Hello All: I’m once again sitting in the balcony restaurant with a cup of tea and come cookies. I finished working on my online class earlier today, so I don’t have work tonight, which is nice. It’s really lovely here.
Bill decided not to go diving today. Rocket Frog diving does not seem very reliable or responsive to problems, which is a bad sign with companies that take people diving. If they can’t give you the correct address, you also wonder how well they keep up equipment and maintain safety. Diving can be dangerous so you need a reliable company. It might be good that he didn’t get to go. He has two days scheduled next week with a different company and hopefully that will go better. I just talked to the owner of our hotel. She also dives and she usually goes with the company Bill picked for next week so that’s a good sign. She’s from Venezuela but grew up in New Jersey and somehow ended up in Costa Rica. I thought she was German or Austrian. Her accent doesn’t sound Spanish.
This morning, we camped out at the hotel. I’ve taken a beating lately in the waves so it was nice to have a slower morning to recover. We ate an early lunch at small local restaurant where we had a conversation with the server about her tattoo. Bill spent some time pointing out violations of electrical codes in the restaurant. It reminded me of the fuse box in the house where I grew up that my dad never got around to wiring correctly.
After lunch, we stopped by the tour shop and booked a 4-wheeler trip to Playa de los Pirates. We went there yesterday on 4-wheelers and our guide said it was a good place to snorkel so I wanted to try it out today. It was probably the best snorkeling that I’ve done in Costa Rica. There is a small rock of an island swimming distance from shore where we saw a fair number of colorful fish, tubular sea creatures that coat themselves in rocks, a really interesting star fish and some other various invertebrates. It’s probably a good spot for turtles but we didn’t see any today. We had a little over an hour there and it was definitely worth going. This beach also had huge stretches of sand and tidal pools and almost no people. It’s really awesome! We got the snorkel tour plus about 40 minutes of 4-wheeler riding for half what we paid Sketchy Kevin last week. The longer you stay in a place, the better you get at finding good deals and good companies. Tomorrow we are doing jet skis and snorkeling, which we are both looking forward to.
This evening, we ate at a good restaurant down the street a little ways. We both had whole pan fried red snapper, vegetable risotto and shrimp in a mango pineapple sauce. I’m generally skeptical about food that still looks like an animal once it’s on my plate, but the fish was good.
Bill and I think that if we come back to this area, we would like to get a vacation rental so we could cook some of our own meals. We are getting good food, but it’s 3 big meals a day and I don’t think either of us are going to come back thinner! We are pretty active, and swimming makes us hungry, but I probably don’t need the package of cookies I’m currently eating. We would also like to have our own transportation, either a car or a rented 4-Wheeler. A 4-wheeler would probably be better on dirt roads and you can ride them on the main paved roads here too.
Both the Costa Ricans and the other tourists are super friendly and easy to talk to. I tried talking to people in Jamaica but no one seemed very interested in conversation. When we went to lunch today, a guy we see on the beach surfing with his boys stopped to talk to us for a few minutes. I think he works at a local hotel restaurant. We met a young couple at breakfast and I just met a couple from Texas who also come to Costa Rica a lot. It’s a really friendly, welcoming environment. I’m used to Samara, so I missed the familiarity there at first, but Brasilito is definitely growing on me.
We know that some of you who read the blog are interested in traveling to Costa Rica. Bill has done a good job trying to describe what it’s like to be here. We are really enjoying this vacation but it’s probably not for everyone. Small towns in Costa Rica are not fancy and if you are imagining that Costa Rica will look like Hawaii, you’ll be disappointed. Vacations like this aren’t as easy as going to an all inclusive resort. It takes some time to settle in, find tour shops and good places to eat, but for me, it’s so much more interesting. I’ve met a lot of great people and we feel like we are more part of a community here where we support local business and talk to people about their lives. It’s true that geckos come in and out of cracks in the windows and doors and our room last night and part of today smelled strongly like a skunk, but you get good stories that way.
I’m thinking about swimming in the pool but I’m on the fence about my wet swimsuit. I need to make a decision quickly. The pool closes at 8:30 although I don’t know how well that’s policed.
Bill is working on pictures so I’ll post a few here and more with his post.
Traveling with Emily! 