Around Punta Del Este, UR

Family Picture - so much fun!

Punta Del Este Lighthouse - Still working!

Jose Ignacio lighthouse, south of where we are staying. Also still working. Funny story on the way to visit the beach and the lighthouse. We were just driving along enjoying the view along the coastal road and then a cop appears up ahead. I wasn't speeding, but he was just pulling people over to check identification and what not. So guess what...he signalled for me to stop and pull over. He is speaking spanish to us and of course we don't understand it. He says..."American". We say "Si" But, then he just keeps speaking in Spanish. Long story short...we didn't have any ID on us besides copies of our passports. Thru alot of hand signals we told him we would go get it and come back, because he wouldn't let us go any further. So, we turned around went and got it came back and showed it to him. Thank goodness he would of taken the car and arrested me. EEKS! With that delay in our day we missed hiking up the lighthouse 120 steps by 3 minutes. So, we went to the park and Ava fell down and scraped her knee really bad. Just one of those days. We can go back to climb the 120 steps. It is not to far.

Around Punta Del Este, UR

We have had a lot of fun exploring our new home away from home the last few weeks. The kids have had a alot of fun catching small crabs with their nets. We brought 2 of them home, but they escaped. Thank goodness they were outside. We have also expolored the local parks. The 4th picture down is of Punta Del Este from the mansa side (the river side). Those tall buildings are all condo's. Punta Del Este is where all the rich and famous come to vacation from Argentina and Brazil. Google Punte Del Este and you can read all about it!

We are in the Southern Hemisphere!

Below are several pictures that I have taken over the last week. We got into Uruguay in the early morning of January 27th. That started our adventure and our realization that we could possibly be the only English speaking people for miles around. Now it was 5:30am in the morning and we had been up for 24 hours traveling with ALOT of baggage and kids, but it took us 3 attempts to get the paperwork right to get thru customs. "Oh she wants us to fill out 2 forms for each of us". Anyway...we made it! But, it is true not that many people speak English and we are fumbling our way thru. We can order at a restaurant, buy groceries, and do the day to day stuff. However, don't try to have a conversation with me because I don't know what you are saying and you don't know what I am saying. One of our goals on this adventure was to learn more Spanish so we are going to find a language school for us to attend. Last week we just got organized and figured out the lay of the land, where do we get groceries, where is the local cafe, where is the beach...basically how to live. The weather is beautiful this time of year but it was cold and very raining for about 3 days last week. They really needed it because it had not rained here in 5 months. We think we brought the Oregon rain! Big changes compared to Costa Rica - the ocean is cold here! It was about 78 degrees in Costa Rica (tropical) and the water here is about 65-68 degrees. And...it is only about 80 degrees here not 90! But, the biggest of all is that we have a women by the name of Karen (from Chicago) who is the kids homeschool teacher. She has been here for only a day and she is great. She is living with us as part of her pay. We have a "maids" quarter out back which is her space. We call it the "teacher" room! She is fluent in Spanish, so that should also help! That is about all we have been up to this week. Uruguay is a very beautiful place. Beaches, sand dunes, long ocean grasses, pine trees, and crisp ocean breezes. From our house you can be out in the country with in 5-8 min ride. All the development is along the coast line. Oh, also a big change is we have internet at the house! So, you should see more postings from me. Chow!

Ava lost her first tooth!

BIG NEWS! Ava lost her first tooth! We didn't even know it was loose. We were in the car and she said "Daddy I am bleading" and on the seat next to her in the car was her tooth. She received $30 Uruguain Peso's from the tooth ferry! (Rich - A little over a dollar)

Our house in Uruguay!

This is our house in Uruguay. It is only 3 blocks from the beach and we can hear the ocean . The name of our house in "Pura Vida". Which ironically is a Costa Rican motto- meaning pure life. It is commonly said in Costa Rica, but our house is in Urugay. They guy we rented it from used to live in Costa Rica. That is our little red car parked out front. It is very compact, but is fine for what our needs are. It is a great house on a double lot so the kids can play out side! Almost all the houses down here have built in BBQ's which we are really loving. They BBQ with real wood! Such a nice flavor to whatever you are cooking. We don't have a dryer down here, so we use a clothes line! Things you take for granted, dishwasher and clothes dryer! We are really enjoying the house it has 3 french doors that open out to the yard and big patio out back. It is a great indoor/outdoor living house. Home away from home!

Uruguay!

1st picture: Kids eating at McDonald's in Punta del Este. They have not seen a McD's in 2 1/2 months. The fries taste the same, but they didn't have ketchup.

2nd picture: Kids looking out at the water!

Uruguay!

1st picture: Fish market - fresh off the boats!

2nd picture: At the end of the pier

3rd picture: The Yachy Cory and I are going to buy! Someday...maybe?

4th and 5th picture: "The Hand" was done by a Spanish artist. It looks like a hand is coming up out of the sand.

Costa Rica what a beautiful country...

