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costa rica…take two • 05.25.08

sooo, lillis and i made our way back down to costa rica for the second time in the last 12 months. as you may or may not recall, she has a family friend in jaco (pacific coast) who has a couple of condos. they are just about to head into the rainy season (and from what i understand it was very ugly weather in san jose the whole time we were there) but it was beautiful once again in jaco. we got in late on a thursday night (this time with me doing a white knuckle drive through 2 hours of mountain passes) and got a bit of a late start on friday. the first thing we did was head to an outdoor market where we bought cheese and bread and a few other things to eat during our stay.

jimmy and brenda are growing orchids on the back porch and i snapped a shot of one.

soon after, bad times hit. lillis had her bag stolen when we had pulled off at an overlook. it was a manuever executed with miltary precision. the car pulled up right behind us, one girl was a little distracting and another swiped lillis’ bag from the vehicle. the bad thing is i knew something was fishy (IMPORTANT NOTE: general rule of thumb, if you’re in a foreign land, and somebody who is local starts asking you questions, assume they may be stealing something from you) but i didn’t realize lillis’ bag was on the seat, so i thought we were cool. we tried to speed off after them, but too late. that led to an afternoon of me watching the rain fall (the only rain we encountered on the trip) while lillis called multiple credit card companies. poooor lillis.

the next day was beautiful and sunny and we got up (1 bag lighter) and headed out to the beach to swim at esterilloes oeste (btw, worth noting that esterillos este is EXTREMELY dangerous to swim at, oeste is where we go to – it’s safer and it has a mermaid). anyway, we stopped to snap a photo or two here. funny thing; right when we pulled over a car comes screaching around the corner way too fast. i see it start to spin sideways and at one point, i think he’s gonna end up doing a high speed 180. but, apparently the toyota yaris isn’t made for such manuevers and the car ends up flipping over into a ditch. i’ve never seen a car take flight before (and certainly not with me standing 60 feet away from it) but the funny thing is that my first instinct was to make sure that that couldn’t possibly be some setup to steal something else from lillis. ultimately the plan of “roll my car into a ditch at high speed, pretend to act disoriented, then steal lillis’ sunblock and beach towel” seemed unlikely, so i went over to make sure the guy was ok – he was.

here is the view at esterillos, where we were able to find a nice girl who was working the bar at the beach who agreed to keep our stuff behind the counter with her while we swam. : )

and her is a little fishing boat in front of the mermaid statue that sits out on the end of a long promontory.

lillis was trying to do some yoga move on the beach (the same one that led her to kick me in the face earlier in the week) but eventually gave up do to the unsuitable conditions of the beach sand, and her physical exhaustion.

and then we did a little swimming and body surfing.

after we had had our fill of swimming (and fed lillis plenty of fish tacos at bubba’s – she LOVES bubba’s fish tacos) we met up with jimmy who took us out on one of his boats. we caught up witht he trash line (run off from the rains) about 8 miles out, and within 15 minutes i had caught this mahi mahi (dolphin).

here lillis enjoys the boat ride. earlier she was sitting in the bow of the boat and leaning out into the wind, kind of like i would expect a yellow lab to do : )

then she caught her first deep sea fish

i know there’s nothing more exciting than a fishing video, so i thought i’d include one here….it IS actually worth it (if you’re a lillis fan) to watch, just to listen to her commentary : )

the next day (our final one in jaco) we went out surfing. here lillis drops into a wave.

and here i am riding one to the shore. the guy at the surf shop on the north end of town (name eludes me right now) did a really good job of gettins us on a good board and of directing us to a beach that would be better for learning to surf. this was a MUCH more enjoyable experience than our previous surfing excursion!

then lillis and i get one more photo together before we head in (the beach makes her very VERY happy).

these cows also made lillis happy. not sure why??

it was a really great trip, though made slightly less relaxing by the whole theft thing. we stayed at hotel mango next to the airport our last night as we had an early AM flight, and we went out and met my friend katie and her husband alfonso for dinner there in san jose.

anyway, all the photos are here but even more spectacular is the awesome surfing video i created. actually, it’s really not that good and apparently the quantity (if not quality) was affected by some camera malfunction that i would have to let lillis explain.

OH, and this time, there was no plane skidding of a runway and preventing us from leaving on our appointed day…..pura vida!

