All our love from La Fortuna!

New addition to Down the Rabbit Hole--video updates :)

Saturday 19th, 2011 – "Por Los Ninos"

Today was the much buzzed about surf competition at C&C Surf School. We got up and got ready, somehow managing to waste an immense amount of time before actually heading down to the beach. Keep in mind that we are both consistently late, always doing things on our own time, and the last one to walk out the door. The 2 of us together is not exactly a prompt or speedy combination. We tend to base the time of day on temperature, where the sun is, and how well we are tanning. Hmm, don’t think that will work once we get to NYC. But anyway, we scored some beach spots at the surf competition when we found Jessica, Amanda and Kristen. The full moon has had the tide super high all weekend, so the beach was really small all day- which left all of the audience/vendors/surfers packed in pretty tight. Aryan was helping out with the food (the whole event was for a children’s charity so we didn’t feel guilty spending a few bucks on lunch) so we bought a delicious plate of papadillas (“por los ninos” being yelled over the microphone was a nice reminder too). Glen had also made some amazing sangria for sale! After eating, the worlds quickest tide washed us away pretty quickly. So we hung up our towels on a tree by our friends and took a quick stroll into town to pick up a bus schedule. We hung out and watched a few more surfers afterwards, but decided the beach scene today was a little too much for our tired selves.
We decided to head home and rinse off before meeting everyone at Mixology at Gusto around 5.

Jen rinsed and strolled over to Olas for some skyping. On Kelly’s way to meet her, the screaming sounds of “hola gringa! I looove you!” came roaring down the street from the neighborhood kids who are now out tiniest Tico friends. Naturally Kel stopped for a little playtime with the kids and then we had a little sunset beach walk. Mixology turned out to be a no-go, so we decided to stroll through town and see if we ran across some fun (this is how it works in a world without texts or bbm apparently). Luckily, we ran right into Arian and Max and decided to go grab some dinner and drinks. We ended up at La Vella—yummy! From there Arian went home for a shower and the 3 of us went to Iguana to get a few things for our evening (the ingredients for a fruity rum concoction and some much needed cereal and milk). We stopped at Arian’s (he lives with Jessica and Amanda, both of whom were in for the night) and got him back up and out of bed. Hair was gelled, watch was on, he still wanted to go out so we went down to Olas. The four of us camped out at a beach table and played cards for way too long! Everyone hated the fruity rum concoction, except Jenny who thought it was a delicious choice. Olas was getting really busy and the crowd is pretty…hmm, how should we say….”righteous.” Lots of the Ticos there are smoking “righteous cigarettes” if you will and one guy was even selling pipes out of the knit bag hung around his neck. We finished up our game and took a little beach stroll to scope out the Saturday night scene.

Next door to Tabanuco is a bar called Tutti Frutti, which was obviously the most happening beach club about 10 years ago. Now there are just some mellow ticos sitting around the couches that line the big room. But the crazy awesome jams were calling our names so we decided to have our own Tutti Frutti dance session, which left Aryan and Max rolling their eyes in boredom, and on we went. There was a big bonfire on the beach in front of Olas so we gravitated that way. There is a strange man that has been in town for a few days now - we’ve seen him performing with batons on the beach, attempting magic tricks at Ariba (we say attempting because the answer to “is this your card?” always seemed to be “no”) juggling glowing balls at Reggae night, and now ferociously swinging glow balls on strings at the bonfire. He’s French Canadian… the best way to describe him, well… have you ever seen the South Park episode about Canadians? Yeah, that’s this guy. Anyway, Jenny was drawn too his shiny talent and after much persuading, he let her try it. Now, we know what you’re thinking, Jenny’s plan for the quesadilla stand is way to awesome to just throw away! But if you saw her skills with circus creep you would understand why this is also a very serious option. Stay tuned I suppose…

Our friends Max and Arian walked us home, being the brotherly types they are, and we went to bed, deep in thought about all the possible career paths at our feet. The circus is a great way to travel…


Surf Competition at C&C

Some of the audience ....

Jen's new talent... circus show here she comes!

Don't you guys wish our news was like this? hahaha

play date with my favorite amigos :)

Friday, February 18th: Part 2 - It’s a Charmed Life….

umm...now do you get it?

Reggae Night-- Sarah and Emma (TEFL friends)

at Mama Africa! (from left: Aryan, Jessica, Kelly, Amanda, Max, Jenny, Kristen)

Last night we left you with a chilling cliffhanger… you may recall we were headed home in preparation for our first Reggae night. I’m sure the suspense has been killing you, and we apologize if anyone lost sleep from all of the overwhelming anticipation. So we’ll just pick up where we left off…

Upon arriving home we blankly stared at our empty refrigerator containing eggs, cheese, and bread. Naturally Jenny made it work. We ate our sandwiches (egg and cheese, if you couldn’t piece that one together) and hung out with the oldest and most loyal addition to our twosome, Op (you may know her as Oprah). After yet another intense episode, we found ourselves deep in philosophical conversation (don’t laugh, that wasn’t sarcastic, geez). Beginning our day as zen yogis must have stuck with us, because 3 hours later we were still deep in our inner exploration chat. It was one hell of a therapy session, and even more importantly we still weren’t tired. We got ready super quick and set off for town. We met some friends, the TEFL grads, at Mama Africa and finally introduced ourselves to the owner- Andrea. She made us a delicious cocktail and we headed to Reggae night down the beach at Tabunuco.

The last couple times we’ve been at Tabanuco, we have been having such intense dance parties that we haven’t quite taken the time to really observe the scene. So we did a bit of that, in between our dance sessions of course. Our former TEFL class was out on the town finally and we ran into them, which was fun, but re-confirmed how happy we are with our decision to have quit. We have had so many fun experiences here that we couldn’t have had sitting in school. Alright, alright…and there is a strong chance our particular class may have had one too many dudder sandwiches for lunch, also reconfirming our great decision to be beach bums like our bud Keith (refer back to TEFL class rundown featured in “Ultimate Quitters”). Anyway, back to Reggae night… after everyone we know decided to call it a night, we found ourselves taking a dance break on some benches. It ended up being quite the social scene and we made lots of new friends- many of whom were “Rastas”. The people here are all so fantastic, so every time we end up surrounded by a new group it’s a good time. While Jenny talked to the Rasta bartender from Mama Africa (whose dreads were piled into his huge red yellow & green knit cap) Kelly befriended the local DJs, all of whom sported Bob Marley tanks, board shorts and dreads. One of these DJ’s decided Kelly looked like a great candidate for tomorrow nights DJ and told her she could pick the tunes at Tabunuco. At this point Kelly was absolutely convinced she had found her calling: the first female Rastafarian DJ from Louisville Kentucky, well to our knowledge at least. This plan paired very well with Jenny’s previously discovered life goal of opening a delicious quesadilla stand (see parents, we told you we were figuring stuff out!) Our conversations with Ticos are always in some sort of Spanglish, which makes for some entertaining chats. Not sure if we are saying what we mean but we make it work.