We are now in Uruguay and I hope you enjoy the pictures below from our travels around Costa Rica before we left. We had a great time and got to see and do alot of things. We left Nosara on the bumpy 40 minute drive to pavement and have not seen a gravel road with pot holes since. I have to say I do miss Nosara, it is a great small community with amazing beaches and a tranquility that you can not describe. We met several poeple there that we will stay in touch with probably for the rest of our lives. We got to see 2 very different places on our trip. When we were up in Arenal we hiked, relaxed, and went to Baldi hot springs (highlight of the trip). The kids got to swim in hot springs and they had slides. The pools ranges from 93 degrees to 109 degrees. Then we went down to Manuel Antonio. It is a very touristy town. I felt like I was in another country compared to Nosara. The beach is beautiful, but lined with umbrellas you can rent for the day from $6-$10, people you can order drinks and food from, people selling everything, banana boats, parasailing, jet skis, you name it you could do it there. We went to dinner one night to listen to music and a taxi pulls up full of tourist. They were dressed nice for dinner, the kids had their hair combed. I turned to Cory and said I think we are in a different country. It was completely opposite of Nosara. You just wore your swimsuit everywhere, flip flops or not, hair combed or not, just being you! I like both, but both very different. It was great to talk to the kids about the differences and how both are perfect. We enjoyed ourselves very much but were eager to get to our new home away from home. We are now in our house in Uruguay and what a beautiful place. Stay tuned for pics! We have interenet at the house, so I will be able to keep the blog updated on a regular basis. Miss you all!

Last week in Costa Rica

See below for what we did our last week. I am also working on uploading pictures to another website, so you will be able to view more of what we are doing and seeing. I am trying to take alot of pictures for us to remember and to share with everyone.

1st and 2nd picture are of monkeys right outside and on our deck in Manuel Antonio.

3rd picture is of Manuel Antonio beach - way different than Nosara.

4th picture having lunch with and incredible view.

5th picture getting ready to go jet skiing! Alot of fun!

Last week in Costa Rica

I am back to were I have internet connection! We are in Uruguay now, but I thought I would first catch you up on what we did the last week we were in Costa Rica. We spent 8 days traveling around Costa Rica visiting 2 of the most visited spots in the Country. Arenal Volcanoe and Manuel Antonio. We had such a great time. We started out leaving Nosara and driving to Arenal to see the volcanoe and lake. Then we drove down to Manuel Antonio which is in central Costa Rica. On our drive to Manuel Antonio we got to see some of the earthquake distruction. Large landsides that washed away entire hillsides. Once we got to Manuel Antonio we relaxed on the beach, went jet skiing, enjoyed monkeys from our hotel room. Then we drove from Manuel Antonio to San Jose where we stayed the night and caught a plane the next day to Uruguay.

Top picture is the view we had from our hotel room in Manuel Antonio.

2nd picture is the family with Arenal Valconoe in the background. It was mostly cloudy while we were there so we never got to see more than that! It is an active volacanoe and if you are a lucky visitor and get to see boulders and even lava flows. We were not one of them!

3rd picture is of a hike we did thru the jungle over 16 bridges, 6 of them were hanging bridges. It was a great way to see the jungle.

4th picture is a view of Lake Arenal from the dam.

5th picture is of Playa (beach) Ostional which is north of Nosara. It is a black sand beach that is protected because of the turtles that nest on that beach.

We are on the road...

Hola Familia and Amigos,
I won´t be blogging for a week or so. We are leaving Nosara on Sunday and traveling around Costa Rica for 8 days. Then we are off to Punta Del Este, Uruguay. Our new house has internet, so I should be able to post more often. I promise once we get settled I will upload pics of our travels and our new place.

Week ending Saturday 1/10

What were up to last week?

Pictures (top to bottom) The neighborhood kids all on a floaty in the pool! Having too much fun in the sun! Turantula, it is a baby. It was on one of the noodles in the pool. The kids showingoff their paintings I did on them. The last picture is of me volunteering at Escuelita; which is at the local elementry school for Costa Rican's. They are off for thier break and the Gringos in town put together an program for them while they were out of school. I painted faces for 3 hours! It was alot of fun. I learned Spanish from all the little girls - Flores (flowers) Mariposa (butterfly). It was alot of fun.

Change of plans!

I have not been taking as many pictures lately, but thought I would update you on what we have been doing and most importantly where we are off to. We have decided to travel more now that we are down here we are getting the travel bug. We have met some many people who are traveling with children and visited so many places. So, we have decided to leave Nosara and travel around Costa Rica for 10 days then we are catching a plane and heading down to Uruguay. Sounds maybe crazy to some, but we (Cory) actually did research on Uruguay also. I just couldn't take the leap to travel down there (so far away), but since we are down here why not. The World is too big to stay in one place. Who knows where this adventure will take us, so we definetly need to take advantage of it. Our goal is to figure out who can live somewhere like Costa Rica or Uruguay part time and part time home in "sunny" Oregon. Stay tuned for news and pics.

Friends in CR

Hola, These are pictures of friends that we have met in Costa Rica. Brian, Danielle, Owen, and Lucy. Their kids are the same age as ours and get along great.

Having fun!

Last night we went to a house that is way up in the hills. Alot of the expat community that is here in Nosara was there. They had several belly dancers do a show. It was so beautiful. It is nights like that where adults and children are socializing in an amazing place, with good music, and dancing. The kids were so tired Ava was asleep in my arms before I could get to the car.