, he kept asking me to repeat myself. I finally asked him what language he speaks, since I was pretty sure I was saying things correctly, and he replies, “Dutch, German, and English.” Well, say no more. I can’t speak German or Dutch but English, we could be on the same page with. It was a good laugh. He seems like a nice guy. I told him I worked at a B&B and gave him the website and told him to check it out.
We’re sitting under the gazebo, citronella incense burning and having a cocktail. We are watching the rain and it is filling up the pool very fast. The frogs are coming out as well as the crazy centipedes or millipedes or whatever they are. The rain brings out a whole different species of things. It’s cool to watch things come out when it rains. I’ll bring an insect book the next time I come here. It’s a necessity here. When we had internet at the casita I was constantly on it looking up things. Here, I can’t do that. It’s driving me nuts not to have an encyclopedia at my fingertips. So, as I type this, I’ll have to post it sometime tomorrow when we get to the Mauna Loa. They have really been great to us. Thanks Gustavo and Muriel.

Pool Boy

Playa Junquillal

Our bikes got us all the way to Junquillal today. Jordan, as usual, was NOT going. No way no how. But we made her. It was a long ride from Playa Avellanas but well worth the trip to see another view of Costa Rica. The road was freshly grated to we had a smooth ride. Playa Junquillal is a sleepy, sleepy town. If you can even call it a town. There are a few hotels, rentals, lots of quaint homes on the beach. But no one was around. Its was so quiet and nothing was going on. The ocean was not swimmer friendly so we didn't get in. The currant was extreme and we didn't even chance that. The girls were such troopers and we ended up trying to have lunch at Mary's Place in Negra but they were closed. We rode down to the beach to the Playa Negra Hotel and had lunch and watched the waves and swam in the pool. It was such a great way to get re-fueled before we rode back. We ended up the day at the beach and didn't go in because it stormed so hard here last night and there was so much muck, scum, whatever in the ocean. When it storms hard here the locals stay out of the water. It's usually a good thing because if you have cuts, they can get infected, ears get infected. I certainly didn't want to chance it with my ear healing finally. We got to the house and rinsed off and that pool never felt so good. I was so happy to cool off again after a 5 hour outing with my family. The girls continue to amaze me with their attitude. It was hard to get Jordan going but once she knew she had no choice she decided to have fun. We sang 99 bottles of pop on the wall, twice. The ants go marching, and the many Glee songs we love. It was fun.
We have seen so much more riding our bikes. When you're in a car, we never seem to slow down to enjoy the view. Plus riding bikes enables us to hear the things we wouldn't in a car. It's fun to hear someones music blaring as they are out in their yard cutting it away with a machete. The roosters are always cockadoodledoing. Kid are playing and waving and saying things in Spanish. I took a picture of this old man, after I asked his permission, riding along with a machete attached to his belt. The small church we passed was all locked up and we got off our bikes and I took a picture of the inside through the gate. The dead Iguana's we pass and the lizards we see and the monkeys we hear talking to us overhead when we ride under them. Hannah fell off her bike. Literally just fell in slow motion and had to take a picture of her laying there in total shock. Our first pit stop was at this little store where we bought some cokes and the bakery truck pulled in. He opened up the back and it was stocked full of fresh baked goods. Cakes, donuts, eclairs, bread. He had it all. So we bought some donuts to go with the coke. Power food.
The day was great. We got some serious exercise.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! Pura Vida

