Costa Rica Wrap Up

Here we are in our last spot in Costa Rica, the Best Western Irazu Airport Hotel (which by the way is amazing, free wifi, free Denny's breakfast, free international calls, cable, free HAPPY HOUR)... it's been a good 15 hours.

After 2 days in La Fortuna (meeeeh.) We bailed and went up to the Arenal Observatory Lodge.  A huge thanks to Adam & Deborah Raviv for recommending it, it was AMAZING!  After a super long, and very intense cab ride, we were up at the lodge which sits just over a mile from the base of the active (read: awesome) side of the volcano. The Arenal Volcano has been continuously active for 41 years, and the lodge was originally built for scientists to have a place to stay while they studied the volcano. With in minutes of checking in, the clouds cleared, and there it was, in all of its glory!  We spent the majority of our last two days, chilling out on their gorgeous deck watching explosions (the largest and last of which sent a column of smoke a few hundred feet up and scared the crap out of Mike), rocks rolling down, and one night, awesome red lava rocks spewing down. It was tranquil and fabulous. We also saw some great birds and their resident Coatis (a cuter relative of the racoon), one of which hangs out on the porch and does tricks for tourists.  Our hotel switch completely made the end of our trip, and it really helped us go out with a bang (he he he).

Here is our wrap up:
Coolest Animal: Quetzal
Best Place to hang out: Deck of the Arenal Observatory Lodge, Hammocks at Amor de Mar are a close second... but they have no volcano.
Friendliest Hotel: Pension Santa Elena, those people are awesome.
Best food: Gallo Pinto (rice & bean breakfast mix... it's just tasty)
Most awkward food: Casado... because who needs chopped beets or macaroni salad with their chicken?



We will be in LA for the next two days, then heading out to Sydney!  Call Debbie's cell if you want to check in, we'll have it while we are in LA.

And now what you've all been waiting for... Pictures!

Here are a couple of highlights, you can reach the whole album by clicking on the slideshow on the sidebar... pay no attention to the myriad pics of the same thing... we like to have choices...

Here's Mike tasting a starfruit right off the tree at Ricky & Flor's

Here are our lovely hosts!

chillin' at Manuel Antonio Beach

Monkey... looking kinda angry  and below our Jet Boat... before the jetting part...

Debbie in a hammock in Montezuma.. life is so tough... and then we hiked to a waterfall!

Looks like we made it!

Hey folks!  We did indeed make it to Costa Rica, sorry, we haven't had internet access (but here at Hotel Amor de Mar there is free wifi, what what!). I'll start at the very begining, I've heard it's a very good place to start... But I am a little sleepy, so I'm going to break this in to a few posts, we're here for 5 days, so I'm sure we'll even get in pictures!  Anywho, we made it without incident to the airport, and to Miami, from there we got on our next plane which was an hour delayed (partially due to 'a need to shift cargo'?), we were a little concerned that Ricky would have trouble finding us and we knew he was coming from far away.  But after a short incident with the immigration lady who had no idea where Ricky's mountain get-away was and thought we made up a fake address, we made it outside where Ricky found us in about a minute (because he said Mike looks enough like Mort to spot anywhere :)  We got to go on some fun errands about town with Ricky (we picked up a pinata for their grandson's 10th birthday, as well as some livestock feed... more on that later), then we headed up to their amazing mountain retreat.  I'm sure they wouldn't call it that, but that's what it is. It's lovely, they grow a ton of their own food, they have tons of fruit trees (Mike tried a starfruit right off the tree! I have a picture!!), they raise turkeys and chickens, Flor makes all of her own fresh juices... it was awesome.  We were there for two days and they ruled.

Tomorrow... Costa Rican buses, Manuel Antonio and Monkeys!