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Please to be aware that this is a rough, rough draft. 😊
Having a blast! More info later...
We left Rachel’s apartment around 6:45am & took the subway out to find the Dulles bus. After complications, we jumped in a cab to the airport. Check in was surprisingly fast and easy, as was the security gate…Dulles has come a loooong way since I lived in Virginia.
We flew Mexicana and were extremely surprised & pleased by the service. Complimentary headsets, actual hot meals (I had the omelet & Rach had the crepe) and super-attentive attendants. Mostly on that flight I slept!
We laid over in Cancun, where we discovered that we had to go through immigration before coming back to our gate…I’m pretty sure this is my first int’l lay-over in a country not my destination, so this was new and interesting…and confusing. When we got down to the immigration area, there was a girl with an actual list of names of people laying over…just trying to think of a US airport where that would work…Springfield/Branson, maybe? 😉
Got on the plane to Costa Rica & there were only 22 passengers on the flight. Rachel &
I spread out and each took a row of seats and promptly went back to sleep. Woke up in time to be served another hot meal (this time rice & beans…the “national” meal of Costa Rica called “casado”) and slept again. It really helped as I’ve been having pretty severe insomnia lately.
Everything was great when landing and retrieving my luggage & going through customs. We even got nicely detailed directions to where the buses were and the information that it would take us almost all the way where we needed to go for “one American dollar.” HOWEVER, as we were approaching the doors we heard a huge booming crash. Reaching outside, we were startled to find it was pouring torrentially. No joke. Like crazy rain. We briefly debated the bus idea but then took up one of the dozens of loitering cabbies on his offer to drive us. I’m really glad we did because he was funny and interesting (and quite a bit naughty!) and kept up a running commentary for us all the way to the bus station. I was able to take most of the pictures posted today while he drove us through San Jose and
told about all things Tican (Costa Rican).
Took a two hour bus ride to Torriealba where we are now. Spent a good hour or so trying to navigate the nameless streets (at least street sign-less) to find our hotel. We're staying at the Hotel Interamericanos, which totally has an international hostel feeling, but we got a room to ourselves. Our bilingual host, Luis, has been a font of information and assistance.
We ended our evening visiting a traditional "soda" restaurant. We had "casado" the traditional dinner meal. Beans & rice & meat, baby!
Back for cool showers (which actually rocked!) and trying to get online. Sleep early as we're going white water rafting on Thursday.
Fun, fun, fun! Over 16 hours of traveling by numerous modes of transport, but thus far has been totally worth it! 😊
Peace & Love,
Rae
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Janet McGuire
non-member comment
Yum!
Rae ~ Nice to see you two got there safely. Hope the earthquake wasn't too scary! The rice and beans look yummy! Safe travels ladies! Loving the blog updates!