After our Tico friend fest we decided it was time to check out a new scene. We walked out of Tabunuco and ran into Glen, the guitar-yielding owner of Arriba from Nebraska, who said he was going down the beach to Bar Olas. This is usually our daytime internet spot that blares all kinds of throwback jams - people we Skype from here can attest to the totally random playlist. On our walk to Olas we bumped into Aryan, one of the former TEFL grads we hang out with – he is quickly becoming one of our Samara favorites. Although he is dark enough to be a Tico, and is mistaken for one often, he is actually from NYC - His dark complexion comes from his Colombian mother. He is a ball of fun with a great sense of humor and a serious love for all things New York, hair gel, and army camo. Naturally Jenny immediately liked him due to her past, and totally underrated, army camo phase (you may recall the neon gym shoes that accompanied this). Aryan was on another level when we ran into him, and a fun looking level at that. Olas was totally dead, which is normal with the exception of Saturdays when it teems with Ticas (Costa Rican girls), just about the only time you see them in a social setting. We stood and chatted with Aryan as he perched on the wooden fence surrounding the bar. Suddenly, in the midst of a subpar Goldmember impression, both of Aryan’s legs flew over his head and he backflipped before thudding into the ground and rolling out of his ungraceful fall….hilarious. Well for Kelly and Jenny at least, not so hilarious for his totally bruised tailbone.

Hysterically laughing at Aryan we worked up a serious appetite and decided it was a totally appropriate night for a post-bar snack. The sketchy carts around town that sell random chicken breasts and chorizo sausages to drunk tourists were closed by this time so we realized it was probably pretty late. In case you haven’t noticed we never know what time it is. Neither of us have a watch and we don’t carry our cell phones here. In Aryan’s words “the time doesn’t matter”…which is slightly ironic as he sports a huge blinging watch at all time but refuses to inform anyone of the time. We walked with Aryan, well actually he stopped and chatted and we decided we were having way to much fun in our own world to wait for him, so we maaayy have left him behind. We walked home totally wired and still high off the glory of this wonderful day. Only one downfall, we had totally convinced our tipsy selves that we were starving and couldn’t sleep without a snack. We had cereal but no milk, bread but no peanut butter, and we were both pretty adamant that we had eaten enough eggs to last a lifetime. Then, the most clutch thing that has ever happened to us occurred. Remember at the beginning of this stupidly long blog post when we ate breakfast at Carola’s and met Carola herself? As we walked past her spot we saw her up for the day and making bread and jam for the market. She noticed that we may have been ever so slightly over served and offered us chocolate filled sweet bread - what a glorious fateful event!! We have never been more convinced that everything happened for a reason. This was our favorite day ever in Samara. We had bonded with old friends and made new friends, explored our inner zen yogis, had an epic cultural breakfast experience, laughed all day, surfed successfully, ran on the beach, dance partied like crazy, laughed more, and eaten the most delicious post-bar snack in existence. We were totally buzzed on positive energy (and maybe a few cocktails) when we collapsed into bed after our 20 hour day.

Friday, February 18th: Part 1 - Yogis & Rastas

Up at 7:30 and ready for a yoga class that Emma was teaching. We walked with her (keeping as safe a distance as possible without being rude…remember the stomach bug?) down a few dirt roads until we ended in a smoke filled dead end. Here was the local yoga studio, a large outdoor porch roofed with palm like most structures in Samara. The massive amounts of smoke (not the “righteous” kind) were coming from a clay structure that a Tico was working on – a natural clay oven. Once we got used to the terrible smell we settled into our mats and prepared to become yogis. Emma was an awesome teacher and our hour and a half of yoga really got us into the zen mode – we have been high on the glory of life all day.

Next we decided it was time to try the most frequently recommended breakfast in town at a German place, Café Carola. We quickly learned why it came so highly recommended as we ate plate after plate paired with the most delicious juice (from a weird fruit we have never heard of) and coffee we can remember drinking. First she brought a whole plate of fruit, pineapple, papaya (ew), apple, watermelon, cantaloupe. Next was fresh made bread by Carola herself paired with jams that we can’t even describe made with starfruit, pineapple, passion fruit, other fruits we don’t know, and some crazy fruit that Carola showed us. On top of each piece of this crazy friut grows a cashew nut! The nut is poisonous until roasted and looks like a large gray misshapen cashew….strangest thing we have seen in a hot second. Next was scrambled eggs, tomato, a plate of cheese, cream cheese, spicy sausage, German ham, and even liver. We tried everything and ate for what seemed like forever. If you ever come to Samara, get the German breakfast from Carola!! During our meal Carola sat down with us and we chatted while she told us about her business and her transition from Germany to Samara - we discovered she is our next-door neighbor in our apartment complex.

After talking to Carola and polishing off our breakfast we headed home to get ready for the beach. Talked to our fams when we got into town with the internet at Olas as usual - and then walked down to our new beach hangout, Ticos Surf School. We were the ultimate beach bunnies for hours and hours as Kel read her book and went for a run and Jenny surfed on her new favorite board, a hot pink Roxy.

It is 7:30pm and we are posting this at the beach and have realized we haven’t eaten since Carola’s…probably a good thing! Tonight is Reggae night, which we presume is a big deal here considering Bob Marley blares from everywhere at all hours of the day and the town is covered in Rasta colors…and genuine Rastas for that matter.

Will fill you guys in on all the Rasta deetz next time we are motivated enough to post :)

Thursday February 17th - Oh what a night

After our early night we had anticipated feeling more energized than a rooster at dawn when we woke up today. Unforeseen by us, the neighborhood dogs, of which there are about 15, decided to have a raging party night waking us up at 3am with all types of barks and growls lasting until about 4:30am. Needless to say we woke up feeling super sluggish. Jenny realized her skin was still red as a strawberry so she spent the morning in the sun. Kelly tried to avoid high tide rather unsuccessfully but soaked up enough rays for the both of us - don’t fret ‘rents , she was slathered in SPF 50. Exhausted after such a grueling day we walked home and both accidentally fell fast asleep…don’t judge, this was out first truly lazy morning! We woke up and decided to compensate for our useless morning by walking all over every inch of town and exploring the few roads we hadn’t seen yet. We are pleased at the feeling of becoming part of this small town and we wave and say our “holas” to every few people that we pass. We jogged down the beach and walked through the rest of town arriving home at dusk. Tonight was ladies night…and the feeling….was right (it’s funny every time). We tried to convince Emma to come out for Ladies night….but her feeling…was not right. No really though, it wasn’t, she thinks she has a stomach virus. This set of the hypochondriac in both of us but the reality is we are just fine and bug-free without a single stomach issue to date (knock on wood). We headed out to Ladies night stopping at our new local spot, Arriba, where we met the TEFL grads and our new friend Max, an Intercultura student from Louisville (represent!) Then we headed next door to Mamma Africa, a little outdoor bar on the main street owned by a blonde 26-year-old from Texas, Andrea. This is quite the reggae and surfer spot and the air reeks appropriately of “righteousness.” Here we ran into Julia, our adorable former TEFL teacher from London getting into the party mode. Next, on to Tabunuco for Ladies Night where the free shots are flying and the locals are spying. We weren’t really feelings the free shots or the spying locals this evening but we did shake our groove things to a couple of great throw backs with Amanda, Jessica, Arian and Kristen. After we were sufficiently drenched in sweat we danced our way back home thinking it was probably about 12:30 am. We got home to find it was actually 2:20 am, uh oh, and then we spotted a gecko that has been taking up our home as residence rent-free for about a week, double uh oh. We haven’t named him yet but we will keep you posted. As he dashed under our bed and into hiding we realized he has lost his tail, which somehow makes him even creepier. Unable to find him we were forced to put creepy gecko out of our minds and call it a night.

Until manana amigos!

