Family Vacation

Our first family vacation was a success. We started the long weekend in Jaco in the beautiful hotel Villa Caletas. One of my students gave us two nights as an end of the year gift, which we truly enjoyed.

There was an infinity pool which we spent most of our time in the first day. We even stayed in it to watch the beautiful sunset. Going out on the balcony the next morning, we met who I have called "kermit", a green and black poison dart frog. It was quite the surprise. We started out in the pool again after a delicious breakfast. After the girls naps, we took a trip to a nearby beach called Herradura where we all enjoyed playing in the sand and the waves.

Our last morning there, we spent in the pool again before packing up the car and heading north to the beautiful province of Guanacaste. We were invited to spend the weekend with a family from church that has a house/cabin right on the beach. It took us about 4 hours to get there, but we stopped a lot since we weren't sure of the route. It was literally right on the beach, called Pitahaya (the pictures taken of the kite flying were from the driveway).

Upon arrival, we just played in the waves and sand. With the setting of the sun, we set up our tent (the cabin was full) and enjoyed a delicious dinner. The next morning we went to a white-sand beach called San Juanillo, also a fishing village. Elena just loves the water and she spent the whole time we were there out in the waves. No fear, check out the video paying close attention to how she pushes with her legs...

The owners are well known in the community and managed to arrange a boat ride for us. I was surprised to see how scared Elena was and how excited Katy was. That evening Gera and Katy made their first kite flying attempt and did really well. Katy was so excited when it went up. Afterwards we watched the sun disappear over the horizon and settled in for our last night of vacation.

Over all, it was a great time spent as a family and the girls traveled well. The hardest part was the drive home because everyone was returning to San Jose and the roads were clogged. It took us more than 7 hours to get home. Lesson learned: don't leave late in returning during a long weekend.

P.S. This is the first beach trip in a while that I didn't get burned to a crisp!!