Tarantula!

OK, I guess if I have to come across a tarantula, this is the best way to do it. (He was dead, and it's a good thing, cuz if THIS guy had of crawled across my chest at night I'd have freaked out!)

I was taking a little swim in the pool, and I thought I'd check the skimmer to see how dirty it is, and I found this:

Cute eh?

Feliz Anniversario...

Ok, so we've been in our new home for almost 7 full days already, so obviously it was time to get the heck out of the house and "see/do something." (Anyone that knows Megan well will not be very surprised by this).

So, on a Saturday afternoon whim, we jumped in the car and headed to Jaco beach. This is about an hour's drive from Atenas, depending on the traffic, on some very scenic, but winding mountainous roads. I guess it's like the Atenas version of a trip to Banff from Calgary.

We had heard about this place from a few people but had done zero research on it, so had no idea what to expect.

The first place we stopped was at a bridge over the Tarcoles River, where we were supposed to be able to spot some large crocs. Well we were not disappointed, there were about a dozen or so on one side, and another half dozen or so on the other. Some were really quite large. See the pics below.

Next we went into the little beach town of Jaco, which is a surfing destination. Megan commented that it wasn't as built up or commercial as she was expecting. And comparing it to the Mayan Riviera or Cancun, I would have to agree. The main drag did have a bunch of cool looking restaurants and bars which I bet are hopping at night, and there were a few larger hotels, but the beach itself really wasn't very busy, especially considering it was a weekend. As it was our 11th anniversary today, we decided to treat ourselves to lunch at a Mexican restaurant. It was definitely more expensive than most places in Atenas and surrounding towns, but we were expecting that as it is much more of a touristy place with lots of gringos so of course everything is more expensive.

In my stumbly Spanish, I managed to ask our waitress if she could recommend a good swimming beach (Jaco beach is more for surfing) and she pointed us back down the road to Herradura (sp?). This was an interesting spot in that we drove right up to the beach, parked the car under some trees, got changed behind our car door and ran right down to the waves. Again, not very crowded at all. Our kids love the waves and these ones were just big enough to give them some thrills without us worrying about them too much.

All in all, this anniversary was much better than our 10th last year, although Megan disagrees... She spent it in Vegas with her friends while I stayed home and watched the kids.

Here are a few pics...



Playa Herradura

Crocs at Tarcoles River

Where the heck is Atenas?

It occured to me that some of you might be wondering exactly where abouts in Costa Rica Atenas is.

So, here's a quick link to a Google Maps page for Atenas...

That's it... Ciao

We moved in!!!

Well, we finally found a house and moved in. HOORAY! We ended up in a small bungalow in Barrio Mercedes, which is just a few minutes outside of Atenas proper via a rather bumpy road. It is basically a new house, so everything is clean and everything works well (except for the odd leak here and there - but the guy is supposed to be coming tomorrow to fix those, so hopefully we'll see him within the next week or two.) We're happy to have a fairly well-built home because that is often not the case with houses here in Costa Rica. It seems that if they can cut corners on construction details, they often do). It was not fully furnished nor did it have cable or internet installed, but the owner agreed to install both, plus he let us pick out some new beds, a TV, DVD and Microwave which he'll just take off of the rent. So we're really fortunate to have stumbled across this place and are certainly happy to know that our beds and bedding and all brand new.

The house has 2 bedrooms/2 baths - one quite large master bedroom with a very good sized ensuite, and a small second bedroom where we got bunk beds for the kids. (they get a kick out of that). The living room is fairly large, there's a good sized kitchen with large breakfast bar (no table though) and a small laundry room (there is new washing machine, but no dryer... Yes, I have to hang the clothes out to dry. Most people don't have dryers here, which is fine if you get your laundry out to dry on the line early morning before the afternoon rains hit, but you're stuck with hanging them out for a second day if you miss the window of opportunity.) The house also a large veranda on the front of the house, which is very typical, as most people spend a good deal of time living outside, and we plan to do the same. Many people have what we would consider indoor furniture like couches and a table and chairs outside on their verandahs.

Oh, and did I mention the pool? Yeah baby! It's small, but oh so refreshing on those muggy afternoons. And the kids are perfectly happy to share a room in exchange for getting a pool.

Our property has a few mango trees (although unfortunately mango season is just about over,) some sort of orange trees and even a small jalapeno-like chili pepper tree on the property... I broke one of the ripe ones open and basically just touched it to my tongue and it was SMOKIN' hot. Spicy home made salsa coming up... Yum yum.

