Exiting Costa Rica

HEEEEEEEEELLLLLLLOOOOOOOO all!

Ville and I met up with our friends, Ville 2 and Katri from Finland, right off the plane in San Jose and after many hours on 2 planes and chaos in the airport, we made it to San Jose. FYI for all those traveling down here from anywhere other than the U.S, these countries require that you buy a return ticket to your country before even entering. I was o.k. because we spend so much $$$ down here, but Ville was not allowed on the plane in until we bought tickets back into the U.S. which ended up working out, but a tad bit stressful. And lame.

We met the friends, who scoped out San Jose a couple days and wanted to move on and jumped straight on a 4 in a half hour bus to Quepos near the beach. We stayed at a great hotel with a pool and made a side trip to Manual Antonio Park where we saw a bunch of sloths, monkeys, racoons, crabs, lizards, and bugs. It was just like a nature show. We found a secluded beach that was awesome and swam in the water. Walked the peninsula and headed back to Quepos. Took 2 very long, dusty, and bumpy buses to Monte Verde where there was a big rainforest on the top of a mountain. There we got a great room with a balcanoy to see the mountains and spent a day out on Extremo Canopy Tours (was very extremo thats for sure). It was amazing! We got to do 14 different ziplines over and through the rainforest. Got pics and video I will upload when possible. Don´t worry mom, it was very safe. Safer than traveling in Mexico right now, at least. Speaking of, our flight back to D.C. is at the end of May and we hope flights have resumed by then.

This morning we hopped another 3 buses to Liberia, Costa Rica which is a big city close to the border of Nicaragua. We are staying here a night and then heading over the border to the beach and then to Lake Nicaragua. If you look on a map, it is a HUGE lake with islands in the middle and suppose to be really beautiful. This town reminds me a lot of Mexico it´s pretty cool. Costa Rica is expensive though and I am pretty excited to get to Nicaragua where it is at least half the cost. We are all really good. Travels have been amazing and we are taking a bunch of pictures. Enjoying every minute of it. The people down here are so friendly and thanks to my bilingual boyfriend, we are able to get by. My Spanish is very slowly coming back, but workingon it. Trying to learn Finish on the side as well. I might be fluent by 2030. But no worries down here and life is good. Hope all are well. Stay in touch, I can still read, feel free to write.

Smooches!

Kristen and Ville