The daily commute

For those of you wanting a "taste of San Jose," here's what my daily commute to work looks like. This is one of about 5 different routes in to work, but this one is special. It features the infamous crossing over the "Bridge of Doom."

Mile 0.0 - leaving the house on "Rubesova Street." I didn't steal the sign from Prague - I bought it. Really!

Condominios Altos de Escazu.

Mile 0.25 - one of our favorite potholes. This one's been growing for over a month, and is shaping up to be a real car-swallower.

Mile 0.75 - I think they ran out of asphalt on this stretch. The lack of pavement makes the dumped building refuse fit right in.

Mile 1.0 - Kyler's preschool "The Kids' University", followed by the local dairy. "Se Vende Leche!" fresh from the cow each morning.

Mile 1.5 - One of about four river/creek/raging torrent crossings

Mile 1.75 - on the "Main Road" to Escazu. 6:45 traffic ain't bad.

Mile 2.0 - Mmm! A "Lunch Ejecutivo" at Tony Roma's would hit the spot!

Mile 2.75 - Hipermas grocery store. AKA "Walmart"



Mile 3.0 - The "Bridge of Doom". Jad saw the video, and said "Hmm - that looks like fun!" (much to his mother's horror)

[about a mile of very boring warehouses and train tracks]

Mile 4.12 - Just another day in Uncle Sam's service.

Volcano, with a side of cow tongue, please

OK - so you don't usually run into volcanoes and cow tongues on the same weekend, but there we were, in a hole-in-the-wall hotel/restaurant in the mountain town of Ciudad Quedasa and it just... happened.

It was pouring down rain, we had hours left to drive to get back to San Jose, and the guidebook recommended the Hotel Don Goyo's steak (it also said the hotel would make a great Quentin Tarantino movie setting, so we really couldn't go wrong.) We started leafing through the menu (only available in Spanish), and settled on steak looking items and a plate called "Lengua con salsa de carne." Using our excellent Spanish, we quickly deduced that "lengua" was something similar to "linguini" and that a plate of "Spaghetti with meat sauce" would soon appear.

What appeared was clearly not spaghetti, but we weren't sure what is was. Danna started digging into it with a gusto - "I've never tasted such yummy meat!" she commented between mouthfuls. And then it clicked - a memory from our honeymoon in a small town in Mexico (our only prior experience in a Spanish-speaking country), where Erin and I found our way to a local church for the Sunday morning service.

Once we figured out the passage for the day (James 3), we were able to piece together the gist of the sermon - "La importancia de una lengua hermosa" - or importance of a beautiful tongue. Kind of like the tongue Danna was chowing down on.

The meal was delicious - the best steak we've had... well almost ever. The meat was fresh from the surrounding high pastureland - and in fact, it may well have wandered right off those pastures directly into the kitchen. And, in case you're wondering, no snappily dressed hitmen visited us during the meal. Delicious tongues on a Tarantino movie set. And that's just at the lunch stop on the way back from the volcano!

Tasty tongues aside, a volcano was the real destination for our first trip out of San Jose - an active volcano. In fact, Volcan Arenál is listed as one of the ten most active volcanoes in the world - it's been continuously erupting since 1968! About 3 1/2 hours out of San Jose, the Arenal Observatory Lodge is the place to see it from. Situated on a ridge less than 3 kilometers from Arenal, you really can't get much closer without burning your feet. Getting here involves a 10 Km drive over "native road" - (rough, washed out gravel) after exiting the main road just Northwest of the town of La Fortuna.

The lodge started its life as an observation station for vulcanologists from the Smithsonian Institute, and still retains a bit of the original expeditionary feel. It's no luxury resort - but the rooms are comfortable and clean, the shower's hot and you really don't come all the way out here to watch TV or surf the internet anyway. You come all the way out here to sit on your balcony and watch the volcano slip in and out of the clouds.

The restaurant serves up delicious (though a bit pricey for a rustic lodge - $50 for lunch for our family of five) meals as well as a commanding view of both the Volcano and the Arenal Lake at its base. The breakfast buffet, included in the price of the room, is almost worth the price of admission in itself. There's even a buffet set up outside for the tropical birds.

The kids kept themselves entertained while waiting for food by taking up chess on both of the oversized boards. Kyler soon picked up the essence of the game - you use one chess piece to violently knock over another piece, until all the pieces are on their sides. Bobby Fischer he is not (yet).

