Blogs from Guanacaste, Costa Rica, Central America Caribbean

Here I am … in Costa Rica … third time this year. Why you’d ask? Well, since I thought I would go to Nicaragua to volunteer for three months, I left my backpack with a lot of crap in San Jose and had to go back and get it sorted out. A lesson learned: “Don’t think you will stick to your plan when you travel. You will always meet someone or decide to do something more exciting than you thought you would.” I almost thought the voyage back to Costa Rica was a waste of time and money if not a four-day trip with my dear Mexican friend Mar to La Cruz, salsa en la calle and getting my life a bit organized. So far La Cruz has been a cherry on a cake of Costa ... read more

Dear Blog Readers, Triumphantly I write this blog in the knowledge that I´ve been awarded Blogger of the Week! Thankyou for the nominations and the decision to let this small insignificant deluge into the thoughts of ours on our travels be awarded! We left the Flutterby House bitten to death by mosquitos and there was a little bit too much hippiness going on (at one point I heard Ellie Golding coming out the speakers...*shudders*). However, the place was beautiful and probably the nicest beach we've ever seen so it is definitely worth checking out if you get the chance. I also used their book exchange service. Much to the delight of Betty and Stephanie, I´ve become some sort of book fiend whilst we´ve been away. I implore anybody travelling to get Bill Bryson´s "Notes From A ... read more

Well it's been a while since my last entry so this is mostly going to be a rambling, catch-up post. I guess the primary bit of news here relates to Ella's challenges at Home School Beach Academy (where Charlie seems to be thriving). Ella was absolutely miserable at her school. While Charlie was able to quickly make two friends (Marshall, an Albertan who's been here for 6 years and who's dad works on an oil rig in mexico and Liad who's family has moved here permanently from Israel), Ella found herself in a class of all Spanish speaking kids. In addition to that, the school is in the process of being accredited by the national Ministry of Education, and that requires them to teach at least two classes completely in Spanish. None of us were told ... read more

What’s the best way to triple your spends in one day?? the answer is...cross the border from Nicaragua into Costa Rica...! With a 5am start me and Mike began our day of travel to Costa Rica and more specific Playa Tamarindo. The method of transport started with a taxi which happened to get a flat tyre 10mins from the dock but was fixed in time for the boat, a boat that went ridiculously slow towards the mainland but did make it, a taxi to Rivas to meet Karl who was joining from San Juan and then a further taxi which took us to the border. The border was a strange place which seemed more like a market than anything else, we were approached by one of the tourism guys who help people across and he showed ... read more

After investigating the places we wanted to see, and examining the layout of the country, we decided to deviate from our normal traveling methods and rent a car. Our Ticabus ticket would give us a ride from Granada all the way to San Jose, Cost Rica's capital but that was 3 hours past the turn off towards the Costa Rican Gold Coast. We didn't really want to have to backtrack that far if we could avoid it. We talked to the bus driver when we got near the Costa Rican border to find out if we could get off the bus before San Jose. This was a common occurance. We were dropped off at the intersection of two highways in the city of Liberia, Costa Rica. A cab happened to be sitting there and we hopped ... read more