There are also many coffee plants on a lot of the neighboring properties and it's quite cool to see the large clusters of ripening beans. We also have a small heard of cattle living right across our little road - not the most sociable neighbours but at least they aren't noisy like the freakin' rooster 2 doors down!! He has about the most feable crow out of any rooster I've ever heard and I really don't think he has any concept of time. He tends to crow about once an hour starting at 3am, then a little more frequently once 5am hits. Nathan thinks he sounds like dying cow!

The one minor downside to living in such a lush location is that we do get quite a few bugs and critters around. We were told that they have pulled a couple of tarantulas (Megan shudders at the thought,) a small snake and a couple of scorpions out of the pool to date but we have not seen anything like that yet.

The very first day we moved in, we had a big thunderstorm (go figure...), and when it started to rain, I just happened to be looking out the window to where the downspouts go into the drainage basin in the ground, and up popped a huge toad. While I was sneaking up to get his picture, his BIGGER buddy popped up. I have a picture of it below, but it's a little dark and you don't get very good perspective, but it was easily one of the biggest ones I have ever seen.

We are kind of on a rural street with neighbouring coffee plantations and fruit farms all around. The neighbors a couple of doors down have horses and chickens and, of course, the rooster (el gallo diablo.) That's one thing I have noticed about Costa Rica that is very different from Calgary or Canada - it's very noisy. You hear roosters and dogs and crickets and frogs and birds and dirt bikes and often trucks with air brakes (if you are near the highway), etc. etc., but it doesn't seem all that bad. It sort of all blends into a different kind of white noise and doesn't bug you very much... at least not so far. Most of the noise is non-man made and it kind of makes me think how "alive" it is (or, on the other hand, how lifeless it seems in our sterile suburbs back home).

Enough... Here's a couple of pictures:

Independance Day

Hey all,

September 15th marked the 188th anniversary of Costa Rica's independance from Spain, and it seemed to be a pretty big deal here. The kids get 2 days off school, but for a lot of them, one of those days is taken up with mandatory involvement in parades etc. Rachel and Nathan didn't have to participate as Grade 1 classes weren't part of it and Rachel didn't have a costume.

The festivities started the night before with the "Fiesta de la Luz", or festival of the lights. There were some speaches in front of the municiple building, and then they have the procession of lights. All the kids bring along a candle holder, which is a stick with some ornate open box on top for the candle. These are often homemade, and one I saw up close had a beer bottle cap nailed into the bottom of the box to hold the candle. Then there was a simple box frame and transparent colored plastic for the sides. The best one we saw was a chicken on a stick with an opening in the back for the candle. Sorry, I didn't have my camera for that, so I don't have any photos.

The next day started with more civic speaches, and then the parade. Most of the schools in town have an entry, and the kids dress up in traditional costumes, and if the school is large enough, they have a marching band as well. The parade goes around the central square which is a beautiful green space with big palm trees as well as mango and guyaba trees among others. In the square were little street vendors selling trinkets, food, and cold drinks, etc. We bought some "Granizados" (which I'm sure I spelled wrong), which is shaved ice with a combination of layers of condensed milk, a bit of powdered milk, and a squirt of red syrup on top. I know, sounds rather unappetizing but when you mix it all together, it was quite good and very refreshing on a hot day. The Granizado guy must have had a sore arm by the end of the day because his cart holds a big block of ice that he uses some gizmo to manually shave one cup at a time. Then his wife would add all the toppings - quite neat!

We also tried some green mango slices sold in a small bag with salt and lime... Everybody said "This would go great with vodka or tequila..."

Here are some pics of the kids and some of their new friends. Gabbi and Samantha (in the first pic) are the 2 other girls in Rachel's class that are gringos. The 2 older girls (in the second pic), are Gabbi's sister Trisha and her sixth grade friend Adriana; the other boy in the picture is Nathan's buddy and classmate Wyatt.

Friday morning feria (farmers market...)