Posted in Uncategorizedwith Comments Off on costa rica…take two

costa rica…take two • 05.25.08

sooo, lillis and i made our way back down to costa rica for the second time in the last 12 months. as you may or may not recall, she has a family friend in jaco (pacific coast) who has a couple of condos. they are just about to head into the rainy season (and from what i understand it was very ugly weather in san jose the whole time we were there) but it was beautiful once again in jaco. we got in late on a thursday night (this time with me doing a white knuckle drive through 2 hours of mountain passes) and got a bit of a late start on friday. the first thing we did was head to an outdoor market where we bought cheese and bread and a few other things to eat during our stay.

jimmy and brenda are growing orchids on the back porch and i snapped a shot of one.

soon after, bad times hit. lillis had her bag stolen when we had pulled off at an overlook. it was a manuever executed with miltary precision. the car pulled up right behind us, one girl was a little distracting and another swiped lillis’ bag from the vehicle. the bad thing is i knew something was fishy (IMPORTANT NOTE: general rule of thumb, if you’re in a foreign land, and somebody who is local starts asking you questions, assume they may be stealing something from you) but i didn’t realize lillis’ bag was on the seat, so i thought we were cool. we tried to speed off after them, but too late. that led to an afternoon of me watching the rain fall (the only rain we encountered on the trip) while lillis called multiple credit card companies. poooor lillis.

the next day was beautiful and sunny and we got up (1 bag lighter) and headed out to the beach to swim at esterilloes oeste (btw, worth noting that esterillos este is EXTREMELY dangerous to swim at, oeste is where we go to – it’s safer and it has a mermaid). anyway, we stopped to snap a photo or two here. funny thing; right when we pulled over a car comes screaching around the corner way too fast. i see it start to spin sideways and at one point, i think he’s gonna end up doing a high speed 180. but, apparently the toyota yaris isn’t made for such manuevers and the car ends up flipping over into a ditch. i’ve never seen a car take flight before (and certainly not with me standing 60 feet away from it) but the funny thing is that my first instinct was to make sure that that couldn’t possibly be some setup to steal something else from lillis. ultimately the plan of “roll my car into a ditch at high speed, pretend to act disoriented, then steal lillis’ sunblock and beach towel” seemed unlikely, so i went over to make sure the guy was ok – he was.

here is the view at esterillos, where we were able to find a nice girl who was working the bar at the beach who agreed to keep our stuff behind the counter with her while we swam. : )

and her is a little fishing boat in front of the mermaid statue that sits out on the end of a long promontory.

lillis was trying to do some yoga move on the beach (the same one that led her to kick me in the face earlier in the week) but eventually gave up do to the unsuitable conditions of the beach sand, and her physical exhaustion.

and then we did a little swimming and body surfing.

after we had had our fill of swimming (and fed lillis plenty of fish tacos at bubba’s – she LOVES bubba’s fish tacos) we met up with jimmy who took us out on one of his boats. we caught up witht he trash line (run off from the rains) about 8 miles out, and within 15 minutes i had caught this mahi mahi (dolphin).

here lillis enjoys the boat ride. earlier she was sitting in the bow of the boat and leaning out into the wind, kind of like i would expect a yellow lab to do : )

then she caught her first deep sea fish

i know there’s nothing more exciting than a fishing video, so i thought i’d include one here….it IS actually worth it (if you’re a lillis fan) to watch, just to listen to her commentary : )

the next day (our final one in jaco) we went out surfing. here lillis drops into a wave.

and here i am riding one to the shore. the guy at the surf shop on the north end of town (name eludes me right now) did a really good job of gettins us on a good board and of directing us to a beach that would be better for learning to surf. this was a MUCH more enjoyable experience than our previous surfing excursion!

then lillis and i get one more photo together before we head in (the beach makes her very VERY happy).

these cows also made lillis happy. not sure why??

it was a really great trip, though made slightly less relaxing by the whole theft thing. we stayed at hotel mango next to the airport our last night as we had an early AM flight, and we went out and met my friend katie and her husband alfonso for dinner there in san jose.

anyway, all the photos are here but even more spectacular is the awesome surfing video i created. actually, it’s really not that good and apparently the quantity (if not quality) was affected by some camera malfunction that i would have to let lillis explain.

OH, and this time, there was no plane skidding of a runway and preventing us from leaving on our appointed day…..pura vida!