Holy Ear Ache!!! I am feeling so much better. We had rain all day today and despite it, I felt like getting some ocean exercise. When the rain let up I asked the family if they wanted to go to the beach and do some swimming. Hannah was up for it so we walked, with the boogie board, to the beach. The tide was high and the waves were typical for high tide. Disorganized. It's fun when it's like that so we charged in the water and swam our little hearts out. I didn't go under unless I plugged my ears. We had soooooooo much fun. There were 2 other little kids in the water, from Texas, but they were on the inside more and we felt like we had the whole ocean to ourselves. It was raining and cool and we laughed and laughed. It felt so great to get in the ocean and just be there in it. I don't know what it was. Probably the fact that I felt so much better and when you don't feel well, for me, once I feel better, I am a new person. I need to get a move on it.
We got back to the house after walking in the rain and had a nice swim in the pool until Hannah saw a crab and got freaked. We got out because it was raining so hard. By then it was cocktail hour. Somewhere, at least. We had a fun game of pool and built card houses and played foosball. Good, quality family time. I haven't even dove into the family time and bonding we have had here. We are a very tight knit family anyway, but here, WOE! No choice. And every minute, almost, has been wonderful.
The rain never let up. Jack and I are now pleasantly happy, after a few cocktails and we got bored and hopped on our bikes and decided to come to the Mauna Loa for a beer and internet. It's all Pura Vida.
Pura Vida, Pura Vida, Pura Vida!!!
Damn, I'm gonna miss this.

A Pain in my Ear

Yesterday was day 3 of pretty severe pain and I couldn't take it anymore. I was so nauseous and dizzy and had Jack bring me to a pharmacy to get something. I arrived and luckily someone spoke English, however, I was prepared with my Spanish. I described my condition and she gave me some drops with an antibiotic and a few pain meds and $30 later I was on my way.
We got home and I put those drops in and within 3 hours I felt better. I had a great nights sleep last night and with another round this morning I feel pretty good. I still have water in there or the infection or whatever but it is not a throbbing, piercing pain like it has been. I was one cranky lady with that issue. Sorry to mi familia.
It rained yesterday very hard but Jack got the lawn mowed before it all started. We had a nice lounge day at the house with me pretty much laying on my side with the drops in. I watched t.v. and relaxed. Jack and the girls swam and played pool and foosball. It was fun to listen to them have such a great time with each other. I made some killer sliders, a mixture of Chorizo and ground beef, for dinner with mashed potatos and salad and homemade empanadas for dessert. I need to open my own restaurant when/if we ever move here. Jack loves my cooking. Jack loves any cooking but the compliments he's dishing out at me this trip over my cooking are making me blush.
The girls are ready to go home now. We made the mistake of starting the countdown and now they are anticipating getting home and starting our next vacation. The long drive to MN and WI for the family reunion. It'll be an excellent way to end our summer and we are all super excited to see my family. I know I can't wait and the girls either. Jack always has a good time with my brother's, Dad and cousins. I'm glad we are going.

2 weeks left

It's HUMID!!!!!
Even the dogs are feeling it. Living in Colorado for 25 years has made me such a pansy with the humidity.
We are on the 2 week countdown as of today. Jack and I are sad and the girls can't wait to get home. I am extremely excited, however, to see Teller and Buster. We have missed them so much. I'm glad we have pictures of them on the computer because we look at them almost every day. It's nice to have so many dogs here for us to spoil with affection. The Costa Rican dogs are sweet. Most are small and they usually aren't striving for attention. When you do get to give them a good rub on the belly or behind the ears they remember you and come back for more. I love the dogs here. Teller would have been miserable. After being here all summer, it would have been to hot for him and since he hates the water there would have been no reprieve from the heat. He's also not a very sociable dog and barks at strangers which people don't usually see from the local dogs here. We've only been chased by a few and they are usually just looking for a good time. Teller would have been confused and stressed and just not a happy guy here. I'm glad he's home where he is with his brother.
We're trying to wrap up our last couple of days here. I say we get a shuttle to a hotel by the airport and do a day tour of something cool. The homeowners get back a couple of days before we fly out and I think it would be best to get out of their house and let them get back to their life without us there. They seem to be pretty used to not having people around and I don't want our last couple of days here to be stressful in any way. Wilson, our driver from when we first arrived is available to pick us up and take us back. I think that would be our best route. Time to figure that out today. I don't want to wait until the last minute.
Here are some more pictures. I've taken almost 1000 of them this summer.

