Quinta Esencia and Guanacaste

It is inevitable for those who aspire to do mission work in Costa Rica or Hawaii or some incredibly beautiful place that they are “forced” to have a beach encounter.  It has been our lot these last few days to be at the beach.

 All of the Wisdoms were able to go as well as us 5 making 15 in the van.  It truly is a 15 passenger van. Even with 3 kid's car seats we fit fine.   We pulled the smaller trailer for our stuff, the beach gear and ice chests with food in.

On Tuesday we headed off for a 6 hour drive to Guanacaste.  This is in the northwest, on the Pacific coast.  It is the off season for tourists.  For those of us from Washington and Colorado, it is great.  There are partially cloud-covered days. Maybe a few hour-long rain storms but otherwise it is very warm and comfortable.

The beaches were empty, the stores and restaurants were empty and people were just hanging around hoping we would give them business.

The first night we drove right to a restaurant that had plastic tables and chairs, covered with colorful table and chair cloths, under an awning right on the beach.  While our food cooked we kicked off our shoes and waded into the surf.  With sandy toes, we ate fresh seafood and listened to four guys who came up and played music for us.  A mariachi (sp?) band.  The one guy had a guitaron which is a huge bass guitar.  The strings look more than an 1/8 inch thick and are plucked. 

The next 3 days all that we did was to be in the water as much as possible.  Despite the fact that Dale and Shari, and Jerry and I, Carol got out every hour or so to slather ourselves with SPF 50, we still got well burned.  We just stayed in the bath-warm green water and bobbed and soaked in the beauty of the ocean beaches.  We found a particular beach that was made of broken shells, and was white that was our favorite.

There were strong enough surf waves for the littlest kids to play in and have fun.  I actually enjoyed that quite a bit, being tossed around and pulled in and out like a piece of driftwood.

There also was one end of the beach with rocks that we were able to snorkel around and see some great fish.  Puffer fish were the most exotic.

The second day we all were crispy and had a number of sand flea bites, but were content inside.  The ocean stays in your brain for quite a while.  I still feel the bobbing after 2 days.  I hope it never goes away.  That night we sang Clint a group “Happy Birthday” song.  He and Renee went out for dinner together. They found a private romantic spot that they raved about.   After that we had cake and ice cream. Clint said that he liked his birthday, at the beach, with family.  I can say that that would be my first choice too for a birthday.



The owner of our hotel and his dog going to town.  I believe that he is Italian.  He keeps a nice and clean hotel with off season rooms for $35 a night. We ate lots of cereal and sandwiches with an occasional meal out which made this a cheap vacation.




This was our end of beach day reward, pretty spectacular!!



Russell hated every minute of this.



If you bury the children, you know right where to find them later.




our veranda




 which was also our living room, note coffee maker there




The only thing that makes you tired of bobbing at a tropical beach is getting chilled or shriveled, but it takes hours.



We stayed at an excellent place called Quinta Esencia.  Clint and Renee, the Weides and us Chilcotes each had a room in a 4-room hotel.  Right across the driveway was another hotel with large apartments. All the girls minus Chloe stayed in there in one room.  They had a swimming pool, a kitchen, several bedrooms, as best of all TV!!!  They enjoyed watching movies at night.

We had a 2-block length walk to the beach from the hotels. The area really had no big hotels or buildings.  Everything there, just about, was open to the air.

Our hotel was very charming.  All wood, with a full length porch that we really lived on, looking out at huge tropical plants.  The weather was warm and muggy.  We never needed more than shorts and t-shirts outside.  There was a Jacuzzi.  It was unheated and when we first got there we were not sure it would be used.  It actually was a favorite later with those who wanted to cool off and soak their sunburns in cooler water.

We left yesterday after struggling to get ourselves stuffed back into the van.  Our hearts just wouldn’t stay in there.  We had a remarkably quiet trip home.

As we exited, however, there was a sudden rain storm which made loading gear damp. Also Jerry's flip flops didn't do well on our steep stairs, despite trying to be careful while carrying a load he fell head long without serious injury.  At the same time Dale put his hand on the deck upright and felt a strong sting. He shook something off his hand, and it was a scorpion.  He felt afterwards like it was equivalent to a hornet sting, but hurt more going in.  I guess it was time to go.

Other than the trip to the beach,  we have continued in our spanish lessons daily, and had weekend adventures locally.  Jerry and I took Shari and Katie to the mall. We didn't need anything particularily.  We wanted to test our navigation skills again. 

We did do better the second time without the extra 2-hour trip riding the bus.  We had no problems getting through all the bus changes.  We did get off a little early in one town, but asked for directions and found our stop.  It made a huge difference that we were traveling in daylight.  It boosted our confidence a lot.  If you ask for the town square by the huge Catholic church, you may find one of several. (note to self). 

Each weekend day we can, we go to the local market.  We are less shy about asking questions and have brought back all the fruits and veggis for the house.  It is fun to see, the market people are friendly and honest, and the food is great. Some of them know us now.  We are extremely easy to spot however.

We like to eat the local food from stands when we can. It is usually some variation of a soft taco with a hand-made tortilla.  You can get fresh squeezed juices too.

This band followed us around willing to sing us a tune anytime for a few bucks.  There were few other tourists to help support them.  I thought that some of the businesses must suffer this time of year.

Some of us are going to the church in Llano Verde today.  The rest will stay here and do homework.  Which we did not do over the days at the beach.  No surprise.