Flying Around

Whew, we've been a bit busy the last few weekends/weeks, but I wanted to post about our last big vacation at least! It started out as flying to Michigan for a wedding. We took the red eye getting in Saturday morning and got in a little nap before heading up to Ann Arbor for one of my middle school friends' wedding (she also lives in Seattle now...and works at UW...so we still see each other pretty often!)

We spent the rest of the weekend at the parent's house and had a little dinner party Sunday night with the extended family. That was a super quick little stop on our trip, and so much going on! Monday afternoon, we hopped a plane again...this time to Costa Rica for the rest of the week! We got in late Monday night and stayed the night in San Jose. The hotel was super cute with great views!

Tuesday morning, we started a long road trip. We wanted to stop by a couple of volcanos on our trip to the coast, so we took the long route. Turns out that was maybe not the best day for it since it was foggy all day long...phooey. The first volcano we hiked up to the edge of it...and the crater was completely filled with fog...so we saw nothing. The drive was super pretty though through the mountains! The second volcano was a little more successful. We actually got to it just in time for the US soccer game and found a lodge halfway up the volcano that was playing the game in the bar, so we made a pit stop there for a few hours. It was so much fun watching the game! What made it even more awesome was that there was a giant volcano right behind us...and there were monkeys swinging from the trees on it! The top of the volcano was still covered in fog, but we could see most of it by the end of game watching, and it was right on the edge of a huge lake too which was really pretty. We still had a long drive after that, so we hurried out after the game and hit the road. The mountain jungle roads were ridiculous. Super curvy and steep and they apparently don't believe in shoulders on the road or any kind of buffer between you and the cliff down the mountain. It was a little scary at times!

We made it to the coast late Tuesday night and settled into our hotel for the rest of the week. It was right on the beach and super pretty with a 24 hour pool, which was amazing!

the view from our room

Wednesday we enjoyed the pool for a few hours before heading to the next town to hop on a catamaran for the night. It actually started thundering and lightening as soon as we got on the boat...but the most it ever did was sprinkle while we were cruising. We still ended up doing some great snorkeling and watching a lovely sunset on our way back into shore! I love being on a boat.

Thursday we hit up a nearby beach so Ryan could do some surfing. Supposedly it's one of the best beaches in the country. It was right by our hotel and it was EMPTY and the waves were pretty massive! I parked myself on the beach and listened to my audio book while Ryan did some surfing. There were a few other people scattered about, but for the most part we had it to ourselves!

We went into the next town for a late lunch on the beach and to pick up a few groceries. When we made it back to the hotel, we pulled in just as Ryan's brother, Aaron and his gf were walking in! Chena (Aaron's gf) booked them a trip to Costa Rica to join us for a few days as his bday gift, so they got in on Thursday to overlap a few days while we were there too!

Friday morning we had a little pool/beach time again before heading out for some zip lining!

Friday night we headed back into Tamarindo (a nearby town) for some dinner and drinks. We found a great little restaurant at the end of the road that had some amazing Costa Rican food. Some random local drunks walking down the street recommended it to us, and they were spot on. It was amazing! We finished off the night with some drinks on the beach.

Saturday we did a little more surfing in the morning until it was time for the Costa Rica World Cup game! The whole town was super pumped for it and all morning long people were passing by with flags flying and honking horns and cheering! We started out watching the first half of the game and a random tiki bar right off of the beach. It was super tiny and everyone was crowded around one tv, but they were loving every minute of it and cheering for EVERYTHING. It was great! At halftime we headed down to another restaurant to get some food and finish off the game. It's a good thing we did too since it ended up being a really long game and we were hungry! Although it didn't turn out how we wanted, it was awesome to be in Costa Rica for the game and see how excited everyone was to see their little country on the world stage!

After the game we did a little more surfing. This time Chena and I got to catch a few waves. It hard for everyone to surf at the same time and leave our other belongings on the beach because theft is pretty bad there, so someone stayed back to watch the stuff each time. We surfed into the sunset though, and had a great time! That was our last night in Costa Rica and we just wanted to relax and hang out so we had some late night pool time then ordered room service and played games the rest of the night.

Sunday morning Ryan and I had to drive back to San Jose to catch our flight home. We had a lovely wake up call to an earthquake!! It was actually perfect timing because it woke us up right when we needed to get up and on the road around 6:30am. That was the first time I have ever actually felt an earthquake though and it took me a few minutes to figure out what it was since we were half asleep when it happened. Theeeeen...we got all packed up and checked out just to find that we had a flat tire on our car! Not a good way to start a 5 hour drive to the airport! Luckily the replacement tire in the trunk was a real tire not just the little spare tires they usually are, so Ryan did a quick swap out and we were on the road. This time it was a much shorter drive on much better roads, which was a nice surprise. We got there with plenty of time to turn in our car and make it to the airport. The flight home was awesome in first class ;)  Great way to end a vacation!