Wednesday, February 16th - Beach bums

Today in a nutshell: Woke up (standard so far) and prepped for the beach. Walked there where Jenny surfed for a short while, not so successfully – and as you can tell Kelly wrote the last entry which featured Jenny as an instant pro surfer, a far cry from the reality of getting sucked under wave after wave. We did some reading on our beach loungers. Both went for a lengthy jog from one end of the beach to the other and back, but at alternating times so as not to leave our valuables (2 sundresses, 3 books and a packed lunch of peanut butter sandwiches) unattended on the beach. See parents, we are wiser than you think! After realizing Jenny’s tan was starting to lean a little more to the cherry than the chocolate end of the spectrum we decided to have some indoor time. Siesta (pura vida!) followed by a walk into town to make some plans for NYC. We are surprised at how much we need to use the internet here….but then again without any phones and no ability to plan more than 5 minutes in advance perhaps it is not that surprising. We went home and ate spaghetti with wild mushroom sauce and broccoli prepared by Miss Kelly Puckett….ooonly joking everyone, Jenny made it and Kelly made an excellent kitchen wench as usual. We found some TV in English, relaxed, and had an early night.



Strolling in Samara


Jenny's meal from the night before - photo worthy


No longer microwave chicks

Tuesday, February 15 - Cowabunga!

This morning we realized that we were done trying to stay in bed until 9am. Once we are woken up around 7, it’s really just off and on dozing that ends up leaving us drowsier. Today it was a combination of the dogs barking horses away and our neighbor Edgar, blaring music in his 1 room wooden home (satellite dish included) loud enough to shake our apartment. Have we mentioned Edgar yet? He’s tried selling his Jamaican rice/beans/meat dishes in a butter tub to Kelly twice now. Rumor has it, it’s a delicious surprise. But something about eating meat in a tub from our neighbors not cooled-cooler we just cant quite get past. He’s a cool cat though, not that we’ve ever had a conversation (no English); we’re just basing our liking for him on his choice of tunes this morning. A little Bright Eyes, Rod Stewart, Don Henley, along with a few other girly 80’s tunes…. Olivia Newton John is bound to make a debut at some point. Point is, we vowed not to “sleep in” (oh how our lives have changed) anymore. Stay with us to see how this goes….

After a little breakfast and Friends, we headed to the beach as usual. Jenny skyped on the benches of Bar Olas while Kelly sat on the beach with a great new devotional book (thank you Susan Lowe!), and had some great alone time. This is a pretty lovely place to reflect, pray, meditate, day-dream, whatever you need or desire. Then we decided to head down the beach to Ticos Surf School; these are the same guys we rented our kayak from. Pablo was planning to head out, but he stuck around to give us a personal surf lesson. After learning a few things on the sand (think- Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Paul Rudd “down, up, up, slow down, little faster, no slow it down…”) we went out with our boards and Pablo. As expected, Jenster picked up the sport quickly and easily, while Kelly’s busted (pardon my French) ass way more times than not. Again, as expected, Kelly used the time to make a Tico friend with Pablo and plans for a shrimp boil while Jen practiced her new moves (she loves it—we’ve got a righteous surfer chick on our hands duuuude). Kelly quit with Pablo and snapped a few shots of Jenny’s sweet new moves. We chilled out for a while on some lounge chairs and made friends with the OTHER owner of the surf school- Christian, and his friend Sandro. Sandro scaled a giant palm tree and got us our first coconuts, which he then chopped, open with a machete. Yep, that was lunch today! We actually really enjoyed the coconut water (once we had straws), and Christian says this water flushes your kidneys leaving you with the clearest of pee (we won’t keep you posted on this one).

After a quick stop at Olas for internet, we headed home and then to the Green Iguana for another weeks worth of groceries. Jenny prepared us yet another delicious meal- tomato, avocado, cheese quesadillas (new possible life plan: awesome quesadilla stand at home…could be a money maker).

At 9:00 Christian (who’s also our neighbor) picked us up in his car and we headed to pick up Sandro (a hilarious 20-year-old Nicaraguan) and then to Playa Carillo- the neighboring beach everyone has told us to go too! There we had a bonfire, learned some astrology and Spanish, and heard some death defying surf stories over a 6-pack of Imperial. It was a random and really mellow night on a beautiful beach that was bright as can be from the nearly full moon. We had a great time, and felt like we really made some good tico amigos. After the fire dwindled, Christian dropped off us off at home. Jen proceeded to hijack Emma’s bike (it’s better to ask for forgiveness than permission: jens life motto) to make like a train into town to call Shea and let him know we hadn’t been harassed by our new tico buddies. We went to bed tired gals, but feeling very at home.

Coconuts from Sandro - yum


Cowabunga dude - righteous wave bra

Edgar's house....exhibit A: giant satellite dish

Tico friend Christian at bonfire in Carillo

Monday, February 14th - Hellooo Romeo

Romeo himself - please note his lasso


Luanna our neighbor!

Today we woke up and had some mellow time around the apartment. Actually mellow is a pretty good word to describe our entire day. It was muggy and overcast and the whole town of Samara seemed to be pretty dozy. We wandered into town, found internet, and talked to our families about travel arrangements for a while. Kelly browsed around the local shopping area (2 very small boutiques) while Jenny did some skypeing (no surprise there!) More wandering around until we decided we were starving and we stopped at our new favorite beach spot, La Vella, for the most delicious chicken wraps. Our expectation for hating the food here was totally incorrect and as a result we find ourselves eating like cows far more often than is desirable. Next, more wandering, browsing the handmade jewelry and hammocks that street vendors were selling. We found our way to The Dragonfly, the art museum here….or so it calls itself. The Dragonfly is a hand painted building surrounded by artistic structures made of wood, metal, beads, shells….anything really. After walking through the shell curtain that serves as the door, we found ourselves in the ultimate artsy little shop which sold everything from carved wooden frogs to handcrafted jewelry to large ornaments made of fossils and rocks. The shirtless Tico who owned the art showed us a book of henna tattoos and said we could go upstairs to look through it. Upstairs we presume was where he lived. It was totally full of random paintings and art supplies with every inch of wall space covered in paint and drawing. This was the ultimate artists den, so beautiful in its random strangeness. If we hadn’t fallen all the way down the rabbit hole yet, we certainly just had. Next, more wandering out of town and to our apartment for a much-needed siesta. We ran into Jessica, Sara and her mom, and Emma. Planned with both Jessica and Emma to meet them around 7:30 at Tabunuco for Valentines 2 for 1 cocktails, what a way to celebrate! We arrived back to our neck of the woods greeted by a pack of the neighborhood boys on bikes swinging their homemade lasso’s over their heads and shouting “hoollaa chiccaas, gringasss gringas!” at us. The most charming of the bunch, an adorable little boy sporting a backwards red cap, took this opportunity to wow us with his Ingles. He looked over with a raised eyebrow and said "hellooo." What a little charmer! These kids clearly knew how to have a good time and they came over to show-off their best lasso and dance moves – one hell of a spastic combination. We met a little girl who was watching them play, Luana, who talked to us on-and-on in rapid Spanish about the tiny filthy doll she was holding. She was a total sweetie-pie and someone we could definitely spend some quality porch time with, so we did. Siesta delayed, play time took precedence. Played out after a while we headed in for nap time and then got ready to go out for 2 for 1 cocktails at Tabunuco. We met Jessica, Aryan, Amanda, Tim and the other TEFL graduates there and sipped a v-day mojito. It was surprisingly dead so we headed to Sol y Mar to check out karaoke, which turned out to be 3 Ticos taking turns belting sad slow-moving Spanish songs into the mic. Before walking all the way in we decided that this was not the place for us so we all called it a night and headed home. Upon arriving home we realized Jenny is having super cell phone seperation anxiety and Kelly is experiencing movie separation anxiety. Kelly won when she turned on the TV to find Bridget Jones Diary starting at the very beginning in English. Jenny lost as she wandered around the dirt road outside waving her cell phone in every direction for 45 minutes with no luck, ggrrrr. Time to rest up for surf lessons tomorrow!

