http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/patt0248/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from patt0248 en-us Sat, 02 Jan 2010 11:50:28 +0000 Sat, 02 Jan 2010 11:50:28 +0000 After going through all of my blogs I was disappointed to see that I had not written much about my experience at Sistema Educativo Saint Clare and I apologize. It is after all the reason I came here and has been just as much an adventure as surfing in Nicaragua or eating the innards of a cow. My student teaching experience in Costa Rica has been amazing and I donrsquot think I could have aske http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Cartago/Cartago/blog-350461.html Ah now I can leave happy. I wanted to see a monkey before I came home and I would have stayed until I saw one. A few weekends ago Steve and I headed to the Pacific coast to a small town called Quepos. Quepos is well known for its ability to provide incredible sport fishing opportunities but is also becoming a more populated area due to its proximity to Manuel Antonio. This area should be on y http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Puntarenas/Manuel-Antonio/Costa-Rica/blog-350036.html I apologize that I havenrsquot written a blog in a while. I have been quite busy with getting work done that I have forgotten to write. I only have a few days left here so I am going to try to write about my last little adventures. I am sorry if these blogs are a little bit on the short side.The weekend after Steve and I went to Memorsquos we were lucky enough to be able to go to another f http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Alajuela/San-Carlos/San-Carlos/blog-350016.html Ah Turrialba the land of farms friends and oddly enough the Rawlings factory that produced the weapon Barry Bonds used to hit his record breaking home run. The weekend following our trip to Nicaragua Steve and I made our way to nearby Turrialba to visit my good friend Guillermo Memo who I had met while harvesting the Earthrsquos bounty at the Bean. It is partly due to his stories of Co http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Cartago/Turrialba/blog-340146.html Well it turns out that you cant stay in one country for more than 90 days without having to pay some sort of a fine. So to get around this Steve Ali and I all took a long weekend to travel to neighbooring Nicaragua for a few days so we could renew our visas and then come back to Costa Rica with a fresh 90 days. We decided to go to a small fishing community called San Juan Del Sur that is beco http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Nicaragua/San-Juan-Del-Sur/blog-335168.html Recently Steve and I made our way to the nearby town of Cartago in hopes of catching a bus to the top of Volcan Irazu which is the tallest active volcano in Costa Rica. Everything was going great. We made it to Cartago early with a map of the town in hand and found the bus stop for Irazu or at least what the map said was the bus to Irazu. Turns out the map was wrong and we missed the bus but o http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Cartago/Cartago/blog-335166.html Well its still winter here in Costa Rica which means one thinghellip RAIN It has been raining just about every day down here. The mornings are usually beautiful and just like clockwork everyday as I leave school to walk home the sky lets go and it pours. However we still find time to enjoy the country.A few weekends ago we Travis Steve Ali and I made our way to the Caribbean beach to http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Cartago/Cartago/blog-328728.html It seems to be one of the great laws of the universe that nothing goes as planned. This is not always a bad thing as I have learned in the past and was reminded of a couple weekends ago. The plan was this Travis and I were going to meet up with a group of teachers from Saint Clare on Friday night to cook dinner and to present a slideshow of pictures from Travisrsquo trip to the top of Chirri http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Cartago/Cartago/blog-326902.html Well itrsquos been just about two weeks since I arrived here in Costa Rica and everything is going great. I have been enjoying my time at Saint Clare very much. I spent most of my classroom time last week observing my two cooperating teachers Alexandra and Rebecca. Both were originally biologists who found that they enjoyed teaching science just as much as they like doing research. They ar http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Cartago/Cartago/blog-318767.html And so the trip begins. I arrived in San Jose Costa Rica on Tuesday August 19th. The day started early with an alarm clock at 330am so that I could get everything ready for my 700 flight. The first flight to Charlotte NC went really well as I slept for all but the last half hour of it. I then had to catch a flight from Charlotte to San Jose but before we could board the plane we had to f http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Costa-Rica/Cartago/Cartago/blog-314624.html