Sunset

Jack and I saw our first real sunset last night. Being rainy season, there are always clouds on the horizon so the sunsets here haven't been the kind you can see the green flash on. Jack asked if I wanted to go to the beach and take a walk. I was up for it so we hopped on our bikes and parked at Lola's and took off walking toward the rivermouth. Nobody was on the beach. It was gorgious. Jack, not being the hand holding kind, even held my hand. Be still my heart. We had a good conversaiton and when we got to the rivermouth we headed back. Jack wanted to cross the rivermouth but the locals have me all freaked out about the crockodiles so I didn't want to. Our trip has been pretty near perfect and I wasn't about to change that. We started back and when we got to Lola's we sat down and had about 15 min until the sun dropped. It was perfecto. Except for the gal who was about 4-5 glasses buzzed on her red wine. She was chatty and within 5 minutes of us having our romantic moment we knew more about her than we asked for. I ended up tuning her out and Jack felt like he needed to be a little more polite, which is so not like him. Anyway, the sunset was awesome and when it dropped into the ocean, no green flash was seen, we grabbed our bikes and headed back. My ear problem got worse and I had to go to bed because I couldn't even open my mouth. I skipped dinner and felt terrible. I woke up feeling the same. I'm going to get my suit on and go lay in the sand and fall asleep. Maybe when I wake up something will have changed.
More later.

A Stocked Fridge

Jack and I rode to the lot today and then to Santa Rosa to the pulparia to get some groceries. I kind of got my butt kicked today. I don't know if it was the heat, humidity or my ear but I was feeling it. We stopped at Christophers, in Panilla, for an ice cold coca. Sooooooo good. The coke is muy bien here. The sugar rush definitely helped get me home. And, we didn't get rained on. But now, we have a stocked fridge and some fresh fruits and veggies.
Two of the banana trees, out of 4, that Jack planted are taking off. They are thriving and look healthy. We have some avacado seeds in some water and hopefully they'll root before we leave so we can get them in the ground as well. We've decided not to go crazy with trees until we get the infrustructure all set. We don't want to have to move trees once they are planted. The lot needs to be cut again. We won't do it but it's amazing how fast the grass grew in the time we have been here. I couldn't believe the growth.
Last night was the night for the cool bugs to come visit. Sometimes, we won't get many. Just the usual inch long beetles and geckos and mosquitos but last night we had these water bugs that were huge come into the pool and it was gross. They had these pinchers on them and they wouldn't swim FROM you they were swimming FOR you. It freaked us out enough to get out of the pool and caputure them. We never did get stung or bit or whatever they do so we didn't find out what those pincher thingys were. Then, this green, green grasshopper type bug flew on the porch and it had antaennas on it that reminded me of the creatures. They weren't as long but they were about 2". I'm not a very good photographer with the bugs but I'm trying.
The panoramic is of the lot.
Hannah ran out of her room the other night to get me and said there was another scorpion in there. Sure enough, there was a scorpion on the floor ready to attack. I ran and got a kleenex and grabbed it before it could run away. That's the 4th one we have found and I'm sure they stowed away in our bags from the casita. I did get the laundry that hadn't been washed yet from the casita and threw it in just in case. It's so scary. Scorpions have surpassed cockroaches on my list of least favorite bugs, or whatever catagory a scorpion falls into. I will not miss the scorpions. They are just plain nasty. Not only have the frogs and bugs been quiet at night the monkeys aren't making a lot of noise either. Usually you hear monkeys all day, especially in the morning and they have been very non talkative. Wonder why? I read some interesting facts. Costa Rica covers .25% of the worlds land mass. It contains 5% of the worlds biodiversity. Over 25% of this country is protected by National Parks or some other organization. Over 35,000 species of insects have been recorded in Costa Rica, with thousands more still undiscovered. 10% of the world's butterfly species reside in Costa Rica. Just some cool facts I thought I'd share.
It's raining and I need to skidattle back home. I thought I could squeek out an internet session without it raining on me but no go.
Adios