What's really neat about this place is that you're really out in the middle of the woods. The woods in this case being real, live rain forest! Every morning, a guide from the lodge leads visitors on a free three hour hike; first over the property's hanging bridge and via paved trails, past trees, bushes and shrubs that are labeled for your Botanic edification. Did you know, for example, that the one of the primary ingredients of Chanel N°5 perfume is the leaf of an extremely fragrant tree that is pollinated by bats? I wouldn't have believed it until I sniffed a crushed handful of leaves.

The trek then heads off the beaten trail to a waterfall surrounded by green. A great place to break in new rain boots, throw rocks into the rapids and pretend you're Indiana Jones searching for the long lost somethingorother.

For those without kids... miles more of interesting hikes await - to lava flows, flooded craters and more.

Of course, being in the rain forest, critters abound as well. The purple flowery bushes buzz with hummingbirds, furry racoon-like critters roam the grounds looking for a handout, white-faced monkeys glare at you from the treetops, and if you pause to look carefully at the plants lining the trail, you find an incredible variety of tiny critters roaming about (pardon the scientific terminology in the above paragraph).

What do you really want after a hike in the rain forest? A soak in the hot tub, of course. Being a lodge in the rain forest, you do have to cross a hanging bridge to get to the pool and hot tub, but it's worth the walk!

All good volcano trips do have to come to an end, and soon we were back on the road to San Jose - winding up and up the narrow mountain roads, in the rain (they don't call it "rain forest" for nothing!), and eating delicious cow tongue along the way.

I get a feeling this (and not the litter-strewn, potholed streets of San Jose) is why people come to Costa Rica.

Painting day

One nice thing about this job? The free housing! Before we even arrive in a new country, a board meets, deliberates, and assigns us a house. Zimbabwe, Oman, Czech Republic or Costa Rica, we're assured of getting something livable to house us for the three years of the assignment. We're also assured that our house will be issued to us with government-standard white walls. Nine years and four houses after we started this Foreign Service life, we've always lived between white walls, and until now, we just haven't had the time, energy or experience to do anything about it. Perhaps being pregnant or arriving with a newborn in hand at each of our previous three posts had something to do with it?

Kyler surveys yet another white-walled bedroom

Our arrival in San Jose was different - for the first time, we had three walking kids... two of whom started school the week after we got here. Time to bring some color into our lives for a change!

Last week, Erin and her capable assistant (Kyler) made a trek down to San Jose's equivalent of Home Depot. Still without wheels, they summoned our new best friends - Taxis Escazu. Once the red taxi appears, the next trick is to use our two-week old Spanish to get the taxi where we want it to go. This conversation was about par for the course:

Driver: "¿A dónde?"

Erin: "Epa, por favor."

Driver: "¿Qué?"

Erin: "Epa, por favor?"

Kyler: "Kapachoowee"

Driver: ¿Qué?

Erin, at this point, writes down the name of the store... "EPA" on a piece of paper and shows it to the driver.

Driver: "Ah! Epa, si!"

At least they know how to find their way to our house now, which is more than I can say for Ambulance drivers around here - but that's another story. Anyway - EPA found an English speaking employee to help Erin out, and she came home equipped with paint and the tools of the trade.

After a quick breakfast, we shooed the kids out of the way and started work.

Good thing I'm tall - these ceilings are up there - even standing on top of furniture! Photos courtesy of Danna.

For newbies at this painting stuff, we didn't do to badly. Managed to keep the paint off the hardwood floors (mostly), the furniture (well, except for that one little spot), the kids (at least one of the three), and ourselves (eh... not really).

Walls dry, curtains back up and bed back in the room - all in one day!

By just after lunchtime, we had two of the three kids rooms done. Kyler and I put the finishing touches up in his "new" room by putting up his car, plane and train decals.

Yes - the paint was actually dry before he leaned on the wall!

Of course, the new base color is just the beginning. Both Jad and Danna would like their rooms to sink into the undersea universe of their imagination. Jad wants a shark staring at him every night. Kyler has asked for "Maskween" (Lightning McQueen from "Cars"). Not sure what's going to eventually appear on Danna's walls - unfortunately, our favorite mural artiste is still in Prague, so Ariel may not make a repeat appearance.

But... despite the fact that there's still paint under my fingernails, this stuff is kind of FUN! And really not a bad way to spend a rainy Saturday without wheels in Costa Rica. Who knows - in a couple weekends, we may not have any white walls left in this place!