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