Tag Archives: nature

Bienvenidos a Costa Rica! // Family Travel Edition // Tortuguero

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Hola amigos! Guess what?! My family made it to Costa Rica!

So here’s what’s up – my mom loves to travel and wouldn’t miss a chance to travel somewhere new and since she has never been to Latinamerica she just couldn’t resist and booked a flight. Last year when I went back to Michigan to visit my former host family and friends, she wanted to tag along for a while but sadly it didn’t work out at the time.. so my mom, my sister and suprisingly my brother (who has just finished his apprenticeship yay!) flew out to Panama City on Saturday (7/28/18). After two days in Panama they flew to Costa Rica…

After my Tuesday morning class I cleaned up my appartement and waited for my family to arrive. It felt weird knowing they would visit me here, me being like a tour guide as if I knew all about Costa Rica.. I guess I really have gotten to know this country pretty well but there is still so much more to learn and experience here. Around 2pm they arrived with their rental car at my place and got everything organized and settled. I was very happy to finally see them again but it also felt so weird – in “my” appartment, on the other side of the world, where I myself have just spent a little over 5 months… we ate some food at a local Meditarranean restaurant, and my family got to know Charlotte after she came back from work. In the evening we all ate dinner together at our favorite Soda (Typical Costa Rican restaurant) which is right next to our house. The next day we cooked some pancakes for breakfast and then visited my workplace – LIDEPO (Liceo de Poás). My students have been so excited to meet my family and when we got there everyone introduced themselves in german and we handed out some german candy that my siblings had brought. We also got to know Wiebke, a german university student from Hannover who is doing an internship for a month at the school. Later that day we all went out for dinner at a local Soda (Wiebke, Charlotte, Lina – she came from Heredia, Marco & Isaac – the german teachers, and my family) and just talked for a while. The next morning my family and I drove out to Mi Cafecito –  a local coffee plantation and production site north of Poás (close to San Miguel). We had a great tour and learned a lot about the origin and production of coffee, and it was awesome to see a local, fairtrade workplace after living in the mountains for so long and seeing huge coffee plantations everyday. Afterwards we drove further towards Guápiles and stayed there for a night. On Friday morning we kept driving towards Tortuguero – we left our rental car at the secured parking lot and took a boat towards the little town of Tortuguero, which was about an hour long drive through the connecting rivers. We arrived at our home for the next two nights – Tortuguero Natural Hotel . Later that night we went on a tour to see the turtles – we we’re a group of 6 people and waited patiently for the turtle watchman to bring us to the beach. Disoriented we walked through the darkness, closely following our guide. A turtle was spotted and group after group we were able to see it laying eggs with the infrared flashlight focused on the turtles lower body. It was so intresting and amazing to see an animal laying eggs! We stayed a little longer and were also able to see the turtle camouflage the eggs by putting more and more sand on top of them. I learned so much about the green sea turtle – for example they return to the same beach they are born at to lay their own eggs and out of over 100 eggs only about 2 baby turtles survive as they walk towards the water (all the others get eaten by predators). I learned so much more and if you want to know more just do a little google research – or visit a hatching site or National Park! It is definitely worth it! If you are an animal and nature lover, Tortuguero is  a must-see in Costa Rica. After an adventurous night, we didn’t stop exploring and spent 2 hours on the river on a Kanu with a local guide. We saw some amazing wildlife like Caimen (small alligators), different types of monkeys and birds and some smaller turtles. We had a lovely morning out in nature and spent the rest of the day chilling in our hotel’s hammocks, laying at the beach and exploring the trails of the National Park. On Sunday morning it was already time to leave again, and we took the boat back to the parking lot after we ate breakfast. From there we drove back to Guápiles, where I took a bus to San José and from there I went back to my place in Poás while my family continued driving towards Puerto Viejo on the Carribean coast.

We had a great family reunion and I’m so excited and happy that my family is here to explore this beautiful and unique country that I was able to call home for almost 6 months now! They are staying a total of 3 weeks and I will meet up with them again next weekend for some more adventures. For now I am enjoying my last 2 weeks of volunteering at the school…

Hasta pronto!

//Olivia

Dominical y Uvita // Weekend Travel Edition

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Hola!

