Costa Rica

For those of you who have been anxiously awaiting news of our trip, I have finally gotten to blogging on it! It all started when my dad wanted to go snorkeling in Costa Rica. I had studied there for a semester and he had heard such good things about it from my experiences. My mom told him they weren't going without a spanish-speaker and so my brother and I were considered for the job. Eventually the whole family banned together to go; ie Carolyn & Kevin, Mike & Janiell, Casey & Sheryl, Kent & Brittney. We flew down on Jan 1 and came home Jan 14. We rented 2 4-wheel drive vehicles as the terrain can be rather rough and if it rains roads can be completely washed away.

We did get in 1 car accident but luckily it was after coming back from a river kayaking tour and we were in a van. I can't imagine if we had been driving and would have had to deal with the accident.

We had such a great time and so many adventures it is hard to describe all of them. Kudos to Mike and myself (Sheryl) for putting the trip together :). As we had both been before we knew what things to do. Manuel Antonio is still my favorite beach, we ate at so many tasty restaurants and I ate a great deal of delicious fresh shrimp while there, YUM!

We stayed at some really nice hotels, hung out on the beach boogy boarding, surfing, and snorkeling. Mike, Brittney, Casey, and Sheryl all went waterfall repelling which was a blast. We went to one of the few cloud forests in the world and did ziplines across the rain forest. We kayaked down a river and saw lots of monkeys and other wildlife. The boys went deep sea fishing and Casey even caught a bird! We slept at the bottom of an active volcano (Casey couldn't sleep the volcano was so noisy). Kent fed Pizotes from our car...

I have attached a few pictures and I might add some more later. Enjoy!

This is a pizote, in the same family as a Racoon

We saw them mostly near the rain forest in the north central part of the country

Casey and I on the beach in Manuel Antonio

Manuel Antonio is near the Southern border by Panama Beatiful sunset at Manuel Antonio
Casey with some locals

They were our waitresses at a really yummy restaurant

We were in central Costa Rica in a town called Junta

Here I am at Flamingo Beach

This is on the West Coast of Costa Rica