I'm home

Wanted to let everyone know I'm home safe. Flight was on Wednesday and got in at about 12:30 to lax and home by 2:30.

Few more blog posts to come filled with more pictures and an account of what happened my last week in Costa Rica!

I'm alive!

Hey everyone! Interrnet has been kind of spotty on the road  but I just want to let you all know I'm safe.
The last two nights we stayed in Rio Celeste in the northern part of Costa Rica. We got up early this morning to go for a great hike and saw over 20 species of birds.
We are now in the Arenal area staying in La Fortuna. Tomorrow we are going to take a ferry across the lake and spend a day or two in Monteverde. From there we'll plan what we want to do until our flight on Wednesday!
Thought I'd make sure you all knew I was safe though.... And I learned I'm not a huge fan of mud baths... Good thing it was free!

End of turtle season

Here are some pictures from the last few days at Costa de Oro. We had the giant BBQ Monday evening. At 4:30 the neighborhood kids came over to join us. It was our normal turtle release time but we didn't have any turtles to release that night. They hung out a little bit and we had so much food I gave some to them as well.

The next night we had about 300 turtles to release! We all decided that we should dig up the nests to see what was going on. From the time that an olive ridley turtle hatches to them reaching the surface is three days - they fall asleep a lot. With that being said, we thought there should be turtles in a couple nests and that would cut down what we were leaving the our locals to tend to (7 nests). After opening four nests that morning we decided to go and check a couple more just to see what was going on. We did only to find three more nests to come up that had babies hatched and ready to go.

Since it was midday and warm we couldn't release them then and saved them all for our 4:30 release with the neighborhood. During the day of packing we kept going out and checking the hatchery make sure nothing else exciting decided to happen while we were working inside the house. There was a nest we didn't think would have babies yet that we found one hatched from, though when it cooled off and we could sit on the sand we found that there was actually just that one baby that had hatched early.

When it came time for our last sunset pictures, Courtney really wanted her sand man. We were having troubles just building a regular sandman when Alvaro suggested we stick a trunk in the middle and build around it. The architect would suggest that. The kids had a lot of fun building the sandman with us and we put up some little palms for Christmas trees, Court had lights to add, and we decorated the sandman with my easily accessible bathing suit top and hat that weren't packed yet. (Mari and Jon - hope you like the sandman's Solution Surf hat).

Yesterday, Courtney and I  headed north up to Rio Celeste after the guys at the car rental agency in Liberia treating us like we were complete morons who had never been to Costa Rica. I don't think people get off planes looking as dirty as we did...

But none the less we were off and on our way into the rainforest.

Hasta luego Costa de Oro

This morning was a sad one. In fact the past few days have been pretty sad, packing up the house and saying goodbye to everyone. We had our BBQ on Monday and then a clean up day after. Last night was my last sunset at home. It was beautiful and filled with hundreds of baby turtles we had pulled up from their nests that morning. Perfect way to leave. Last night we had dinner at Drew's and brought our luggage up since we were either walking up here this morning or getting a ride with Alvaro on his quad. luckily we got the ride. Our friends live in Javilla and Costa de Oro is about 10 min the opposite direction, we already felt like they were doing us a huge favor we didn't want to inconvenience them any more by asking them to get us.

I don't have last night's sunset or any of the baby releases uploaded. Everything got packed and spent the night at Drew's, except me. I'll get some pictures posted when I get internet next. We are heading up to Liberia to pick up a car and then figuring out where we are going from there. I'll keep you all posted on my whereabouts though!

Waterfalls

Saturday we went for a little hike with some friends back in the hills of Javilla. Their property lines up to a waterfall that is about 60 feet high, at least what they told us. Unfortunately, there wasn't a water hole big enough for us to swim in but it was a fun site to see. Once we got the waterfall we then hiked around up to the top to take a look from the top of the waterfall. We talked about going up to the next fall, but I think we were all a little tired and starting to get a tiny bit hungry, so we opted to turn around and go back to the house. We hung out and socialized for a little bit and then they gave us a ride back to the house. They had a new truck, Victor and I were having a discussion on the way up about how nice the bed of the truck was in comparison to others we have sat in on the very bumpy roads here.

Two more nights here, in no way am I ready to leave. I woke up this morning just thinking about all the work that needs to be done. Luckily we are having a BBQ at our house today for all the projects so we can stay at home and get some packing done while everyone comes to us. We are having pork ribs, a leg and some steaks, all cooked on a pit that is going to be dug out on the beach. I was pretty excited when I heard. But it is one more chance to see everyone before we leave.

Our friends we went hiking with are heading up to Liberia on Wednesday so we are going to get a ride with them up that way and pick up a car in Liberia to go out on our adventure. We got lucky that they didn't mind us tagging along because I think Courtney and I were both not looking forward to taking the bus (and 8 hour bus ride).

December 2

Okay okay, I'm lagging with the sunsets a day. Here is last nights sunset from the hatchery. I thought the clouds were too pretty and much more exciting being from the hatchery rather the beach again.