Costa Rica Short Blog Posts
These small snippets that we wrote while traveling can give a better idea about what life is like during long term travel. The larger articles have much more information but these are much more fun.
A Long Travel Day
Our travel day started with a drive down to Victoria Airport. We had 3 flights and an even longer drive ahead. Our first connection was tight but luckily our plane landed 30 minutes early and I found a great app for getting through customs really fast. You save your passports, check in within 4 hours of landing and you get to skip most of the line. It was great.
Next flight- Seattle to LA then we left LA around midnight for an overnight to San Jose. The kids amazing and all the flights were smooth. I am not a plane sleeper but I’ve gone before without sleep so all was good.
Thankfully we decided kind of last minute to get a driver to take us to La Fortuna. Our driver was great. He told us a lot about the area and delivered us safely to to our hotel.
We landed in San Jose at 7 am and made it to La Fortuna about 11. The hotel was really cute, next to a great soda and had a fabulous view.
We were able to find a Bama game on and then the entire crew crashed.
La Fortuna – the hotel
We started our trip with a 5 days in La Fortuna near the Arenal volcano. We choose to stay closer to town and in a small hotel.
The view of the volcano was amazing, we had a little pool all to ourselves, and we could walk to several nearby sodas. We planned a couple excursions but mostly we hung out around the pool. The hotel was great at helping us plan activities and getting us Taxi’s. We even had 2 Toucans come hang out with us at the pool. I scared them off when I saw them and screamed but they still stayed near by – just not near enough to get a good pic.
We enjoyed eating multiple meals at the soda right next to the hotel and really enjoyed meeting new people in the area.
Traveling to the middle of nowhere, on a boat
For our next 5 days we planned a trip to Tortuguero. This is a little island on the Caribbean just south of Nicaragua. You can only reach it by boat and it’s known for nesting sea turtles.
Apparently at this time Hurricane Nate was developing just East of Tortuguero. We were worried about the drive and the boat ride but it ended up being great weather. Luckily our hotel host knew a guy on the island that knew a lot about the local weather. Randy talked to him and we were confident on our plans. We had used a car hire from the hotel which also helped (although it was missing some seat belts – everyone that knows me knows I don’t do well if anyone is missing seatbelts).
We found out later that the rest of Costa Rica had major flooding. Tortuguero was just fine.
The trip and boat ride was a great experience. The kids got to see non-tourist Costa Rica on the car ride. The boats started from a little dock (aka mud bank) way outside of some obscure town that was not on any of our maps or google earth – down miles of dirt roads and past lots of banana (Chiquita), pineapple, papaya, sugar cane, watermelon, and coffee plantations. We stopped to see a little 2 toed sloth in a tree on the side of the road and saw Cayman in a river.
After about an hour boat ride through the jungle we arrived at the little town of Tortuguero. It’s a cute little place and a great choice for the next few days.
Tortuguero Costa Rica
We spent 5 days in the little town of Tortuguero Costa Rica getting to know the area. We stayed in a little hotel about 1 block from the beach. There are no cars on the island. You just walk. It definitely had it’s own vibe. There was a little run down playground that the kids loved. We had to get used to the small alleyways and small run down buildings but once we figured out our way around it was really enjoyable. I really liked walking the main drag and it gave us a chance to practice our Spanish.
One of my favorite nights we watched the Costa Rica vs Nicaragua world cup qualifiers. Costa Rica had to tie to move on. We watched from a TV outside in a local soda (Costa Rica’s version of a restaurant). They evened the score at 8 seconds. It was great!
The beach is beautiful but has dark sand – and you can’t swim in it – too many currents (may be sharks and crocs too).
We saw spider monkeys at the park, iguana’s just hanging out at the sodas, and had about 20 Macaws hanging out around the hotel. — that’s not even mentioning the Turtles.
Turtles!!!
On our first day in Tortuguero we saw baby turtles hatching and running down to the beach. They were so stinking cute flopping around and scooting down to the water.
The next night was a large nesting night. When we came out the next day we saw so many mama tracks making their way to the nesting ground. The tracks were crossing and all over the place.
On one of our last nights R, M, and B signed up for a guided tour. In this town it is illegal to be on the beach after dark. You must go with a guide to see the mama’s lay eggs. You have to dress all in black and follow some pretty strict rules. The night of the guided tour there were not as many nesting so they took a boat past the small airport and to one of the nesting grounds. They got to watch 2 mama turtles lay eggs and one go back in to the surf. It was an awesome experience that I’m sure the kids will always remember.
A Canoe Trip Through the Jungle
Why we have travel insurance – Monkey Bar Scare
When you’re on a small island in Costa Rica and you think you daughter broke her wrist on the Monkey bars – you make a splint from the math book, a plastic knife, ace bandage and athletic tape (although I was also thinking of the paper mache route would work nicely).
We’ll get X-rays in a few days when we drive through San Jose. She is doing well and not hurting much (even at the UC I’d still just splint for now until the swelling goes down).