P.S. you may be wondering what happened to school at Intercultura – classes were full for this week so school is out and fun is in. We agree that this is probably better for our travel budget in the long run but a definite bummer in the short term, especially when we are trying to understand the neighborhood kids.

pps-- Happy Valentines Day to all our loved ones. Thanks for all your love and support and know you are heavy on our hearts throughout this adventure! <3 onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoHoofhLwMYl25YKGRd6NxHjyg1HOs0JvA1kh8JmRe_n4Zzt2llE4PyBvgQhKWld1LInu3npvnVVHjNuihc-Da-qldkhUJOI-agysbcnYb-EGvDthC30GmcNdTnEsTdskHh8YO8ccI6Tk/s1600/JENS+CR+PICS+112.JPG">
Valentines :)

With the TEFL grads!

Sunday, February 13th - The Bus Stop Gang

at Ariba's with Emma :)

The random bus stop kids...and our 1st bonfire!

Today we woke up ready for a full day at the beach. Emma, who stuck with TEFL has been dying for a day to herself after a week of being in school from morning until night. We packed up our beach bag and had some great philosophical chats while enjoying the sun and doing some swimming. Emma went to skype her family and we enjoyed a nice walk down the beach hunting for shells. We headed home at around 4 to shower and get ready for happy hour with Emma. Jenny made vegetable quesadillas, which turned out to be a delicious dinner. If only we had the skills to make chips and guac like Kala. We went out with laptops in tow to do some skyping after our cocktails. We headed to Arriba, where we met quite an eclectic group of friends. The ringleader was Madison, a 20-year old surfer boy and self-proclaimed “free spirit” sporting a Justin Beiber haircut. We immediately decided he was a perfect match for Jenny’s loco younger sister, Brittany (pics to come Britt). Madison’s group of “friends” were really a bunch of solo travelers he had met at bus stops during his time hopping around Central America. Travis from Oregon (Emma couldn’t stop obsessing over what she referred to as his “midget-like” hands); a tall Italian guy sporting a t-shirt about “wankers”; a Pedro from Napoleon Dynamite look-a-like; and Brian, a cheerful bearded guy who showed up and joined the crew. Madison suggested a bonfire on the beach so we left Arriba and weaved our way to the beach, beers in hand. Once there, Madison took on full eagle scout role directing us to gather wood for the fire. We were not very helpful but luckily Emma was able to gather a few flammable palms in her bike basket. Beach bonfire was a great time with lots of random conversation - but mostly just us and Emma cracking up about our current surroundings and how wonderful this little cocktail excursion had turned out to be. We walked home, Emma wheeling her bike, and were ready for a great sleep….until the power went out taking our fan with it. Holy hotness, far from a great sleep or even a good sleep. Prepare for tomorrow, “holy grogginess, I need a siesta!”

Saturday February 12th - Lost at Sea

After our early to bed evening, we woke up Saturday morning feeling refreshed and back on track (and back to our normal schedule since the roosters had obviously returned home). We started the day off with a hot but happy jog, followed by some working out in our even hotter apartment. Once we had worked up a serious sweat, we rinsed off in our cold shower and Jenny made yet another successful meal—toad in a hole! It was a delicious breakfast (and treat for Kelly who would be eating peanut butter and cereal only if Jenny wasn’t a little Betty Crocker).

We set off for the beach with packed backpacks and one goal – kayaking. It was the next excursion we wanted to try, in addition to being a great workout and way to tan. We made friends with Pablo, who owns one of the beachside services here (surf lessons, kayaking, snorkeling, etc.) and he told us to wait about 30 minutes for the tide to go down a bit. We went for a swim (Jenny bravely braced the waters again despite her crab scratched foot) and then talk to our friend Jessica for a while to kill time. When we went back, Pablo suited us up in our life jackets and gave us a lesson on how to kayak to the island by drawing a picture in the sand with a paddle. Turns out, getting there is not quite a straight shot. We had to first get through the surf (with a little push from them), and then make an “S” shape around a so-called reef which we couldn’t see from shore. Once we got to the island we had to paddle through the channel to the north side so avoid landing on rocks and being, well, screwed. Despite the somewhat chaotic directions, we set off for sea! The way there was exciting, surprisingly exhausting, and overall very intense. We took several breaks to look back at Samara and around us; I wish we could have taken pictures because the views around us were breath-taking. We quickly learned how distorted your perception of space and movement becomes once you get this far into the ocean. We headed for the Island in hopes we had already passed the dreaded reef. The waves between Samara and the island were colliding intensely along this rocky area; we aimed our kayak for the sandy beach which was actually a very rocky/shallow ocean floor and BOOM! We flipped. Kelly went down sideways; making her leg feel like it was on fire but popped back up only to find poor Jenny trapped under our giant green kayak, helping her up so she could chase her paddle before it went out to sea. We were left with some decent battle wounds but nothing as bruised our egos in front of the other 4 kayakers about to set back off to Samara.

We hung out on the island for a while, but were too scared (and smart) to swim in the mighty pacific (told you not to worry Mike Puckett). A European couple kayaked up before we left, in a much more graceful manor, and helped us get off the island with much more ease than we had come in with. We attempted to figure out our route back based on what we could see. Here’s the deal: what you see from the ocean, island or beach, is totally based on where you are! I wish we could describe how distorted your perception is once you’re out in the ocean but it would sound totally nonsensical. What we thought was our best route back turned out to be pretty far off and we were left totally overwhelmed… but we kept paddling and heading back towards town (after much conversation about where the heck we were- there aren’t really any good landmarks in our tiny town), bracing the crashing waves around us. Well, that is until one wave got the best of us. Yep, you guessed it. Flipped again! This time we were close enough to the shore that we decided just to drag our kayak through the last 200 yards or so in the shallow water. By the time we got back we realized it had been nearly 3 hours. He said it would take about 30 minutes to the island, so we’re guessing it may have taken our weak arms a wee bit longer.

We stole a few lounge chairs in front of Gusto and ate our sacked lunch- peanut butter sandwiches and plums. We were SO tired. It was almost 3 o’clock and we had been going since about 7. We’ve realized that some days, we have to remind ourselves in the late afternoon how much we have done in that one day already!

We headed to Olas to get these travel plans under our belt. Kelly decided to change up our searches and found some killer deals. So, after a long and tedious night of details and organizing, we did it! We are excited to give our faithful readers (hey parents) our newest plan:

We will be leaving Samara (most likely on a bus) for San Jose on Wednesday, February 23^rd. Thursday morning, we will be flying on Delta from San Jose to Atlanta, and then from Atlanta to New York City! We’re going to spend a long weekend in NYC, reorganizing our luggage (i.e. minimizing it) and then flying to London on Monday, February 28^th (arriving there the morning of March 1^st). The details after this are…. Well there aren’t any. But we plan to spend time with jenny’s extended family there and then head to Italy and Spain with a Euro pass. But I guess if there is one thing we have learned in the last week (whoa, it’s only been a week?!), is that plans change. And to not fly United. But mostly that plans change. So we’re open to seeing what happens next… or when we run out of money ;)

Stay tuned for pics and videos-- wi-fi not super at the moment ! Love to all.

Friday, February 11th - Crabby Gringas

On Friday morning, something glorious happened…. We woke up… at 11:30! It was a weekend MIRACLE! (or a possible side effect of our first night out here in Samara). We were bummed to have missed the morning sun, but didn’t quite feel like being beach bums anyway. So we decided we would go and explore by taking a walk down the beach. We ended up walking for about 2 hours until the sand became all giant rocks, where the cove wraps around. We didn’t realize how far the walk was but our legs were tired by the end! We forgot to take our cameras- but here are some things we saw: two HUGE fish heads (totally intact), a treasure chest (which we seriously considered bracing some rocks to open—the Goonies inside of us were pretty sure it was full of jewels), a pirate ship out by the island—seriously, it was definitely a pirate ship, flags and all; finally we saw a huge white horse galloping along the deserted area of the shore, which was so whimsical we both agreed we may be dreaming.