Cabana Boy

Pool Day

Today was a mellow day. I didn't even go to the beach to chill out. The girls and I went over to see the puppies. We stayed for awhile and Hannah and I left, Jordan wanted to stay. We got back to the house and made lunch and swam. It was our first real long, almost all afternoon, pool day. Jack fell asleep on a towel while Hannah and I played and played and had fun. We then decided that Jordan had worn out her welcome at the boys' house so we made our way back there on our bikes and everyone was laying in hammocks and chillin' with the puppies. I snapped a few pictures of them. AREN'T THEY SO CUTE??!!!!
I'm getting sad because we only have aprox 2 weeks, this thursday, before we fly out of here. The girls are excited to get home and aren't sad at all. I'm sure they will feel a little bit once we get down to the last days. I am really going to miss this place. I'm not going there yet.
I'm at the Mauna Loa for the 2nd time today because this morning they didn't have internet. It's always a mystery why things just shut down here. It's how it is.
Pura Vida.

Photos

Here are some photos.

Domestic Life

I feel like we’ve settled into a pretty domestic life here at the nice house. I do a lot of cooking (and cleaning) and we are living a normal life here. It’s something I could get used to. Although I have gained a couple of pounds back, darnit. Living in the Casita was more work and even though I don’t have a scale, I brought my skinny shorts with and now fit into them. Yesterday I put them on and felt a little snugness. It’s time to start riding my bike a bit more.
My guilty conscious wouldn’t let me be fine with having Liad and Idan over knowing how the owners felt about it so I emailed them and asked permission for us to have them over once in awhile. I explained that since we don’t have a phone the only way for them to get a hold of us is to ride down and see if we’re around. I said that Jordan and Hannah have made great friends with them and I find them to be very respectful and nice kids. They got back to me and gave us the big thumbs down on having them over. I have to admit, I wasn’t expecting that reply since I see no reason why not but to each their own. Well, we went to the beach yesterday and I explained that to the mom and she understood. We just said we’ll send the girls up to their house on the bikes. Really, no biggie. Jordan came home from the beach after me yesterday, crying, because that is just how she reacts to bad news. She wanted to bring the boys back to the house. I made lunch and told them to hop on their bikes and go up there. They did. They came back a couple of hours later all smiles and totally excited. The boys got puppies. They arrived yesterday afternoon when the girls were hanging out over there. They are 4 week old boxers. So, now they have an incentive for riding their bikes up to their house. Puppies. What a break. It’s all good again in Jordan’s world. She just needed to get over that initial disappointment.
The beach was quiet and calm yesterday. Quiet isn’t usual on a Saturday. Usually it’s packed with Tico’s up and down. The water was glassy and calm which we haven’t seen lately. The tide was the lowest I have seen yet so you could go way out and swim. Jordan and Idan swam for hours and Hannah and were beachcombers. We haven’t done much collecting and yesterday there were some great shells that had washed ashore. With the low tide, it’s easy to find treasures. We found all sorts of different color sea glass and cool soap dish shells. The two of us walked and walked and collected and collected. I hope they don’t confiscate what we take at the airport. So far, they never have but I have had friends who have had all of their shells taken away. We shouldn’t be taking them anyway. But, I am. Bad tourist.
The past 2 nights have been relatively quiet outside when we sleep. I now sleep with the windows open because it is so hot and it helps. Usually, when we go to sleep, it’s a symphony of frogs, insects and who knows what else, outside. A couple of nights ago I woke up at around 2 and there was nothing. Nada. No sound. I woke Jack up, who wasn’t really sleeping, to have him listen to the sound of nothing outside our window. We were both amazed. He said last night, at around the same time, “Hef, listen. It’s quiet again.” Weird.
Time for the beach.

