Puerto Viejo Weekend

The following weekend after visiting the volcano, I went to Puerto Viejo with Courtney (remember her?) and two of her friends from here home stay. We left San Jose at 6am Saturday morning, and arrived around 11. The drive was absolutely beautiful, but long! When we got there we couldn't check into our hostel yet, so we had lunch at a little sandwich shop downtown. When we finally got to our hostel, it was nothing but interesting, to say the least! We stayed at Rockin J's that only offers hammocks, and tents! So of course, for $7 dollars, we slept in hammocks that night! After checking in, we changed into our swimsuits, locked up our bags, and headed to the beach! We went to a close beach, but it was filled with coral, so we decided to rent bikes and head to Punta Uva, which was suggested by the bike guy. It was soooo far, about 7 km, but when we made it, it was worth it! The beach was not crowded at all because it was the day Costa Rica played in the quarter finals, so everyone was watching the game. On the way back, we ended up stopping at a bar to watch the end of the game. It was a bittersweet moment when Costa Rica lost. The entire bar was sooo happy at first, then once they lost the entire bar got quiet and nobody really said anything, then all of a sudden a lady stood up and started cheering and thanking the team for making it as far as they did and the whole place joined her. After eating lunch we finally made it back to the hotel and just hung out there and played games and talked. Later that night they had a fire show which was really cool! The next day Courtney and her friends went back home on the 11am bus, and I wasn't ready to leave so I stayed until 4pm. I ended up renting another bike to venture out to the Jaguar Sanctuary, only to find out that it was closed on Sunday :(  I ended up going to the beach that was near the hostel and just sat and watched crabs run around in and out of their little homes.

Volcano Irazu

A few weekends ago (6/28) I went to Cartago with my friend Charlie. Many of you know Pilar (or remember me talking about her on here) well Charlie is her nephew who lives here in San Jose. He took me to the movies here one night, and we decided that the next day we would travel to Cartago to see the Volcano Irazu, and also to a famous church to see "la negrita" which you can read about here. It was a pretty quick trip, and it was a lot of fun. Instead of writing about it here, I will attach pictures and describe them as I go :)

 This is the crater of the volcano. It used to be filled in this weird green lagoon type stuff, but not anymore. 

 The crater stats: Depth: 300meters Diameter 1,050meters

Another picture of the crater. It was really cool. 

Random green plant life everywhere around the crater, it was the strangest thing! 

Coatimundis that we came across. Charlie was feeding them crackers. 

They were so cute! 

The volcano from a higher viewing point.

It was so large!

Took this for my Nana. She loves L.L. Bean

This was the viewing tower we went up in to see the view!

 Basílica de Nuestra Señora de los Ángeles. On August 2nd, people from all over the country walk to this church to give thanks to the virgin. I can't wait to see it!

 It was really pretty, my grandma would love it. We were able to go inside, but they were having mass so I didn't take any pictures. 

Under the church where "la negrita" is, they have all these glass cases with different things in them. This case was arms and baby charms. People put them here for healing from the virgin when something is wrong with a certain part of their body, etc. 

The Story

The famous statue.

It was pretty small, but neat! 

Here is another case that people bring things to put in. 

These two held trophies and things, giving thanks to the virgin for watching/helping them through events in their lives. 

This one was filled with animals, I'm assuming sick, or animals that have passed away. In total, there were probably 15 of these cases with so many things in them, it was neat to see how a certain religion and population respond to things. 

First Vacation Weekend!

After Costa Rica's first big win, everyone had time to settle down and the week was pretty normal...and then came Friday, June 20th CR's second game of the World Cup! Talk about CRAZY! English classes were cancelled, but the students still had to go to school and watch the game in order to get credit for the day! Even though Friday's are my days off, I still went up to school to watch the game with them, I figured it would be fun, and I was definitely correct...I had a BLAST!! The students were so into the game and everyone was decked out in red, white and blue, CR's colors too. The game was so intense, and of course, Costa Rica WON!!!! The school and the town went crazy! I had about 3 hours to get back to Maximo Nivel for Spanish class which is on the other side of town from INA. Everyone was worried that I wouldn't make it on time and they were telling me to just stay to celebrate and not go. Of course I didn't want to miss class, since after all I am paying for it, so I decided to go. There was a group of my students who wanted to go to the Mall San Pedro which is very near Maximo Nivel, so I went with them to make sure I was safe! The people were going crazy, the town was basically shut down and everyone was out in the streets cheering. The buses were running, very slowly, but still running, and the people inside the buses were going crazy! Of course I have pictures of it all and will attach them at the bottom.

Saturday morning (6/21) me and Courtney, a friend from Spanish class went to Manuel Antonio. Its a town about 3 or 4 hours away by bus and it is very beautiful! There is a National Park there with a bunch of wildlife, but we decided not to go in and just stay on the beach. We laid out and got in the water a few times, it was a very relaxing day, especially after all of the commotion of the game the day before. We decided that we wanted to stay in a hostel that night because neither of us had experienced a hostel and we figured it would be a cheap alternative to a hotel. We stayed at Vista Serena, and I highly recommend it to anyone who is wanted to travel to Manuel Antonio!! I wouldn't say it was a "nice" hostel, because there isn't anything nice about cold showers and bugs everywhere, but that is part of the experience of being in a hostel in a 3rd world country. The receptionist was really really really nice, had it not been for her, I probably would've hated the place. She was very friendly when we first got there, and she offered to help us with anything we might need. We wanted to do a zipline excursion and she gave us TONS of options and helped us pick the best one. She even called the place to book our reservation and even tried her hardest to get a cheaper price! At the hostel we stayed in a 16 person dorm for $11, it was super cheap and the best experience. I will attach pictures below, but the room had 7 bunk beds and one queen size bed and one shower. I'm not gonna lie, I was kinda iffy about staying in a room with so many other people, but it turned out to be just fine. We met three guys from Texas who are doing a study abroad with UNT. We sat out on the patio with them and talked for a while, then ventured out into the rain for dinner. It was raining pretty hard, but we eventually found a nice little pizza place to eat.
The next day we woke up and had breakfast with the three guys from Texas, then we ventured off to do our zip lining excursion! Courtney and I were the only ones that were doing the zip lining, so we had our own personal guides, it was pretty nice. It was a lot of fun, definitely something I recommend if you ever have the chance! I might even do it again in a different town while I'm here! Of course I bought the pictures, so I will be uploading some of them at the end of this post as well. After that we ventured back to the bus station and made our way back home. The trip home was miserable, I just wanted to shower and stretch out in my bed! When we finally made it back to San Jose, finding a taxi who took cards was difficult, but we made it!

Here are some pictures from the second WIN and also Manuel Antonio