Alrighty, it’s been awhile since my last post so this one might be kinda long. This week is Semana Santa here is Costa Rica which in English is “Holy Week.” Like 98% of the country is catholic and therefore Easter is a big deal. But instead of just celebrating Good Friday and Easter they celebrate it all week and have it’s nothing like the Easter in the States. No Easter bunny or eggs or baskets filled with candy in the morning. Anyhow, so yeah this week everyone has off work and school and go to the beach or family’s houses all week. We got off of classes also so my mom came to visit!
She got here last Friday and we went straight to Tamarindo which is this beach town farther up on the Pacific Coast in Guanacaste. It was really nice. Really hot (which my mom wasn’t too thrilled with) but our hotel was really nice with a clean big pool and we had a little kitcheneete in our room. We spent most of the three days there relaxing by the pool, soaking up the sun, and just talking which was really relaxing and fun. We went to the beach a few times. Unfortuantely I caught some kind of stomach bug… which made it so we couldn’t walk around and whatnot as much…but still a great three days. Oh the bus to tamarindo took 6 hours! It was awful. I can’t even imagine how antsy my mom was after the 7 hour flight and waking up at 2am! And then once we got to the town we couldn’t find our hotel and we walked around lugging our suitcases and backpacks for like 20 minutes until we realized we had walked right by our hotel!
After Tamarindo we went to Arenal/La Fortuna! We got to see a real, live, active volcano! At first we just hung around the hotel, there was another pool, explored the little town of La Fortuna…then I was like “there’s a volcano! Like within 3 miles of here! We have to go see it!” So we went on this expensive, but organized and guided walking hike to the observatory point of the volcano. It was basically the closest you could get without dying from the volcanic gases haha! We saw some cool wildlife and flowers on the 35 min hike up and then we were standing on lava that had hardened from the volcano in 1992. We saw some parrots and toucans and we could hear the rumble of the volcano and watch as lava (turned into rock from the cold air) fell down the side of the volcano! It was really cool to learn all about the volcano and the last eruption it had in 1968 when 87 people died from falling rocks and the gases.
Then mom and I headed to San Jose the next day to make sure we would be all set for her departure on Thursday. We checked into our cute little bed and breakfast and then walked to eat dinner and we came across a casino! I played the slot machines for my first time! They were fun…we lost like $40 together which isn’t bad my mom said haha.
Overall it was a great trip and I wouldn’t have wanted to spend my spring break any other way! Now I’m back in Puntarenas…which is deathly hot. It’s disgusting. It’s crazy that we can only be two hours from san jose but like 40 degrees hotter! I took a 3 hour nap today and woke up at least 3 or 4 times with sweat dripping down my face and my back stuck to my bed…gross. My family definitely told me that April was supposed to be the rainy season.
So anyhow, it’s kinda hitting me that I only have a month let here. It’s crazy how fast time is flying by. I’m not gonna wanna leave. Yeah, I miss the US. The food. My family. My friends. But it’s a different world here. I’m gonna have to wake up and go back to reality and find a job and not travel every weekend and not meet new interesting people every day. I definitely want to come back here though. It’s like a second home to me already. I feel like I belong and I’m not some white gringa stranger walking down the street :)