Friday, July 30th

I’m sitting here enjoying my cocktail by the pool all by myself. The family is inside. Jack is sleeping; Jordan and Hannah are watching a show on TV. I couldn’t be more content. It’s fairly cool, although, I’m still sweating like a pig. I’m showered and ready for my dinner out. Jack decided to give me a break (there is nothing in the fridge and I think he also figured it would be easier than to send him to the store). Fine by me. My suggestion was to drive to “Mary’s Place”. I hear they have live music on Friday nights and usually the music is good. And the food is terrific. Problem is, is that it is in Play a Negra, which is about a 20-30 min bike ride away. Riding home in the dark would be no problem but it is threatening rain, big time, and we didn’t want to chance it. So, we’re going to walk to Las Olas instead which is a good gamble. Before, when we lived at the casita, it was a haul to walk there. Now, it’s literally across the street. We just have to manage our road out, which by no means is an easy task at night. But a lot shorter walk. It hasn’t started to rain yet although the sky is super ominous and there is thunder all around us. Could be interesting. I’ll be sure to bring the bug spray. It only took me 2 ½ months to figure out to bring bug spray wherever we go. DAH!
We had a good day at the beach today. The surf contest never happened. Don’t know what was up with that but it never happened. I emailed Liz this morning to ask permission for Liad and Idan to visit us. Hopefully the reply will be positive for us. I won’t abuse that privilege if it is.
We set up camp at the beach in front of Karen and Isaac, Liad and Idan’s parents. Karen was selling some great clothes at the beach from Israel today. We girls bought ourselves each a little something that we liked. She gave us a good deal. For those of you who read this and know Kakoon, it’s similar to that. Good quality clothing. Hannah and I bought a dress and Jordan opted for a cute skirt. I brought down some watermelon and I made sandwiches from home so we were set for the day. The beach was beautiful and we hung out in front of Lola’s, which was a change for us since we always go and hang out by dead tree. It was fun to people watch. Lola’s is busy and today seemed to be exceptionally so. I see tourists arrive in their perfectly clean rental car, and they are lily white, and their kids have rash guards on, hats, the mom’s are taking pictures galore. It’s just like us when we arrived. I laugh at the thought of us when we first got here and how clearly out of place we were. We seem to fit in now. The locals come up to Jack and give him the local hand shake, I am welcomed with the kiss, kiss to each cheek, the girls are hugged and they say “hola” as they should, even if they know the person speaks English. It’s such a warm place and I have to say the only other place I felt like I fit in like this was in Summit County, when I moved there in the mid 80’s. It’s like that. Small town feeling and everyone knows everyone. Or at least recognizes everyone. I was talking to Gustavo, the manager of the Mauna Loa. He is a great guy and has kindly let us swim in the pool and use his internet. We don’t swim in the pool anymore but we used to go over at least once a week for beers and a swim. Anyway, I was saying to him how we have found Playa Avellanas to be so great and the people are much of the reason. He felt it too when he first moved here. He’s a Costa Rican and I can’t remember where he is from. A city outside of San Jose. He came to Playa Avellanas a few years ago with the same kind of wonder we did. I was saying how when we first arrived we had rules for the girls like they couldn’t ride to the beach without us. Or basically, do anything without us. It took us about 2-3 week s to figure out that it is safe here and we need to use our common sense. We still wouldn’t let them ride at night alone but during the day is fine. He confirmed our feeling saying the same. It took him 15 days, he said, to feel at home here. He said after that time people start to recognize you. You won’t get treated like a tourist anymore and sure enough, he was right. Living in tourist country, I don’t like being treated like a tourist, not that there is anything wrong with that, but if you want to live the life, well, you really have to live the life. We haven’t even scratched the surface of life in Costa Rica but at least we have a small feeling of what it would be like. It’s just plain PURA VIDA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!