Costa Rica

Last month we visited Costa Rica. Steve and Pedro, a fellow professor, are planning to teach a class down there next year, so this was their scouting trip. Carson and I met them at the end to make it a vacation. We flew in Tuesday night, and spent the night in San Jose. Steve met us there to take us to the hotel. The original plan was that I would rent a car and drive to the hotel. If that had continued to be the plan, I probably would not be here today, because I'd still be lost driving around. There are no street signs, one way streets aren't marked, and even the map only labels a few streets. People dart out across the streets and walk on the very edges of the roads. Oh, and not lane lines in the city. Just crazy. Though I must admit I enjoyed driving there also. Our hotel had no air conditioning, so we slept with the windows open. Daylight hours are pretty consistently 5:30 to 5:30 - Costa Rica is very close to the equator. So VERY early in the morning we woke to hear: "Tamales! I got tamales!" Alternate the English with the Spanish in a VERY loud voice (I thought it was a man - Steve said it was a woman) repeated over and over and over....... Time to get up!

All Costa Rican meals included rice and beans, with yogurt and salsas you could add. We ate breakfast, and wandered around the city some. We stuck out like sore thumbs, to put it mildly. Looked like Americans, and of course there is Carson with his white hair. We visited a national museum which included a wonderful butterfly house, a beautiful Catholic church, and the first McDonald's in Costa Rica.