We had a great time in CR, despite a few mishaps such as, Nick finding out he was allergic to Jellyfish, venturing to the hospital to see if I needed stictches in my lip after a surfing accident, finding out our waterproof camera didn't work in the surf and quickly died, running of money and then getting delayed on the way home in San Jose airport for way too long with a stayover in Houston....in addition...here's what we got up to!

PURA VIDA...

can be seen or heard almost anywhere while in Costa Rica, meaning 'Pure Life' in Spanish, it's used as a greeting and a goodbye and basically as words to live by. And with the beautiful scenery that surrounds this country it's obvious why they have adopted this versatile phrase.

I've wanted to do a surf and Spanish camp for while now, to get better at surfing and practice all that Spanish that has been bottled up in my head for years now. Whenever I have gone surfing before, it was for a one day here or there, renting a board in Australia at the beach a couple times or borrowing Nick's super short board and deciding that I sucked at it. It's always been something I could see myself doing, but then again it's much harder than it looks. This was my chance and thankfully Nick agreed to both parts the Spanish and the surfing for a week to learn and finally get the hang of it.

We stayed the week at the Escuela del Mundo, 'School of the World' which was pretty much like a hostel, although a pretty cool house. We stayed at the school with probably 15 other students who were busy studying Spanish and learning any one of the following: yoga, surfing or photography. Many of the others were there for weeks or planned on staying much longer than our very short 6 days. Looking back a week wasn't long enough, just enough to want to do something similar, somewhere else, for a longer period of time in the future.



Our first day there, we drove straight from San Jose to Jaco Beach, thankfully avoiding any time spent in San Jose, from what we heard it can be a bit of a dangerous place. And after being mugged once this year already, I didn't fancy staying in the city for the night, seeing some of the sites just to possible have something similar happen. Yes I'm a bit jaded now and not as trusting of places or just more vigilant, but regardless it was nice to just get to the beach.

We stayed the first night at a small hotel just around the corner from the School of World as we couldn't check in yet. Jaco beach is definitely a tourist trap with some touristy restaurants that charge way too much compared to what the locals would ever pay...and yes we got stuck in one the first night. Sad thing was, it wasn't even very good, just expensive. We would soon learn that Costa Rica while being in Central America is quite expensive. Add on the tours you want to enjoy and a splurge at the Marriott at the end it makes for a costly trip....fun, a lot of fun, but costly.