Gringas in Costa Rica: Spending Some Time Outside the City

The first full weekend we were here (June 7-9) we went on our first excursion outside San Jose. Right after class on Friday a bus picked us up and drove us two hours to Jaco where we stayed the weekend in an all-inclusive resort! They had a pool and it was also located right on the beach. We arrived at about 3 pm on Friday and spent the rest of the day walking the beach and sitting by the pool. On Saturday we literally got up at 9 am, ate breakfast and spent all morning and afternoon lying out in the sun by the pool and on the beach! Needless to say, I got a little pink. Okay, a little more than pink…I was kinda fried. That night, we showered and put on some dresses and headed to the little restaurant area with the rest of the UNK students. Amanda, Mary, and I had been looking all over for Liz and Fin but figured they must have went out to explore the town or were in their room using the (thankfully free wifi!!!) to skype their parental units. Well, all of a sudden on the bridge leading up to the restaurant, there they were, walking up to join us. So, ecstatic to see that Liz and Fin were neither dead nor raped, Mary and I went running to them to give them hugs! Mary hugged Fin and I hugged Liz. Well, remember we were on a bridge. We somehow lost our balance and started to teeter totter. At first, the rope on the edge of the bridge caught us but next thing I know, we were both falling over the edge of the bridge, hitting a sign, and landing in the plants below. Yikes! I was also wearing a dress, so as you can imagine, my legs were spread eagle as it was not a very graceful fall and the whole world got a glimpse of my white and red underwear. Liz and I were both just lying there heads in the plants and laughing our butts off. We could not believe it! Neither could anyone in the restaurant because they had all seen it happen and came running out and were standing up on the bridge just staring. I was left without a scratch and poor Liz has been nursing her scraped up leg and bruised ankle ever since. The next morning, we got up, ate some breakfast, walked around the beach, and loaded the bus to head back to San Jose.

Liz's poor leg from the fall!

pyramid on the beach!

It was gorgeous!

Just getting fried at the pool!

This last weekend (June 14-16) we headed to Manuel Antonio which is one of Costa Rica’s national parks. It was a completely different atmosphere for us! Definitely not a city! There were literally monkeys in the trees right outside our hotel! How neat is that? On a scale of 1-100 of neatness, it is at least a 99. Friday was Mary’s birthday so everyone from the UNK group got dressed up and we went out to get some pizza. It was kinda rainy and we were in an unfamiliar location so it kind of put a damper on the whole 21^st party scene so we ended up calling it a night at about 10 pm and went to bed. We got up pretty early the next morning and headed into the national park with a guide. Boy was it worth the extra $5 to get a guide! He spotted so many things I would have never seen on my own! We got to see iguanas, spiders, interesting plants, birds, monkeys, and sloths! We then played on a beach for a few hours. The waves were so calm and it was so nice! There were also little raccoons running around who would steal people’s things! I thought it was kinda funny but then again, none of my stuff got taken by the little rascals. When we were headed back to our hotel we decided to take a shortcut that our guide had told us about before he left us on our own. So we were walking it and eventually we got to this little body of water with a sign that read “Warning: there are crocodiles in the water, Do not get in” So the smart person would pay the few extra bucks and have one of the guys with a boat take us back. But nope, many of the people in our group decided we should just walk across and risk our lives! What?! Next thing you know, we were stripping down to our suits and walked across the water holding our bags above our heads. Sure glad no one got attacked! I think I would miss my leg more than a few dollars. That night when we got back we showered and went out for supper and then just hung around the hotel. Sunday, we got up and laid out on the beach for a few hours and then got on the bus to head home.

While the weekend at the national park was beyond fantastic, we did have our fair share of issues. So, the hotel was a bit of a dive. It didn’t have any clean towels, our room was infested with ants, the floor was as sandy as the beach, their wifi barely worked, and the humidity was so bad all of our things practically melted. Also, the food was beyond sketch! On Saturday night we walked to this little bar and grill place and ordered some hamburgers. The first sign that it was disgusting was the burger was gray! Okay, eww. But, then as I was chewing I literally pulled out this huge piece of I’m not even sure what but it resembled rubber. And on Sunday morning I ordered a ham and cheese omelet and I kid you not, folks, when I cut it open a whole bunch of water came pouring out. It was gross. But I talked myself through it and somehow managed to gag it down.