She did pass out after she fell when she tried to stand (that scared the crap out of me) but after 2 full Cokes (which she has not had before) she had a miraculous recovery.
Our Costa Rica Home
We chose a rental in the mountains for the next 4 weeks. The house was on 12 acres and had amazing views of the mountains and down to the Pacific. There was a really small town (or almost town) nearby that had a pool, 2 sodas (restaurants), and a mini store.
We were also near a coffee plantation where we stopped to get some coffee on our way home.
To do any significant shopping we drove about 20 minutes to Santiago de Pursical. There was a larger resort type pool in town where we spent a few afternoons.
It’s a very pretty area and the people are very nice. It was a little too easy to spend the time in the house on the hill vs doing more exploring. It was a little tricky to make sure the kids got to see enough of the culture but we managed and enjoyed the beauty – and the rain. It rains a lot in the mountain rain forest during rainy season. Thankfully our house stayed put and no mudslides during our visit.
Don’t Jump – or Swim!!!
Kids Museum
When we visit a new city our first stop is almost always the kids museum. I sometimes even judge my cities by the museum and the kids will say “is that the city that had this in the museum.” We have probably been to about 10 and we always want to go to more.
San Jose has a really cool one. It was once an abandoned prison and is now turned in to a really cool kids museum. It’s huge. We were there about 4 hours and did not see the entire thing. There were lots of hands on exhibits and many unique areas. I did find it a little tricky to find an area that the parents could sit and the kids could play by themselves for an extended time but it really was a wonderful space.
There were so many different experiences in the museum that it’s hard to list everything that the kids got to do.
Surfing and Exploring Jaco Beach
One of the big things I wanted to do this trip is take M and B surfing. We decided to take a weekend trip down to Jaco Beach. It’s a short distance (by the crow flies) – it’s 2 hours of mountains, turns, motion sickness and dodging people, dogs and cows when you’re in a car.
We rented a small apartment in a BnB 2 nights. It was an adorable place with a pool. We got there just in time to eat, find our hotel, change the kids and meet up for surf lessons on Jaco Beach. The kids did wonderfully. Both of them got up on their first try. They were naturals and looked like it they had been surfing for months.
I really enjoyed the town. Everyone was so friendly (which is usually the case in Costa Rica) but I felt it was even more so at Jaco Beach. We found some great little restaurants. One had the best hamburgers that I have had in a very long time. After dinner we walked/danced back to our hotel in a monsoon – but totally worth it.
Next time we go to Costa Rica we will definitely spend more time on the Pacific.
The Festival de la Mascarada
In my search for Halloween – ish activities I came across this festival in Escazu. It’s a celebration of hand made masks. We decided to check it out to try and get some more authentic experiences during our time here. When we arrived the festival was set up with stations and many of the masks were set up for display. You could tell that people put a lot of time and work into making them. They were really cool and many were really tall. We hung out, let the kids play on the playground and got snow cones.
About 12:30 the parade started. Now, growing up a somewhat close distance to New Orleans you always know when the parade is about to go when the music starts – the same goes for this parade. The music started, the masks went up and the dancing began. This mini parade was fun. The masks were so tall and many were spinning and dancing down the street. We only stayed for the first block (it was getting hot and we all needed more water) but I hope it’s something the kids will remember.
What to do about Halloween?
Halloween in Costa Rica with Kids
Halloween is one of my kids favorite holidays – it ranks just behind Christmas. In our neighborhood the streets are full of kids and adults strolling around and having a good time. It’s a very festive atmosphere and so much fun. We dress the house up and take turns making the candy rounds. The kids generally go in groups and we may get 100 kids or more asking for candy at the front door (probably more – that’s only 10 groups of 10 … likely way more – we should count one year)
This year I have been really struggling to find a way for the kids to celebrate Halloween in Costa Rica. It is not a traditional holiday down here and finding a neighborhood that does trick or treating was not happening just from an online search. I really wanted them to be able to celebrate it somehow but I’ve also been preparing them with the “it’s not going to be the same” talk – especially when they started asking about Halloween 2 months ago. We are currently renting a house in the mountains and we are not near much of anything else.
At the last minute I finally was able to find trick or treating at a mall in Sana Ana (about 1 hour from our house). We stopped by Walmart on our way (luckily we found one of those too – our other shopping options are pretty much limited to the bare essentials) and picked out a few items that could count as costumes and to the mall we went.
The place was pretty packed and the kids really enjoyed it. We ran in to a couple English speaking families which was great (our Spanish still stinks) and off the kids went collecting candy from all the shops. We also bought some crafts at Walmart (which was set up more like an IKEA then the one’s we are use to – had to go through the parking garage, up the escalator and through the toys to get to the rest of the store). We’re going to use the crafts to make stations for Halloween night and have our own little Halloween party. It’s not the holiday that the kids are use to but it’s still been a lot of fun.
We’re a family of 5 (Physician Assistant mom, IT project manager dad and 3 kids ages 3,6,10) taking a gap year from normal life to travel. For blog posts, locations, and more information on how we did it and how you can to click here.