Every friday morning in the town center, they have a farmers market where you can get fresh veggies, fruits, meats, baking, clothes and trinkets, among other stuff. Our haul for the day is at the bottom. We got fresh green beans, cilantro (Megan want's to make a salsa), tomatoes, cucumber, watermelon, a funky type of mandarin orange, mangos, red peppers, some hearty organic bread from Melanie, the local German baker, and some SMOKIN hot, huge jalapenos. You will also see some seedless grapes there, but they were relatively expensive (as it turned out) and imported from California. We also bought some "chicharrones" at one of the meat stands as well. These are little pieces of crisply-grilled pork, and while I've never been much of a pork guy, these were quite good. The little town of Atenas is in the middle of not only coffee country but also farm/ranch/agricultural country, so it's known for its good pork and chicken. We actually ordered a pork dish the other night (in error really) but were very pleasantly surprised with how lean and tasty the pork was - would definitely consider more pork dishes to try in the future.

The thingies in the tinfoil are called "papusas" (think they originate from El Salvador) and they are basically a fresh, hand made tortilla with "frijoles y queso" inside (beans and cheese) then are fried on the open grill and served with a type of pickled coleslaw. They are cheap and tasty. Yum yum!!!

As you can see, Megan is trying hard to look like a local with her lululemon bag (if that's even the way you spell it....)

As for the price of things, you can see the price for a kilo of papayas (I think that's what they are) is 500 colones, which is less than a buck.

Neither of us have ever been much for mangos, but they are in season here, and are excellent. They are growing on both of us. Something about all the fruit stands seem to scream out "blender drinks!" all the time. Too bad we don't have a blender yet, or a house to put it in for that matter.

Another weird thing is that for all of the cool local stuff that grows right here in people's yards, like crab apples do in Calgary, the one thing the whole family seems to like the most so far are the tomatoes. They are huge, tasty and cheap! The other thing is watermelon. They are so big and fresh that every time you start to cut into one, they actually burst open - kinda like the sound when you open a fresh bag of coffee. It's pretty cool and happens every single time.

I guess I had a pre-conceived notion that I would start to eat all of these exotic things that you couldn't easily get in Calgary, but instead I'm diggin the tomatoes and watermelon. Oh well, at least we're filling up on fruits and veggies everyday and lovin' every minute of it.

I have tried a few local things like "Mamo Chinos" (an ugly, hairy red fruit with kind of a soft lyche (sp?) nut inside) , "Jocotes" (a little green fruit sold in bags at the side of the road that seems like a combination fruit/vegetable with the texture of an avocado,) and "Guyabas (sp?)", and while they were all interesting (and different), I can't say any of these are my new favorite. But I will say that Melanie's organic carrot/zuchinni/oatmeal bread is definitely our favorite new bread. And luckily enough, there is also a couple from the States at the feria that have fresh baking like we're used to back home, so we've so far enjoyed their homemade cinnamon buns and carrot cake. We're trying to discipline ourselves and only buy one new thing from them each week, but it's REALLY tough!

W

Our current digs...

For the first 2 weeks here, we have been staying at a little resort called "Poco Cielo", which means a little piece of heaven, and it is pretty great. Here's a picture of the view from the infinity pool, with the Poas volcano in the background.

Just over to the left of the above picture, there is a little hike down to a cool stream... The spider below was just one of many "locals" we saw. (So far on the trip we have seen parrots, toucans, tons of cool butterflies, a bunch of cool, big bugs that I can't identify, plus iguanas, and a gecko that Rachel used an earring!) The video at the bottom is of some leaf-cutter ants from the hike.

The location is great, but the people are great as well. The owners are from Priddis (go figure), and we had met them the last time we were down (in March, on a pre-scouting trip). They are actually in Calgary right now for a "vacation", which always makes me crack up. They are great people, but this time they left some friends to watch the place, and they are just as great. Jay and Melissa are a couple of self-described gypsies from New York. Jay is a fabulous cook, and they invited us to dinner with some of their friends in the "Rancho" at the resort. (A rancho is an open-air gathering place, usually right next to the pool, which includes an outdoor kitchen/cooking area, tables & chairs, etc. - most resorts and a lot of private residences have them.)

The food was REALLY good - he had grilled eggplant appetizers, fresh local veggies and chips with home-made guacamole and hummus (which he made specially for Megan as she had commented earlier in the week that she wished there was a store in town that sold hummus.) Then for the main dish he had jumbo shrimp in his homemade sauce over pasta. It was great! He has also shared some other dishes with us that he whipped up during the week, and they have all been really tasty and healthy! Here are some pics... Jay's the bald guy, and Mellissa's the one with tats on her right arm...

So, obviously we are getting spoiled here and haven't found our own place yet... For some reason, we're not in much of a hurry...

Wayne