Hotel Relax B & B San Jose

... subway sandwiches, it was Sunday night so most places were closed, and it turns out Costa Rica is ruddy expensive. Before long the hostel was trying to shift us to another room as they had double booked the room to a French couple. It had been too long a day for that kind of nonsense so we declared we were going nowhere.

In the morning we took a walk into town , very busy and very warm. Managed to exchange our very heavy South America guide book while Ang bought some new ...

... when it was time to return, I had a question for the bus driver. So…I got on the bus and stood beside him. It was the wrong bus and he started yelling at me. I was scared and confused…he was livid. He just kept yelling and pointing and motioning for me to get off. I had no idea what I had done, what he was saying, or what to do. I stood there for 20 more minutes before getting the courage to asking another bus driver. This one ...

... that wanted to drink 'for free').  It was a lot of fun but it made getting up this morning that much more difficult.

Breakfast was bread (the kind I really like), coffee, juice, fruit (pineapple and strawberries) and an egg over medium.  Class was painful for all of us today especially since a few of the people drank a lot last night (LOL).  Our teacher, Juan Jose, was nice enough to let us start our 10am break at 940 and gave us 40 min instead ...

... to the springs. We enjoyed a few hours of bathing in a steamy river surrounded by natural beauty. It was wonderful. That night we shared drinks and food with a group of about 10 people from all over the world....

Next, more or less, we headed south to San Isidro where we would spend the next 6 weeks with Frank, Sue and Jillian working at finca La Puebla. We learned how to process and roast coffee. We also learned about cinnamon, cocoa, medicinal ...

... lasted the whole 4 hours but that was okay. Then we had lunch and us girls went to this restaurant that had Casado, a traditional Costa Rican dish. It was good and I will probably get more of it eventually. Afterwards we had Spanish classes and they were fun. I like my professor because we just have conversations about our home stays and the differences between our houses and routines in Costa Rica vs. the US. We study grammar and vocabulary but ...

... br>El Sobrino had decided that he wanted to head straight to the Arenal Volcano area instead of spending some time in Monteverde as we had planned. We took him to a cafe where his bus was to pick him up. Now initially I thought my cousinŽs desire for Arenal must have been due to the Hot Springs & spa scene there. However I learned that the decision to skip Monteverde was due to a clip heŽd seen on You Tube, that showed a viginette of the ...

... some mangoes. There was a small aisle of groceries. I got a photo of the "chips" aisle (not to be confused with sheeps). For those 30 Rock fans, you may find some comedy in this. Further down the hillside we stopped Mirador Del Valle for a sit down lunch. There was an option of chicken, sea bass, or "meat" (beef). This was accompanied by the ever present black beans and rice, with a slaw type mix of veggies and some sort of cooked root vegetable. They ...

December 11, 2008 Discouraged! Thursday morning. It's good to get our 10,000 steps/day but are developing a serious case of "hotel fever" and need to move. We got a lead from a call this morning which took us to a large white house just a few blocks from the Little Victoria. The location was OK; there was an apartment of sorts that we wouldn't have minded too much but the whole place seemed a bit like a boarding ...

... a lesson on making coffee drinks, and a field trip to their husking and drying facility in addition to a whimsical costumed performance that's part of the standard package, but which had been pared down for CCS's private mini-tour. (For the record: in my September 3 entry, "Me Gusta Cafe," I erroneously identified Cafe Britt as a coffee plantation and processing center; it is in fact only a processing and packing plant. They buy all their coffee from small ...

... just like I like it - uneventful. After landing in San Jose and waiting for everyone and their brother to get off the plane we finally headed towards customs. We expected the "international airport" for a capital city to be larger than what we found. We walked about half the airport in a mere five minutes. We easily made it through the customs line then went out the door to find our shuttle driver from the Marriott. We were ...