After our walk we went for a swim… we figured the ocean was a bit rougher than it had been because there were so many shells! We were standing about waist deep when Jenny suddenly screamed and exclaimed “OW! A CRAB BIT ME!” Let’s just say you have NEVER seen two little “gringas” (that’s what American girls are called here) book it out of the ocean so fast. We made it back up the beach and made sure Jenny’s foot was fine, which it was. However the emotional toll it took was another story…ha! At this point we decided the day was winding down and it was time to do some work. We are anxious to plan our next destination on this adventure and needed to get going on travel research. We headed to bar Olas (free wi-fi at this chill tiki beach bar), and took advantage of as much internet as we could. Stay tuned for updates on our next travels!

We headed to a restaurant on the beach called La Vella, which had been recommended to us over and over again. And with good reason—it was delicious! They have just about everything, but we opted for a fresh Mexican dinner and had quesadillas and burritos. It is without a doubt our new favorite spot!

We went home with intention of a little down time before getting ready for reggae night, the most talked about party night in the town which took place at Taunuco beach bar ….

2 hours later our neighbor Emma woke us up. We all decided there would be more reggae nights and it was way too much a hike for tonight. We crawled into bed, happy to be at a place in our lives where we didn’t care about staying in on a Friday night.

Thursday February 10th - "aaaaahhhh"

Jen gets ready for her first fall!

HIGH UP!

Gearing up with our pal Gerald...

We woke up today super excited for our ziplining adventure! We were scheduled to be picked up by “Wing Nuts” at 10:30am at Sol y Mar, a restaurant the end of our dirt road, where we anxiously waited. Keep in mind this is Central America so we really weren’t sure what kind of vehicle we were looking for or who would be picking us up. Things aren’t exactly super official down here, when you go to a restaurant it is often hard to tell who works there and who is an employee. We waited until about 11am when we realized that this wasn’t just Costa Rica time, where everything runs on its own schedule, and that they probably weren’t coming. Ugh time for the walk into town, (something that we are beginning to dread, especially in mid-morning heat) to go ask the tour agents we scheduled with where the Wing Nuts people were. Upon arriving they called Wing Nuts who had apparently forgotten to write down our reservation yesterday. No hard feelings, that’s just how things are here, they would pick us up at 2pm instead. We killed some time and headed back to the end of our dirt road, and at about 2:15 a Tico pulled up next to us in his little SUV wearing a Wing Nuts shirt. He introduced himself as Freddie and we chatted as he drove us through town and out down some windy roads we have never explored. We ended at a beautiful wooden house in the jungle where Freddie introduced us to our other guide, Gerald. Gerald told us that the 2 o’clock tour that day was scheduled for 10 “very fat people” who apparently often have to be rescued off of the ziplines. They had cancelled at the last moment so it would be just the 2 of us today! We harnessed up and piled back into Freddie’s mini-SUV and drove straight up what must have been a mountain. Then he parked in the trees and we hopped out and were guided into a marked path in the jungle. We climbed up a long wooden bridge (think playground style) until we ended in a platform up a tree. The tour consisted of 9 long zipline cables between 10 platforms up in the trees, taking about 2 and half hours to complete. Before the first cable Kelly held her camera up to take a picture of the view but was called out by Freddie for the fact that her hand was ferociously shaking. It was mutually decided that Jenny would go first. The feeling of flying through the canopy was incredible and the view was indescribable and impossible to capture in photos, not for lack of trying. At one point Jenny attempted to take a video while whizzing along and forgot the concept of breaking at the end of the cable before slamming into Gerald and knocking him backwards (luckily just into the tree and not off the platform). At one point we sat down for a picnic of fresh fruit and oatmeal cookies on one of the larger platforms with a built in bench. As we munched on pineapple and melon we looked out through the jungle canopy for a breathtaking view of the beach. Here we learned that Freddy had built the entire course by using ropes to climb and suspend himself in the jungle canopy! Needless to say we had an amazing day. Freddie and Gerald were awesome and spoke great English so we chatted away all day. Well, mostly they made merciless fun of us as we shrieked and laughed while whizzing through the jungle canopy. Better than tour guides, these were our first Tico friends! We finished the tour, went back to the wooden house where we bought Wing Nuts shirts and paid for our best adventure yet.

After ziplining, the Wing Nuts owner, a woman from British Columbia who had moved to Samara 29 years ago with 3 small children, dropped us off in town. We haven’t quite figured out what it is about Samara that compels so many people to up and move here permanently, but we have meant dozens. We stopped by TEFL so Kelly could drop off her unpaid deposit (buzzkill). Then we headed back to our house to get our laptops so we could do some travel research. We trudged back into town with our laptops in our backpacks, for what seemed like the thousandth time to use our newly discovered free WiFi on the beach at Bar Olas. We have to remind ourselves how good this long walk is for us every time we do it, and needless to say a heavy backpack definitely inresifies the heat. At Olas, travel research turned mostly into Skype time and we left without much progress in planning our next adventure. Time to go home and shower our super sweaty sandy jungle bodies – it is veryyy hard to stay clean here. Tonight was Ladies Night at Tabunuco and after repeatedly breaking into the song “ladies night and the feelings right…oooh whaat a night” (the only part we know) we were ready to head out for a night on the town. On our way out we stopped in to see our TEFL graduate friends (Jessica, Amanda & Aryan) at their house, which is right in the middle of town and a 2-minute walk from the beach. Sitting on actual leather couches and armchairs in their high-ceilinged living room it occurred to us that we live in the poor rural area of town….not sure how we had never noticed before. Amanda and Jessica were working on their dance moves and perfecting their harlem shake (a ghetto dance move with your shoulders) when we walked in (while Aryan watched and rolled his eyes). Kelly, being the harlem shake’s biggest fan and unofficial master, jumped right in with some tips and pointers. We all went to Arriba, the bar we had gone to on our first night here, and sipped on enormous long island iced teas – which came with an equally enormous bill, well for Samara at least. The bartender at Arriba has the hots for Kelly and showed his affection with a complimentary tequila shot – now she was really ready to harlem shake. The 5 of us walked to Tabunuco, which is described by our Costa Rica highlight book to be “the most sophisticated bar and restaurant in Samara.” The dance floor was illuminated with flashing disco-style lighting and was a little less than sophisticated but a whole lot of fun. We danced for hours and hours, and since this bar is outside and right on the beach we were not free from the Costa Rican heat. We were all sweat buckets when we finally called it a night and headed home…well, except Jessica who was having way too much fun and stayed out chatting to a Tico friend of hers. We pit-stopped at Aryan and Amanda’s place before walking back out of town to our house, so physically exhausted after our long day and with our eyes closed before out heads hit our pillows.

Wednesday, February 9th - Mucho Gusto

Jenny and our rooster pals out front had had enough of each other by Wednesday morning. She couldn’t quite go back to sleep after their 6 am wake up calls and decided she may as well start unpacking. Kelly gave in soon enough and felt motivated to do the same. Jenny decided to take another jog to the Iguana (this time with money) to buy us some milk for our cereal. Turns out, the regular Special K here is not so much special as it is saugy. Oh well! Still a nice change of pace to eat at home.

