http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/VS/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from VS en-us Tue, 10 Nov 2009 02:44:47 +0000 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 02:44:47 +0000 My parents decided on a whim to come visit Costa Rica. What a great excuse for Mike and I to continue our travels of the country and show my folks around a bit. We had planned on taking them to La Paz Waterfall Arenal Volcano Manuel Antonio and ending their visit here in Smara. It wasnrsquot until halfway into their trip that I realized we simply wouldnrsquot have time to do everything and http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Guanacaste/Samara/blog-100152.html Smara is located on the western Pacific coast between the beaches of Nosara and Montezuma. It is said to be one of the safest and most beautiful beaches in Costa Rica. Wildlife here abounds and not a day goes by without us seeing monkeys lizards and birds from the deck of our condo. Wersquove also spotted in our back yard a crocodile who has become quite famous around town for his survival ski http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Guanacaste/Samara/blog-93865.html Manuel Antonio was really an amazing park. I would definitely recommend heading there in the rainy season considering it felt like we had the park all to ourselves with the exception of only a few other hikers. We have heard that the place gets a bit overrun in the dry season with tour buses lining up on the street outside. Our seven dollar entry fee was well spent as we saw an abundance of wildl http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Puntarenas/Manuel-Antonio/blog-91777.html After spending the past few weeks heading down the coast enjoying small beach towns along the way Mike and I have come to realize that what had appeared to be insect and spider bites is now a serious case of poison ivy. I canrsquot tell you how many people have said they didnrsquot even think Costa Rica had poison ivy. Let me assure everyone that this lovely little plant is alive and thrivin http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Puntarenas/Manuel-Antonio/blog-90474.html I have officially lost my first battle with nature. After spending the last week and a half in San Carlos and trekking through multiple rainforests on more than 20 farms the heat mosquito bites spider bites and poisonous plants have finally gotten the better of us. My 30 insect bites have now turned into 89 welts that are driving me bonkers and Mikersquos quick brush with fire ants have enco http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Guanacaste/Liberia/blog-87662.html Mike and I arrived in San Carlos on Thursday of last week and it seems like every day wersquore in this area the more we feel at home. San Carlos is quite a large area. Itrsquos more like a county containing many small towns such as Ciudad Quesada Muelle La Fortuna and Santa Rosa. Itrsquos northwest of San Jose in case anyone is looking at a map. On the way to San Carlos Mike decided we http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Alajuela/San-Carlos/blog-86992.html Mike Gerardo and I have just gotten back from a few days in San Carlos. What a great place This is the third time we have ventured around the area and seem to enjoy the town more and more. We decided to head back up there for the day and check out a farm we had looked at last week. Funny part was that we didnrsquot expect to spend the night so we had no change of clothes no toothbrushes no h http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Heredia/blog-85530.html Last week Mike and I decided it would be a good idea to check out the Serpentarium so that we would be better equipped to identify different types of snakes here in Costa Rica. Costa Rica has 135 species of snakes with 17 being venomous. The two main venomous families are coral snakes and pit vipers. Neither of which I care to run into. I had asked Mike before we left if he knew the way. He said h http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/San-Jose/blog-84964.html Mikersquos been spending a lot of time with Jorge our mechanic working on the truck to get her ready for our adventure. The other day Jorgersquos friend Carlos stopped over and invited everyone to have lunch at his fatherrsquos house up the mountain. When he said ldquouprdquo the mountain thatrsquos seriously what he meant.Carlosrsquo father Jos Luis works for the governmentr http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Heredia/blog-84252.html Wersquove bought a truck All the time spent weeding through trucks that werenrsquot exactly right for us has finally paid off. Narrowing our search down helped as well as we had done additional research on the 4Runners Landcruisers and Pathfinders. We found that the Landcruisers while great to look at had very bad gas mileage and had extremely poor emissions. Pathfinders faired better how http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Heredia/blog-83313.html Last Saturday rolled around like any other day here in Barva. Mike and I made our way over to the Delgadorsquos to have some lunch at about noon and chat up the family a bit. Little did we know that Gerardo had other plans for us.By the time we got to the house Agnes one of the daughters had told us lunch would be ready in about an hour. Gerardo seized this opportunity to convince us to go to http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Heredia/blog-80690.html Yesterday was a good day. We had a 10am meeting with the lawyer who would send us with his driver Brian to get our driverrsquos licenses. Brian is the same guy who worked with us on getting our fingerprints and paperwork from the police station when we were working on our residency so we were already familiar with him. Hersquos a good guy of little words probably late 20rsquos but definit http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/San-Jose/blog-80039.html The past few days have been an education to say the least as we have been driving all over Costa Rica in search of the perfect truck. So far we have been to Grecia Sarchi Escazu Santa Barbara Guadalupe Palmares San Ramon and San Isidro. Some of these places are up to an hour away. Purchasing a car here is very different that buying in the States. There are basically three places to buy cars http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Heredia/blog-79309.html Our lawyer is located in San Jose only a few blocks away from the Costa Rican National Museum of Art. Since Mike and I donrsquot have a truck yet and arenrsquot on any real schedule we figured wersquod make the most of our time in San Jose and check out some of the museums in the area. We still plan on visiting the Serpenterium figured it was good to know which guys to look out for and th http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/San-Jose/blog-78871.html Mike and I arrived in Costa Rica on July 27th tired from all the running around we did in the States during our last two weeks there but very ready to begin our new adventure.Our flight was due to leave Philadelphia at 630am which meant a very early wake up call at 330 Thankfully my folks drove us to the airport and saved us a costly cab ride. Once again the airlines tell you to be 2 hours http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/San-Jose/blog-78362.html While sitting in the airport during our 4 hour layover in El Salvador on the way back to the States looking up I noticed a small bat on the ceiling. I have no idea how this poor fella had gotten into the airport but I can imagine the bright lights and the loud speaker going off next to him werenrsquot exactly pleasant. Considering I wasnrsquot sure how the airport police in El Salvador would http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/El-Salvador/San-Salvador/blog-73978.html Irsquove recently learned that Heredia is not just city living. Gerardo had mentioned that he wanted to take us to his cousin's farm up in the mountains of Heredia. His cousin Rigo had a wood burning stove and Gerardo wanted to take him some scraps of wood he had left over from his shop. Tejoncito is the perfect vehicle for this type of road trip. We had 7 people yes 7 in the truck along wit http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Heredia/blog-71546.html Everyone has weeds both here and in the U.S. Some of us have had to pull weeds put chemicals on them to kill them put down special ldquoweed barriersrdquo to stop them from growing etc. Costa has weeds as well. At times Irsquove seen Ticos outside with their machetes chopping the weeds back ensuring they stay in perfect form and donrsquot get too out of control. The only difference bet http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Heredia/blog-71362.html Good Neighbors A day hasnrsquot gone by since wersquove been in Costa Rica where the people havenrsquot simply amazed me in some way. Irsquove never been around folks who seem so completely genuine who love to converse and who take a vested interest in the wellbeing of others.Matthew has some really amazing neighbors. Ana Juan Carlos and their children Gaby and Carlos have welcomed us http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Heredia/blog-71304.html 3am came incredibly early this morning. It was one of those mornings where you feel like you only just closed your eyes and suddenly the alarm clock is going off. For a second you think you must have set it wrong. Personally I know itrsquos way too early when even I donrsquot want a cup of morning java. I could hardly form sentences when Mikersquos mom asked me if Irsquod like some coffee http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/San-Jose/blog-70273.html