Our trip to Costa Rica was quite the adventure. Tom looked up the weather forecast the day before we were scheduled to leave. He called me at work to inform me of a huge storm front that was moving toward Central America that was going to linger for about a week. I poo pooed him & told him that "they" never predicted the weather correctly. We arrived on a gorgeous and balmy day to join some friends who had already been there for a week. I was not even bothered that it poured the entire next day & night. It was a good excuse to sleep in and lay on a hammock & read. We started a gin rummy tournament on the porch. I was a bit over it by day three. Oh the sun did make some appearances, mostly during the early morning hours, so one had to jump out of bed to take advantage of them. There were even some breaks of light during the afternoon & we quickly scooted over to the beach, set up a blanket only to feel the sprinkles start soon after.

Luckily the house we were staying at was right on the beach. The grounds were stunning. We had lots of lizards & geckos on the grounds, as well as a large Iguana that we named grandpa who lived in an old tree stump. We could view him right from the porch. We soon found out that grandpa liked to eat cantaloupe, bacon, toast and whole raw eggs. While the grounds were breathtaking, the house itself was basically a surfer shack. We made the most of it & cooked up some great meals, but the place really got on my nerves after a while. Old moldy beds, no AC, limited furniture and cooking utensils and my least favorite thing about the place - the bathroom. It constantly smelled of sewage. So, even though it was raining we left the shack to go on adventures. We saw some beautiful country sides & beached. Crossed a few rivers & bought fish from local fishermen.

We rented ATV's & toured all around the Santa Teresa & Mal Pais area. These surf communities are just starting to gain popularity. There are some adorable cafes, restaurants and shops along the main (and unpaved) roads. Most are owned by Canadians & Europeans that came for a vacation & decided to stay. And there were a couple of high end resorts that we visited for mohitos & Cuban cigars. So, I mentioned the unpaved roads. After days & nights of torrential rains they turned into big, muddy swamps. It was impossible to keep dry or clean. Let's just say by day 5 I had had enough. And so did my friend Jeanette. We insisted the boys moved the only dining table, which was outside, indoors. We could not take the dampness for one more second. I fantasized about being dry and warm.

On our last night with my friend & her man we decided to go out for a nice dinner. We were going to dress up & keep dry at all costs. I made a skirt out of a garbage bag, placed my rain coat over it & even rode the ATV while holding an umbrella in my hand. We had a lovely dinner at this place and then moved here for after dinner drinks & stogies. We headed home feeling a sense of victory and were less than 3 minutes from our beach shack when we noticed our friend's ATV stuck up ahead. It looked as if it were tipping over. Tom stopped & tried to push the vehicle out of the mud by himself. It did not budge. He called to Jeanette & I to help. We looked at each other in totally disbelief. Tom was standing knee deep in mud, which means it would reach close to my thigh. "But, we're all dressed up!?" I cried. He did not show even the slightest bit of sensitivity to this. In the mud pool we went. Three of us pushing on this thing while Jason (Jeanette's man) stepped on the gas & tried to manuver the vehicle free. Every time he pressed on the gas, the wheels turned in place spitting up loads of mud right in our faces. Not that it really mattered since we were already in it thigh deep & it was pouring rain, & I fell face first in it several times. We freed him about 20 minutes later. I had mud in every crevasse of my body. I was not a happy camper. I think I was crying a bit. We ended our night by finishing our gin rummy tournament (I won) & drinking lots of rum & pineapple juice. The next day the sun was shining, our friends headed back to NY. They're puddle jumper flight was delayed, so they hung out with fellow passenger Vince Vaughn for a few hours. We headed off to a different part of Costa Rica for what was suppose to be the dry, adventure free part of our vacation. NOT.....TO BE CONTINUED....

Posted by Dawn Falcone @ 9:35 AM 2 comments