We spent a really pleasant and beautiful morning on the beach, soaking up all the rays we could. At noon, we had our second (and hopefully final) meeting with Barbara at TEFL and all went smoothly! We weren’t out too much money, and left feeling relieved to have it over and be on good terms with everyone! After which we grabbed smoothies next door (Note: Papaya is not our favorite flavor, Mango is always a winner though) and waited for our friends to get out for their lunch break. We headed back to the beach with Sarah and Emma while they lunched and got a quick swim in. Our buddy Tim stopped by and told us all about the canopy tour he had just taken with his little brothers from his host family. We knew it was activity time for us! Plus, Jenny’s friend Caroline said zip-lining was one the coolest things she did in Costa Rica.
We headed straight to a travel agency downtown and booked out canopy tour for the next morning at 10:30! After which we walked across town to La Verde Iguana to finally get our grocery run over and done with! We noticed that Ticos must shop as needed because we were the only people with a cart full, clogging up the line (Kroger days are long behind us). We carried home all our bags like champs, finding our way home on some back roads. Jenny immediately made pasta salad and hardboiled some eggs (Kelly would’ve helped but we all know it would have just been more of a hindrance having her in the kitchen:)… Kelly swept and cleaned a bit. This apartment is finally starting to feel like a home! Funny story real quick- Jenny accidently shattered a brand new bottle of Lancome foundation off the top shelf of the open shelves that hold all our shirts and shorts. Needless to say, there was glass everywhere and most of Kelly’s shirts/shorts have tan paint spots all over them. Which is ironic since we haven’t even worn makeup here but just thought we’d give it a chance! Ha! Stay tuned for adventured to the laundry mat ☺

We both got showered up and headed across town to a place we were anxious to try. “Gusto” sits right on the beach and it has an L.A. or Miami vibe unlike anywhere here. Still on the sand, there are tables and big white benches under palm canopies surrounded by twinkle lights. Our goal was to get some drinks and use their wifi so we could skype in a comfortable and beautiful place, rather than the internet café AGAIN. Kelly’s internet worked just fine but forgot to charge her battery and Jenny’s janky mac couldn’t quite pick up the signal for more than a few minutes at a time AFTER Kelly’s computer was off. So we gave up and just enjoyed our delicious cocktails and atmosphere. Tim showed up again, and hung out with us as we split a really yummy plate of chicken skewers and veggies. Jen went down the beach a few spots to try and pick up some wifi to spend a little skype time with her boyfriend, but it was fairly unsuccessful (we’ll figure these things out in time). From there we walked home, really tired once again (we’re still adjusting to living a pedestrian life in a 95 degree climate). Excited for a full nights sleep before our first adventure into the jungle!



The kids in our front yard playing after school :)

Gusto Beach Bar...wifi not great...food and cocktails-delicious! cool vibe.

cocktails at Gusto :)

Tuesday February 8th - Vacation Time

We woke up…well, rather the rooster woke us up….and we realized “Shit! We have been here for 3 days and not written a single blog entry. Being 2 of the world’s best procrastinators we decided this was something we could not put off any longer so we got to work and wrote this delightful blog that you have been reading up through February 7th. The we headed to a meeting with Barbara Miller, the TEFL director, to get our skrilla back (for those who don’t know her very well, skrilla is what Kelly Puckett says instead of money). Barbara’s TEFL investors were not too thrilled about giving us back our skrilla so we left without any and with a rescheduled meeting for the following day to see where we stood. Then we headed to the beach and ate delicious club sandwiches and fries at a sandy-floored café. Here we had our second realization for the day: we were eating more than the constantly grazing cow-goats that inhibit our backyard. We decided that it was time to explore grocery options to save our money and our beach bods, which were looking less than beachy. After a long afternoon of magazine reading on the beach we headed to one of the groceries here, “Pali!”, which was a lot like Wal-mart except everything was totally disorganized and random and was being displayed and sold out of the cardboard boxes it had been shipped in. We later found out that Pali! actually was owned by Wal-Mart and was the Central American version. We stocked up on a few necessities and headed to our next destination, “Super Delfin” grocery store, which is up the same dirt road that we live on. Here we bought some crucial Lysol disinfecting wipes and we headed home trying to carry our random edible and household purchases in baskets on our heads like African women. After getting home we felt kind of ambitious and decided to go for a run to check out the third, and most popular grocery store “La Verde Iguana.” This run was a very hot choice and we arrived realizing we hadn’t brought any cash with us. We snooped around a little and then ran back to our apartment, sweatier than ever. Cold showers then off to the internet café to do a little skypeing and post our blog and pics. Then we decided to walk back to the other side of the town to stock up on groceries at “La Verde Iguana” which the Tico store clerk said closed at “diaz.” Arriving at 9:20pm we found it closed. P.S. we are doing a looottt of walking here because as much as it’s a small town things aren’t exactly close together and we aren’t very organized in our route planning, clearly. So we headed back to the other side of town once again to find some late-night dinner as the random items we had purchased earlier were not enough to make a meal of. We ran into Jessica, a TEFL graduate from the US, who gave us a useful hint, if we wanted to tan we needed to hit the beach at 8am. We were exhausted after our grocery exploration day and we went to sleep thankful for our early morning rooster wake up call so we could catch some prime tanning rays the next day...


The front of our apartment -- we live in the bottom left side


Our best grocery- The Green Iguana :)

Monday, February 7th – Ultimate Quitters

The first day of school is always a strange one, whether you are 5 or 22. We were nervous with no idea what to expect, except for the intensity that the TEFL graduates we met last night had ranted about. We kept an open mind while we walked to the TEFL school that day, stopping at a recommended bakery for pastries for breakfast and lunch. We only get an hour break in our 9-hour class day and we were determined to book it to the beach with lunch already in our backpacks.
We arrived at the TEFL classroom, which was on the second floor of “La Mini Plaza” next to a dentist’s office and a café. Here we met all of the TEFL students (9 total, including ourselves)……..

Racheal and Chris – young newlyweds from Canada who left their jobs (Chris was a stockbroker and Racheal was a piano teacher), bought a dog and moved here indefinitely after enjoying a vacation here last year. They want to get their TEFL certificates and teach in Samara. Their last vacation was in Thailand where they attended a “half moon party” (a rave where everyone is painted in glow paint and they dance the night away in a crescent shaped field) and rode elephants.

Georgie – a 50 something married woman and teacher from Michigan. We met her husband Keith the night before while watching the Superbowl. He has come to Costa Rica to be a beach bum while she takes TEFL, something she has wanted to do for 12 years. They lived in Kenya together for a decade where he got involved with disaster relief and eventually got a job with the US government heading up international disaster relief programs.

Gennevive – A French Canadian who exclaimed during our first icebreaker that she likes German boys. Her mother has worked in Samara since Genny was 16 so she has been in and out of Costa Rica since then. After falling in love with an Italian she moved to Italy for a while and then found herself in New York. She speaks French, Spanish, English and Italian. She wants to be able to teach English to master it herself and have it on her resume for some job that we can’t remember. Her last vacation was a 72-hour non-stop dance cruise out of Miami.

Diana and Sara – the South African mother and daughter we befriended in the cab. They came to Samara from Tiajuana, Mexico. Sara has so many traveling stories and wants to get her certification to continue to see the world but is a little torn about her journey as she has left her English boyfriend behind in Cape Town. Her major was International Relations and she will get her masters after tending to her travel bug. Diana speaks many languages and wants to take the course and then go back to Tiajuana and then return to Cape Town.

Emma – our red-headed, yoga-loving, ceramicist, adventurous neighbor who came to Costa Rica by herself from Ashville to get used to traveling. She wants to get certified and spend 2 years traveling and teaching in Central America before getting her masters in Psychology. Originally from the Boston area she may return home to teach art for a few months to make some cash to fund her next adventure.

