Meeting new people, experiencing other cultures, and perhaps learning a new language (one can only hope, Amigo) places traveling on my list of life’s enjoyments. Heide and I have embarked on a two month trip to Costa Rica and, happy to say, we aren’t missing the 8 to 10 inches of snow our hometown received yesterday. I am sitting on the patio listening to the waves break on the beach and the birds sing in the morning. It doesn’t get a whole lot better. And I don’t feel the least bit guilty about leaving winter behind.
We arrived in Playa Flamingo, Costa Rica on Saturday. Planes were on time, connections went smoothly, and the assistance we got from a few folks with Heide’s handicapped access was amazing. A thousand thanks to Luis (at the Liberia airport) who helped us expedite customs and immigration. Even though he spoke limited English and we spoke almost no Spanish, it was a smooth entry into Costa Rica. He was a tremendous help and comfort as he was the first person we encountered in a foreign land.
Many thanks to Vicky Goodloe, Real Estate Consultant with Blue Water Properties. Her patience with my endless questions over the past few months and recent days is much appreciated. Renting a place for two months sight unseen in a foreign country is a risky business to be sure, but Vicky’s description of the condo and Playa Flamingo were spot-on. We worked from afar to find the right housing while in Costa Rica and working through Vicky was a smooth, reassuring process. She has a warm and welcoming personality and is a very professional real estate consultant. Vicky kindly took me to the grocery store to pick up a few things to get us situated and I appreciate that she did. We needed some basic necessities like food, snacks for what pretended to be the “Super” Bowl and a few personal items (e.g., shampoo, soap, etc.). We’ll have wheels today so getting around will be easier.
Jorge Mendez, Property Manager, was waiting for us when we arrived on the shuttle from the airport. At the end of a very long travel day, it was nice to see a smiling face in the parking lot. He helped us into the condo with our bags and showed us around to get settled. His offer of help in the future was very reassuring. Thank you, Jorge.
Playa Flamingo is a wonderfully quiet, peaceful, and friendly beach community in the Guanacaste Province in the northwestern part of the country along the Pacific coast. The Nicaragua border is just to the north. It is unexpectedly hilly here with quite steep inclines (45 degrees might not be an exaggeration) and everything is uphill both ways…! Billy goat heaven to be sure. It looked flatter on Google maps !!! I suspect we’ll be in Olympic walking form by the end of the trip. I’ve gotten off to a good start yesterday with walking twice and swimming some laps in the pool. I hope to increase the distance on both walking and swimming in days ahead.
Today the rental car arrives and we will be off exploring. Vicky told me where the local produce market is so we’ll be stocking up on fresh fruits and vegetables locally grown. We’ve been here three days now and it’s time we get to the beach to start working on my tan.
Like Bilbo, we are off on an adventure. Although no dwarves are involved, I have, in fact, forgotten my pocket handkerchief and I am sure we will encounter some trolls, giant spiders, dragons. More importantly, magic elves are appearing everywhere and I have no doubt we will end the trip with a dragon treasure worth more than gold.
Share the journey. Stop by periodically.
The conference was well attended and we had some interesting discussions about the differences between Turkey and the United States in terms of education. The similarities were interesting also (e.g., politics!). Although our presentations were in English, many of the audience participants spoke our language. We discussed the fact that few Americans are bilingual. I need to brush up on my Turkish before I return again. I learned at least three things in Turkish: teşekkür ederim (thank you, which I never quite pronounced correctly, Günaydın (good morning, I was better at this one), and a phrase I can’t spell but meant “wear your hard hat” (we were at a construction site)! I intend to improve my vocabulary by the time I return to Turkey.