Catching up

So, this was our day on Saturday, December 5th.
We got up fairly early in our wonderful hotel room. It´s easy to get up early here, since it starts getting light at around 5am. Anyway, we had a wonderful breakfast in their outdoor eating area, and then Guillermo and I took Estevan and Christoph back to the gas station where they had left their car. It was much easier driving the road this morning, since the weather was dry and sunny. We dropped the guys off at their car, and then Guillermo and I drove in the direction of the beach at Mal Pais. We never found a good place to see the beach but when we were headed back, we saw a nice place to look at the beach from. We parked, and walked out on the sand and took a few pictures, but since it was so hot, we sure didn´t hang around long.

Back in the car, we kept on driving towards Cabuya, and then down to Cabo Blanco National Park, which is as far as the road goes. On the way to these places, this young attractive girl was walking down the road and puts her thumb out as we approached. So, we picked her up and took her as far as the National Park. She was from Spain, and apparently travels all over the place and depends on the generosity of people. She looked well-off, and being so pretty, we felt she was a little too trusting. We got something to drink at the park, looked at the beach, and again, decided not to enter the trails since they are 7 kilometers one way and the day was already very hot. So,it looked like that girl found someone to take her back from the park, because we didn't see her anywhere when we left the park. We drove slowly back to Cabuya and stopped to get a drink in a little soda called El Coyote. In Costa Rica, they call those little places to get a bite to eat and something to drink, they call them Sodas.
Driving back to Montezuma, we stopped to look at a hotel Guillermo had stayed in several years ago when he took students down to Costa Rica. We also passed this GIANT strangler fig, where we stopped to take several pictures.

Standing at the bottom of the tree, looking up

There were bats roosting inside the tree!

This strangler fig was really huge!

 Then we got back in the car and passed a lady and her little boy, who both put their thumbs out. So,we picked them up and we took them quite a distance. It seemed to me a good thing for them, though, because when they had passed us on foot, while we were taking pictures of the strangler fig, the lady looked like she could barely make it. The day was really hot, so it was good to be able to help them out!
After dropping them off, we were then fairly close to Montezuma and we found a nice little bakery to get a quick lunch. Guillermo ordered a sandwich and I got chips and guacamole. When I finished with the guacamole, there were plenty of chips left over and they sat there on the plate. Well, a beautiful White-fronted Magpie Jay came and sat not farther than arms length away from me. Then, and this bird was really brave, he got CLOSER than arms length - I could have stroked his back!! We knew he wanted one of the chips, he was making sounds that almost sounded like begging, but we weren´t going to give him any. But he had his own ideas and all of a sudden, he jumped onto the plate, grabbed a chip, and flew off! It was so funny! We felt lucky to be able to see such a beautiful bird from so close.

After lunch, we just kind of hung around Montezuma. It´s a cute little beach town. We walked along the beach, checked out the shops, went to another section of beach, got a drink at a little bar on the beach and then found a nice big flat rock under some trees where we sat for a long time just watching the waves come in.

This is the view from where we were sitting on that nice flat rock.

And looking in the other direction

It starts getting dark here around 5:30, and we wanted to do the road back to our hotel before dark, so we headed back around 5.
Another great dinner at our hotel this evening, except this time, we were the only ones eating there. But it was nice anyway, and it was a perfect ending to a beautiful day.

That was our room on the right.

We saw these Howlers as were were driving back to our hotel.

Quite a day, for sure!

Today was filled with lots of interesting stuff!

The first thing we did was head from Liberia to Palo Verde National Park. We had a good highway up until about 30 kilometers from the park, and then it turned into a dirt road that in some places was quite tricky! We drove down to a river there, can't remember the name of it, and from the banks of the river we saw this incredibly huge crocodile. Must have been at least 10 feet long! That was exciting! It was a very hot day, but it felt good to be by the river. At least there were no mosquitoes. We eyed the little boat that was docked where we were standing, but decided against getting in it. We could just see ourselves miles downstream all of a sudden.

After enjoying the river, we drove back up the road and stopped to walk a boardwalk that stretched out over a swampy area. We saw several different kinds of birds from there, and as we were getting ready to walk back, we saw a huge hawk in a far off tree. We think it was a Great Black Hawk, but it flew off before we could get a perfect look at it. This boardwalk itself was worth the drive into the park. From the boardwalk we climbed an observation tower that was really flimsy, and not all that easy to climb, but we did it! And after all that effort, we felt it wasn't WORTH the effort. But it was kind of fun to do that climb anyway, even though we didn't see a thing from up on top.