Us – 2 recent University of Tennessee graduates with a yearning for adventure and a lengthy list of destinations that we would like to explore. We have no desire to be teachers but thought that TEFL would give us some structure in our traveling and be a way to easily get jobs in Europe, New Zealand, South Africa, Thailand etc. as we hopped from place to place for a while.
We were in the class for all of 4 hours before leaving for our lunch break, ridden with doubts about our choice to spend 9 hours a day learning to be teachers followed by hours of homework and lesson planning for the classes we would begin teaching the following day. We had learned that most teaching contracts were a year and the Costa Rica TEFL school primarily had connections with schools in South Korea and Central America. The program was amazing and interesting and the teachers (Dana from the US & Julia from the UK) were so passionate about what they did. We had befriended our classmates and engaged in the material all morning but we had some serious doubts about if this wonderful program fit with our big picture goals…..

Our main goal was to travel, not become certified English teachers. We both want to get jobs in our fields upon returning to the US, not be English teachers. We wanted to spend our time in Costa Rica learning to communicate in Spanish, not learning to be English teachers. We were willing to spend some of our savings to embark on our adventure of going place to place until we felt ready to go home, not be obligated to stay in 1 place for 6 months or a year to be English teachers……so we asked ourselves a very obvious question: why were we spending a month and a decent sum of money to get certified to be English teachers?

We were sitting on the beach during this bit of soul-searching and we noticed the beautiful Intercultura School right behind us. The grassy campus of Intercultura was full of hammocks with a coffee bar and students from all around the world and at all different levels intently attempting to converse in Spanish. We walked inside to inquire and found that TEFL had brought us to Samara for a reason, and that reason was Intercultura. Here we would pay weekly to learn Spanish in intense 4-hour a day immersion programs. We would be able to spend our time studying lying directly on the beach using the wireless internet (a rare commodity here) and engaging with students from all over the world. A weekly examination (on Monday mornings) places you in your Spanish level for the next week. You must pass the next evaluation to move up a level for the next week, or your repeat your level. Classes alternate morning and afternoon. With our payment for Spanish classes we got access to the campus on the beach anytime, yoga classes, Latin dance classes, cooking classes, field trips, aerobics classes, eco-hikes, and invitatons to the weekly celebrations for Intercultura graduates. We also get a kitchen and lounge at school, language labs, student advisors, a cultural orientation, and tour planning resources. This was the place for us!
Without a shred of doubt left we returned to TEFL from our lunch break and told the director our concerns, and about our visit to Intercultura. She was supportive and gave us our TEFL enrollment money back! The ease of this decision and the support of the TEFL staff made it seem as if it were meant to be.

We left TEFL classes early, used the internet to skype people for a while, and then went to a very long dinner and walk on the beach. We met Emma back at our apartment and she told us about her day and lesson planning for class tomorrow. She 100% agreed that Intercultura is a better fit for us.

Sooo now we have a whole week in Costa Rica until we can take our Intercultura entry test next Monday! We hope to zip-line, ride horses, rent bikes (more to come on this one), take a surf lesson and settle in to our new home!


We live here! :)


Excited for our adventures....


Trying our first Costa Rican beers- Imperial

Sunday, February 6th — Uh, where are we? It's Superbowl Sunday??!

Even though we were fairly wound up, we had decided to go to bed as soon as we arrived on Saturday. Both of us knew that we were exhausted and nothing looks good at night. Under normal circumstances, we probably could have slept for days, but not here! To our morning delight, apparently, we live on a huge farm (and behind a mechanic shop that looks a wee bit more like a junkyard). Needless to say, alarm clocks won’t be necessary here, since we have a large group of roosters happy to wake us up at the crack of dawn right on our front porch. We live on the first floor, and we have to keep our windows open to ventilate our non-air conditioned apartment, so if the animals are feeling rowdy, we are too. Right off of our back porch, there are tons of what we like to call “Cow Goats”. Apparently they are cows, but they have long saggy ears and small horns… now we’re no farm experts but that is not like any cow we have ever seen (which probably doesn’t say much).

We wanted to get out and explore our surroundings, so we put on our swimsuits and dresses and set off to see Samara! First finding: holy heat wave. By the time we reached the end our driveway, we were hot messes (literally). First note to selves: figure out the water situation. We continued down the dirt roads we lived off of, mostly lined in small “Tico” (that’s what costa Ricans call themselves) houses. Second finding: horses are the new squirrels. Instead of little squirrels or rabbits hopping in front of cars, drivers (and pedestrians) have to move for horses that roam all over; seems to take “break for animals” to a new and unusual level. But they are beautiful! We found a tiny little grocery/convenience mart and café on the way which will be great to have nearby! Then we saw it…. As we winded around towards the end of the dirt road we looked up and saw the ocean. Between us is a huge field of horses and cow-goats, so we have to turn and take the main road (where it becomes paved) towards town to cut across to the beach. Well, let me back up… upon the end of the dirt road we weren’t quite sure how to get the beach, or anywhere. A group of girls on their bikes were riding behind us so we asked them and they told us the quickest way. The girl we spoke with, Natalie from Oregon had also been a TEFL student once and now lives here teaching Spanish at the Intercultura school. It was the first person we met who spoke English! As we crossed the bridge and traveled down the road, we came quickly on to town.

Goal 1: look for the internet. Walking around town we were surprised to see a surplus of little white girls, which may sound silly but was a bit reassuring in those first moments. We asked two girls where to find internet and after asking if they were TEFL students, they said “No! But she is!” and pointed over to an adorable petite red head writing down the daily yoga schedule. Our second friendJ. Emma is from the Boston area and lives in the apartment above us! She is tiny but brave as can be. She traveled here alone, and has already been in CR for 3 weeks working on a farm in the mountains near San Jose (where she slept, ate, and worked outside thus considering our new housing a luxury-haha). The 3 of us then made a pit-stop at the internet café so we could Skype/email our families who have no other means of contacting us. After which, Emma went home to get changed and we had lunch across the street. Now, I’ve been told the beef here was incredible (grass fed cows or something) but not being a big meant eater I wasn’t really that interested. I was wrong. We had the best cheeseburgers EVER. We can’t really describe it but they were different and so delicious. All of the restaurants are open air and we watched all the people walk up and down the main road to and from the beach. Two men played a giant xylophone during our lunch, as we tried our first Costa Rican beers- “Imperial”. Delicious! Luckily just about everyone here accepts American dollars, but we receive colones as our change. So we’ve been working with two currencies… 1000 colones= about $2, so the math isn’t hard. From there we eagerly headed to the beach. It really is spectacular, exactly like the pictures we saw online. Samara beach is kind of a cove, lined by palm trees and mountains. We were happy girls for the rest of the day! Although we didn’t tan at all after lathering ourselves in spf 50 and 70 (you’re welcome moms). The town is really small and cute. As you get close to the beach there are tons of little jewelry vendors and tent shops with towels and dresses and other beach necessities. Intercultura school, bars and restaurants line the beach, as well as an American family who rents out lockers, chairs, etc. There are also activities like horse-back riding, surf school, jet-skiing and kayaking right there! Sunday Funday was a great first impression of our new home! It is definitely a beach town, everyone is very laidback. There are Bob Marley flags flying everywhere, a push for going green, the pace is slow, and a general sense of happiness in the air. It is a small town, and we’re told everyone knows everyone, we feel safe and happy!