Posted in Uncategorizedwith Comments Off on costa rica…take two

costa rica…take two • 05.25.08

sooo, lillis and i made our way back down to costa rica for the second time in the last 12 months. as you may or may not recall, she has a family friend in jaco (pacific coast) who has a couple of condos. they are just about to head into the rainy season (and from what i understand it was very ugly weather in san jose the whole time we were there) but it was beautiful once again in jaco. we got in late on a thursday night (this time with me doing a white knuckle drive through 2 hours of mountain passes) and got a bit of a late start on friday. the first thing we did was head to an outdoor market where we bought cheese and bread and a few other things to eat during our stay.

jimmy and brenda are growing orchids on the back porch and i snapped a shot of one.

soon after, bad times hit. lillis had her bag stolen when we had pulled off at an overlook. it was a manuever executed with miltary precision. the car pulled up right behind us, one girl was a little distracting and another swiped lillis’ bag from the vehicle. the bad thing is i knew something was fishy (IMPORTANT NOTE: general rule of thumb, if you’re in a foreign land, and somebody who is local starts asking you questions, assume they may be stealing something from you) but i didn’t realize lillis’ bag was on the seat, so i thought we were cool. we tried to speed off after them, but too late. that led to an afternoon of me watching the rain fall (the only rain we encountered on the trip) while lillis called multiple credit card companies. poooor lillis.

the next day was beautiful and sunny and we got up (1 bag lighter) and headed out to the beach to swim at esterilloes oeste (btw, worth noting that esterillos este is EXTREMELY dangerous to swim at, oeste is where we go to – it’s safer and it has a mermaid). anyway, we stopped to snap a photo or two here. funny thing; right when we pulled over a car comes screaching around the corner way too fast. i see it start to spin sideways and at one point, i think he’s gonna end up doing a high speed 180. but, apparently the toyota yaris isn’t made for such manuevers and the car ends up flipping over into a ditch. i’ve never seen a car take flight before (and certainly not with me standing 60 feet away from it) but the funny thing is that my first instinct was to make sure that that couldn’t possibly be some setup to steal something else from lillis. ultimately the plan of “roll my car into a ditch at high speed, pretend to act disoriented, then steal lillis’ sunblock and beach towel” seemed unlikely, so i went over to make sure the guy was ok – he was.

here is the view at esterillos, where we were able to find a nice girl who was working the bar at the beach who agreed to keep our stuff behind the counter with her while we swam. : )

and her is a little fishing boat in front of the mermaid statue that sits out on the end of a long promontory.

lillis was trying to do some yoga move on the beach (the same one that led her to kick me in the face earlier in the week) but eventually gave up do to the unsuitable conditions of the beach sand, and her physical exhaustion.

and then we did a little swimming and body surfing.

after we had had our fill of swimming (and fed lillis plenty of fish tacos at bubba’s – she LOVES bubba’s fish tacos) we met up with jimmy who took us out on one of his boats. we caught up witht he trash line (run off from the rains) about 8 miles out, and within 15 minutes i had caught this mahi mahi (dolphin).

here lillis enjoys the boat ride. earlier she was sitting in the bow of the boat and leaning out into the wind, kind of like i would expect a yellow lab to do : )

then she caught her first deep sea fish

i know there’s nothing more exciting than a fishing video, so i thought i’d include one here….it IS actually worth it (if you’re a lillis fan) to watch, just to listen to her commentary : )

the next day (our final one in jaco) we went out surfing. here lillis drops into a wave.

and here i am riding one to the shore. the guy at the surf shop on the north end of town (name eludes me right now) did a really good job of gettins us on a good board and of directing us to a beach that would be better for learning to surf. this was a MUCH more enjoyable experience than our previous surfing excursion!

then lillis and i get one more photo together before we head in (the beach makes her very VERY happy).

these cows also made lillis happy. not sure why??

it was a really great trip, though made slightly less relaxing by the whole theft thing. we stayed at hotel mango next to the airport our last night as we had an early AM flight, and we went out and met my friend katie and her husband alfonso for dinner there in san jose.

anyway, all the photos are here but even more spectacular is the awesome surfing video i created. actually, it’s really not that good and apparently the quantity (if not quality) was affected by some camera malfunction that i would have to let lillis explain.

OH, and this time, there was no plane skidding of a runway and preventing us from leaving on our appointed day…..pura vida!

Posted in Uncategorizedwith Comments Off on costa rica…take two

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