Do I ever stay home?! Well.. barely. The reason why I travel so much is simply because I want to use my time wisely and get to know as much as I can of Costa Rica before I leave. Which sadly is very very soon… I have also mentioned before that the little town that I live in doesn’t really have too much to offer, so there really is no point in staying in and watching Netflix at home all day. I can do that when I am in Germany! I should take advantage of my time here, shouldn’t I? That being said, Charlotte and I have decided to make a short trip out to the Pacific coast. Wednesday was a holiday (Annexión de Guanacaste)  and we took Thursday off, and since we have a new schedule (it changed a few months ago) we also have Fridays off!  So we had 4 days in total for our mini vacation. On Tuesday night we slept in a hostel in San José, so we would be able to catch an early bus the next morning. On Wednesday it took us only about 4 hours to get from San José to Dominical. We stayed at the Cool Vibes Hostel, which is the most popular one, and there aren’t many others around because it’s a very small beach town. The rest of the day we just chilled, walked around a little, checked out the beach and cooked some food. I had a late night yoga session before going to bed. The next day we made plans to go surfing in the afternoon, so in the morning we just went out for breakfast and chilled by the pool at the hostel and talked to some other travelers. A few hours before our surf lesson we got a call from our instructor that the waves are too high right now and that a storm was coming.. so sadly our class got canceled and we rescheduled for the next morning. So Thursday ended up being another chill day. On Friday morning we had our surf lesson, and it was Charlotte’s first time trying it. I was super stoked to get back in the water because I’ve been enjoying surfing so much and just never want to stop learning it! We were a group of 4, two brothers from the USA joined us, and we had two instructors – Oscar and Sarah. They explained everything super well, we practiced for about 20min at the beach how to stand up on the board etc. Then we got into the water and started catching waves. It was so much fun and it was my best surf lesson so far, because the explanations were very precise and they always told us what we could do better. I was so happy that I was able to catch so many waves! Charlotte also really enjoyed it even though she had a harder time but that is totally normal, because it was only her first time and I think she did really well for that. The class lasted 2 hours and we had a little snack break with some cookies and watermelon, in total it cost 50$ – which I think is a good price because they were really good instructors! Once we got back to the hostel we just chilled for a while and then cooked some lunch before we headed to Uvita. It took about an hour by bus to get there (it’s just a bit down south) and then we walked a few minutes to our new place called Flutterby House, which is located close to the Ballena National Park. It is a super cool hostel with treehouses, a yoga terrace and a very open and light atmosphere. They focus on sustainability and recycle, compost and try to minimize their waste, and they also have a restaurant that offers many vegetarian and vegan options, with their aim to use as much organic and local grown food as possible. Definitely a very cool place I can recommend and they also have private rooms. On Saturday morning we were up on our feet at 5:30 am. We wanted to check out the popular Nauyaca Falls that are located close to Dominical (we wanted to do that while staying there but our plans changed due to the surf lessons), so we took the 6am bus towards the entrance, and started hiking once we arrived. The trail was about 5km long, with lots of up and downs, we walked through small streams, dense jungle and had some amazing views of the valley and surrounding mountains. After about 1 1/2 hours we made it to the falls and we were completely blown away! I haven’t seen that many waterfalls in my life so far, so I was definitely impressed. There were two different waterfalls, one more high up that was incredibly beautiful and a lower one which was more like a cascade. We took a dip in the lower one and it was cold but so refreshing after the hike. It was only us and another couple from the Netherlands, so we had the whole place to ourselves really. It was so beautiful and relaxing to swim, and sit by the waterfalls…we were both in awe of Mother Nature’s beauty. After about 45min more and more people kept coming and after an hour and a half we decided to hike back. We had only eaten a few nuts for breakfast so we were starving. As we left, the horse riding tours made their way up and I just gotta say – PLEASE do not support these tours here!! They’re awful. When we arrived at 7am, the horses were already sattled up and had to wait for 3 hours knotted to a pole.. also the hike is definitely manageable and if you do have health problems you can be transported by car to the waterfalls! Back at the hostel we ordered some food at the restaurant and just chilled out. It ended up raining the rest of the day so we just spent our time socializing and reading. On Sunday we made ourselves some breakfast and then headed out to Marino Ballena National Park. We had to pay 6$ to get in, then we walked for about an hour along Playa Colonia, which is a very beautiful beach. The park is named after the humpback whales that migrate to the region from about August to September and December through April. It is also famous for its whale tail that appears only at low tide, which is a 1km long “beach” of rocks. We were super impressed by the symmetry of the tail as we walked along it! Mother Nature really never disappoints. Then Charlotte and I parted our ways because I went to get another surf lesson, and she didn’t want to so she went back to the hostel. I had a private lesson with Oscar and it was sooo good! I was able to actually ride some real waves not just whitewash waves! He also challenged me with a smaller board and it was definitely more difficult but I think I did a pretty good job. After the lesson I met up with Charlotte at Flutterby house and we got ready to take our bus back home. The bus was supposed to leave at 3pm but ended up leaving at 4pm, and we got stuck in traffic pretty badly. At 10pm we arrived in San José and from there we had to take an uber to Alajuela, otherwise we would’ve missed the last bus to Poás which is at 11pm every night. We got home super late and immediately fell asleep…

We had an amazing short trip to the Pacific coast and I am so happy that I was able to go surfing again and explore more of Costa Rica’s stunning nature. Yet again we met some great people (a lot of teachers from Germany!) and we enjoyed ourselves so much. Now we’re back at work, and we only have 3 weeks left! 3 WEEKS!!!! I can’t even believe it and I have such mixed feelings about leaving and going back home.. time has passed by so fast! Right now I am actually waiting for my family to arrive! They are traveling through CR for 3 weeks and I will join them on the weekends when I don’t have to work. I am super excited to see them again after such a long time but it also marks the end of my time here which makes me feel very nostalgic… I am definitely going to make the best of my last few weeks here.

//Olivia