There were a lot of birds in this park.

Tiger Heron

Can't see them in these two pictures

The view from the rickety observation tower.

So, then it was getting time to head back out of the park.  The rough roads made it a long drive but we finally got back to the main highway and stopped along the Corobici River to have lunch.

Then we were on our way to Puntarenas.  After several twists and turns down the streets of Puntarenas, we finally found where the ferry dock was and we got in the line waiting for the ferry. We had about a 30 minute wait until it was time to get on. There was a truck full of pigs also waiting to get on the ferry and we were hoping our car wouldn't be behind it. Only one person can drive the car onto the ferry, so I had to get out and walk onto the ferry, and from there I waited for Guillermo to drive on. They loaded the truck with the pigs, and it turned out Guillermo had to park about 5 cars behind the pig truck, so that wasn't too bad. (It's funny, but while standing on the ferry waiting for Guillermo to drive on, I saw a little blue car drive on and the driver was told to wait right below where I was standing. The guys inside the car had to wait quite a while to find out where they would park, and it looked like they were getting a little impatient. At that point, I had no idea that we would be getting to know those guys and be very grateful for their friendship.)

When Guillermo finally got the car parked and found me, we spent quite a bit of time trying to find a good place to sit. We walked all over that ferry. Some places, people were smoking and other places the smell from the pig truck was just a little too much. We finally found a place that we felt comfortable with and waited for the ferry to take off.

The ferry ride took one and a half hours.  It was only during the last 45 minutes of the ride that I struck up a conversation with the two guys sitting behind us and it turned out one of the guys, Christoph, lived 3 miles away from where Andrew works!! He knew exactly where Jet Aviation was and everything. Christoph was from Germany originally, and is now living in Costa Rica. So, we spent a lot of time talking about Europe and Austria and Costa Rica and just marvelled at how weird it was that he knew about Pratteln and Basel and all that.

We didn't know it at the time, but Christoph and his friend, Estevan, turned out to be our guardian angels, because they asked if we knew where we'd be staying in Montezuma and when we said we didn't, they recommended we stay where they were going to be staying. You know, just having met them, well, we were just a little wary, but we said that's a possibility so they suggested we follow their car off the ferry. At first, we told them we'd find the hotel ourselves, still not sure we were even going to stay at the place they were suggesting. By the time the ferry docked though, it was dark and starting to rain. As Guillermo and Christoph went below to get the cars, Estevan and I stood on the deck with the other people waiting to get off. It was dark, and starting to rain harder, and I mentioned to Estevan that maybe it WOULD be a good idea to follow them to the hotel. He called Christoph and let him know and when Guillermo and Christoph emerged with their cars from the ferry, we all found each other and we followed Christoph's little blue car out of town. It is such a good thing we decided to follow them. In the dark, and with all the rain (a lot of it VERY heavy), it would have been REALLY REALLY hard for us to do the drive by ourselves. Then, as luck would have it, we also ended up being Christoph and Estevan's guardian angels!!!   About 8 Kilometers from the hotel, the boys pull into a gas station. We followed them in there, thinking they were just running low on gas, but it turns out one of their tires got punctured in one of the many huge potholes in the streets we had been on and trying to avoid (sometimes unsuccessfully). After spending some time at the gas station trying to take off the tire and getting nowhere (and the whole time it continued to rain really hard), we realized now we were there to help THEM. So, they had no choice but to leave their car there at the gas station, and they rode with us the rest of the way to the hotel. So, it turns out they not only helped us, but we were their guardian angels too!

The hotel we stayed at that night was very very nice, and we had a WONDERFUL dinner there. Our room is beautiful, and they told us there's a nice view of the ocean from our room, and sure enough, in the morning, we could see the ocean from our balcony.

We just felt so lucky to have met those guys, and to be led in the dark and the rain to such a nice place to stay.