Later Sunday we took a small cat nap and cold shower (eventually we’ll stop saying cold, but for now we just wanted to remind you a few more times) and then headed back into town with Emma for dinner. There was one place upstairs next to the internet café that seemed to be the liveliest spot on a Sunday evening (it always seems later than it is because it gets dark right at 6oclock). We strolled into “Arriba” to realize the SUPERBOWL was on! HOORAY HOORAY! We felt so connected to all of you at home. We made lots of friends, and heard lots of stories. There are a lot of vacationers here, as well as students of TEFL, intercultural and a massage school. The bar served pizza or Thai, we opted for a pizza as we tried out the local tequila (again moms-only one, we know we know). Later on the bartender introduced us to a group of 4 kids our age that just finished the last TEFL class. They weren’t ready to leave Samara and told us TEFL is an amazing experience, three of the four are going to teach in South Korea and one was staying in CR. Their names are Aryan, Jessica, Amanda and Tim. They walked home with us and Aryan, a guy from Long Island, had lived in the same apartments during his time as a TEFL student, which was reassuring. There are random dogs EVERYWHERE and they get extra yappy when we walk home after dark, but our new friend reassured us they are harmless…well, for the most part. Ha!

We all said goodnight, and the two of us crawled back into bed ready for our first day of school! We laughed, knowing there was no need to set an alarm…

Hydrate hydrate hydrate!


Reading up on the can and can't do's during lunch :)


Musica!


The road to our apartment...


Our backyard !!

Saturday, February 5th - Getting out of the U.S.

The Liberia Airport

Part 1: Getting out of the U.S.
After arriving at the airport on no sleep at 4:30am we couldn’t have been more ready for a long nap on a plane. We said goodbye to our parents and went through security, where Jenny got the full nudie TSA body scan. Our flight was delayed when United Airlines decided that the weather was too dangerous for us to fly to Chi town for our connection to Costa Rica, which was a little confusing due to the totally clear sky. We had to get on another flight or we would miss our connection to Costa Rica. After much negotiation a saucy United Airline rep put us on a flight with American Eagle (the airline, not the mass carriers of cargo shorts and mini tees) that would connect in Miami . The saucy United rep told us she would get our luggage off the plane to Chicago and send it to baggage claim. The elevator down to the baggage claim floor was like entering an empty set on the Truman Show, totally deserted with an overwhelming amount of product placement. Luckily Kel found a wheelchair and I whipped out some nail polish so we were entertained down there in our private airport section for who knows how long. After emerging from our own worlds we realized our baggage was no where to be found and the baggage claim conveyer belt wasn’t even on. After an hour or so, and much discussion with the saucy United rep (who was more interested on chatting on her bejewled cell phone), our bags arrived. Success!!
Now for the next step, getting on our American Eagle flight to Miami….which unfortunately did not exist. A permed American Eagle rep typed vigorously into her computer for a few minutes before looking at us and saying “You’re young so we are going to try something.” Now things were really getting interesting and we found ourselves sprinting through the Cincinnati airport alongside the permed American Eagle rep with all of our baggage and a backpack each (and this is us we are talking about so all of our baggage is A LOT). We ran from terminal 1 to terminal 3, a true Lance Armstrong moment for Kelly who was carrying an enormous carry-on in addition to her 2 suitcases, and was bundled up in 4 layers of sweaters. Looking like we had just finished a full marathon we collapsed onto the Delta counter where the lady told us we had missed the check-in time by 1 minute – we had reached our breaking point.
Yayyy for our permed American Eagle friend who handled all the arrangements with Delta while we took a nap with our eyes open. We were finally booked on a real flight with Delta, our third airline of the day. We were going to fly to Atlanta at 12:50 and then to Liberia airport in Costa Rica. By 12:50 we were zombies to say the least and we had done everything we could think of at the Cincinnati airport to amuse ourselves. Our TEFL program had arranged airport pick-up in Costa Rica at 1:25pm, the time we were initially scheduled to arrive. Now we weren’t going to get there until 8:30pm and we didn’t have a single address for the school, our housing assignment, or any building in Costa Rica. We had been calling, emailing and skyping TEFL since the morning but hadn’t been able to contact anyone since it was a Saturday and they weren’t at the school. Finally we found our landlord’s phone number so we called him to ask his address. He spoke zero English which was our first reality check about the language barrier. The young girl, Shay (funny coincidence), sitting next to us to us leaned over and said she was Puerto Rican so she spoke to our landlord on our behalf. She attempted to get his address but apparently they don’t have typical addresses in Costa Rica. Our address at Jamie’s is: 100 metros al norte del Minisuper Delfin, mano deracha. Despues del taller, apartmentos amarillos.
We connected in Atlanta and ate lots of appetizers at Chile’s, browsed a bookstore, and called people while we still had functioning cell phones. Finally! Take-off at 5:30pm!! A mere 13 hours of being in airports and both carrying a stack of various boarding passes for flights we didn’t take. We couldn’t have been more relieved to finally be on our way.

Part 2: Are we there yet?
We landed in Costa Rica, where it was already pitch black but still about 85 degrees. We walked down the steps off of our plane and along the runway until we entered a big concrete room that was open to the outside….the airport! We stood in a short line to go through immigration, where a Tico took our immigration form and glanced at our passports. Then we moved on to baggage claim, a few steps away, where one conveyer belt squeaked loudly around and disappeared back into the wall. We got our bags and walked a few more paces to customs, where a man grabbed the other form we had filled out and waved us through and out of the airport without even looking at it – quickest international arrival ever!
We walked out to the mass of taxi drivers holding various signs, still fearing we would have no one to pick us up and no idea how to get where we were going. Amazingly, one of our frantic emails must have been received because a smiling Tico man, named Hillberto, stood holding a sign with Kelly’s name on it. He took our bags to his cab and loaded them in, all the while trying to explain something to us in rapid Spanish. He was met with blank stares from us and finally brought Jenny over to a Canadian uber-hippie (think the slow-talking surfer turtles from Finding Nemo, except dirtier) who would serve as a translator. He explained that Hillberto had 2 more girls to pick up and then told Jenny about how he had moved from Canada to Samara and was a cab driver there. He explained that everything in Costa Rica is a little bit chaotic but no one ever stresses – at all. Something we have found to be very true. The 2 girls we were waiting on were TEFL students as well, a mother and daughter from Cape Town, South Africa – Diana and Sara. Hillberto strapped their luggage to the roof, which made us very thankful that we had arrived first and our bags were safely in the trunk. Then we all squeezed in with our backpacks and purses on our laps and got ready for the 2-hour drive to Samara. Smiley Hillberto turned out to be a total maniac on the road driving up to 90 miles an hour in his tiny red cab, constantly on the wrong side of the road, and within inches of other cars, scooters, pedestrians and animals – all the while with his hand on his little horn yelling that everyone was “loco”. Diana, the South African mother sat in the front seat holding her breath most of the time and screaming out a few times about Hillberto’s insane driving. We were in the back with Sara, the daughter chatting away about all of the amazing experiences Sara has had in other countries. We had our noses pressed against the window to get a glimpse of the amazing stars, which looked like illuminated dust scattering the sky. Sadly our drive was in the dark so we really couldn’t see much of the landscape. Sara made out the outline of a mountain, we saw lots of Ticos walking in groups down the road. We noticed that Tico fences are tiny trees planted in rows which they cut the tops off of and link with wire. After 2 hours we arrived in Samara (the drive with anyone but Hillberto would have taken at least 3) and dropped off Sara and Diana at their apartment. We looked out the window at the small, seemingly run-down town that we had left home to come to. Despite our exhaustion we felt excited to start exploring our temporary home tomorrow. We turned off the paved road and drove about a mile up a dirt road to our apartment. Our apartment is a little difficult to explain and a story in itself so we will write an entry about it later and post pictures…..for now think camp but with a Costa Rican flair. We turned on as many fans as we could and snuggled up under our stolen Delta Airline blankets before falling fast asleep.