Real time news

We had breakfast in our hotel and then drove out to the car rental place so that Fernando could be a driver of the rental car, too. From there, we went to the Jumbo supermarket and Fernando stocked up on items he would need for his first week at the research station. We picked up a few things, also, and then we drove Fernando out to Santa Rosa National Park. We helped him unload all his stuff at his room, and then we said good bye to him. We will see him and Eva in about 7 days. Guillermo and I are going to visit a few places in Costa Rica while Fernando does what he needs to do at the research site. Eva will fly in on the 7th, and we will meet up with both of them on the 11th.
Before we left Santa Rosa, we made reservations for ourselves in the park, for the 11th, and then we headed back to Liberia. First thing we did was drive to the airport to get our luggage. That was more of an ordeal than we thought it´d be. We had to wait a while, and then, they opened our luggage and took away from us our packages of beef jerky. They even put Guillermo´s name down on a database as someone trying to bring meat into Costa Rica!!! We couldn´t believe it!! The worst part is that Guillermo didn´t even know I had beef jerky in my suitcase, but he took the fall for me. And all this because of the mess up with planes yesterday. When we arrived at this exact same airport yesterday with just our carry-ons, they didn´t even LOOK inside of those.  Because if they would have, they would have found more beef jerky in those carry-ons than what they confiscated from my suitcase the next day!!  Just bad luck for that part, is all.  At least we were able to bring to Fernando the beef jerky that was in our carry-ons.
After that, we found a nice little place to have lunch, and then we checked back into the same hotel we had last night. This time we got the room Fernando had last night!!
It is hot here in Liberia!!

We are in Liberia, Costa Rica

December 2, Wednesday was a sort-of nerve-wracking day for us. We got to the airport nice and early, our good friend Sergio took us, and when we got past security and to our gate, we found out the plane we were waiting for had been turned back to Dallas!!! Which meant, even though they were sending another plane out, that we would be delayed by more than an hour. Well, that would make our connection in Dallas almost impossible. The people at American though, were very nice and tried to do everything possible, even triple booking us on flights, just in case one or the other didn´t work out.
Well, we managed to get on another American flight that left an hour and forty minutes after our original flight. Our connection in Dallas was due to leave at 1pm, and we arrived in Dallas at 12:50. We had resigned ourselves to missing that flight, and were thinking we´d probably have to spend the night in Miami. So, we get on the tram at 5 to 1, and the tram took FOREVER to get to the concourse we needed to be at. We race to our gate, and THE PEOPLE ARE STILL BOARDING!!! We look at the board, and it says the plane is now due to leave at 1:15, but it was probably already 1:10. So, we considered ourselves very very lucky to have made that flight. All signs pointed to us missing it.
So, the rest of the trip that day went smoothly EXCEPT for the fact that our luggage didn´t arrive with us. But we were just so absolutely relieved that we would be meeting Fernando in Liberia as planned. It really bothered us to know that we wouldn´t be able to see him until the next day, if we were lucky, since he probably would have gone on to Santa Rosa, where he´ll be doing his research.
Liberia was very warm, and after getting our rental car, meeting Fernando and getting our hotel room, we walked to a nearby restaurant and had some pizza and pasta. The day ended just great, even if we did have to wear our old clothes again. :-)

Aggravations

It's a cold rainy day today, and yet we have to trek out into it. There is yet ANOTHER Bexar County meeting today, where we feel we need to be present. The opposition to the buyout will be there in full force this time, because they felt squelched by the last meeting. So, we at least need to represent another side. Guillermo is in there finalizing what he's going to say to the court.
But it's very aggravating, because we shouldn't have to fight for something the officials should be doing based on the facts, and not which side has the most people. It's a public safety issue!!!!! I mean, COME ON!!!

Then, this evening, there's a meeting at Leon Valley, where the opposition will also be, but we aren't sure if we will make that meeting or not. It's getting ridiculous.

And on top of all that, we leave tomorrow for Costa Rica. The one bright spot amid all this. :-)

Ok, so we went to the meeting at Bexar County at 11 this morning and it was cold and pouring rain. It was rough. The meeting itself was long and boring until they got to our part, and several of us got up to speak. Then the opposition spoke, and tore into a lot of what our group said. It really wasn't that good of a meeting, but at least the commissioners let the opposition know that they did not approve of their tactics, and reiterated that the project is moving forward. So, that's good. We left the meeting and it was still pouring rain and it was like that the entire way home.

In the evening, Guillermo stayed for all of the meeting at Leon Valley, and I only stayed for part of it. But I missed the best part!!! Evidently he couldn't stay quiet about what some of the opposition was saying, and got up to speak even though he hadn't planned on it. I had already left by then, and when he got home he told me he felt that he had nailed down his NON-SCRIPTED speech. He felt he got some points across to not only the opposition, but to the council itself. People clapped for him when he was done and told him he had done an excellent job. How I wish I had been there to see that. I would have been so proud. :-)