There, and Back Again… Part 1

 

Costa Rica Tour Diary / 19.May

Planning for a vacation of this size takes some serious organizing, going back to some initial talks, purchasing

the tickets, and finally planning parts of the trip were solidified. Booking Flights. Hotels. Fun stuff to do. Then
over the next couple of months more things are investigated – Travel tips. Restaurants. Highways and Driving.
Places to shop. Then the countdown really starts with stuff around the house. Clothes for the trip. Getting the
suitcases down. Figuring who will watch Mister.  Finally come the Packing & Preparing.  Passports. Camera.
iPods and iPhones. Obviously, I brought things like a notebook, sketchbook and design things
(hard to leave them at home) mostly for fun.

Then comes the last minute stuff as we are leaving for the airport. Is the house locked up? Mister fed?
 Passports? Plane tickets? Paperwork? With bags in hand, we head out to the cab and off to the airport. 
The only thing I forgot was a sweatshirt for on the plane. Luckily enough, I had an extra one on my suitcase.

We checked in relatively easy and moved quickly through security (unlike the last time I went to Texas – WOW!
 Different story then). We then headed into a bar for a quick drink before boarding our flight to Denver.

Flights can be fun. I’m busy working on writing all this down inside a small notebook I brought with me midway
 through our flight. Tasia is reading “The Girl that Played with Fire” while I rock out to my iPod (“Sick, Sick, Sick"
by QOTSA is on). I’m bopping my head and she’s annoyed with me. HA!!

One interesting thing I noticed is how many UGLY people are on our flight!! I mean just not good-looking people
at all. Oh well. I can stare at them to pass the time.

When I sing and mouth songs, Tasia smiles and laughs. Then I throw in some air drums too. Good times!! I’m
glad we are taking this trip. Allowing us to get closer and have on-on-one time for a week straight. I love her
very much and want this vacation to be AWESOME!!

We are almost to Denver for our long layover. Blah.

 

/ 20.May

So last night waiting at the Denver airport was, how should I say, FUCKING HORRIBLE!! We got in around
 5pm, YELPED for a place to eat and went to the highest rated place there – Chef Jimmy’s Italian. Let me tell
 you – it was AWFUL!! Never eat there! The food (Bad), the service (acted like we weren’t even there), not
 clean (dust and dirt), the FAKE plastic utencils, and the cost… WAAAAAAY to much for shitty airport food. 
We decided to chalk it up as a bad dinner and move on with our lives. Unfortunately we ended up back at Chef
 Jimmy’s for drinks later that night. Let me explain – We had 5 hours to kill before our 11:45pm flight. We tooled
 around the airport,
 

I watched part of the Laker game while Tasia read. I tried to sleep (on the floor) and on some broken benches,
 but couldn’t get comfortable. Knowing that we had some Xanex to help sleep on the flight, decided to have a
 drink or 2 to help the process. Unfortunately, everything closes down around 9ish, except one… you guessed
 it – MOTHER FUCKING CHEF JIMMY’S!!! So I downed 2 Captain & 7’s while T had wine. We popped
 our pills and boarded our flight.

The flight was pretty full and I have a problem sleeping on planes anyways. According to Tasia I slept good,
 getting about 3 hours of sleep and she slept a few as well. We got into San Jose, CR around 5am.

Customs and Immigration were easy & painless. Getting our rental car was a bit of a hastle, as well as
 getting out of the city. Once we were on the open road... WOW!!! It is beautiful here! The lush tropical tree
 & plants. The rolling hills and mountains. Streams and water ways were all quite impressive. Sure, there
 are tiny, windey unsafe roads with MANIACS driving on them but we survived the 4 hour jaunt to our first hotel
 – Hotel Mountain Paradise in Arenal. With bungalow style room, a heated pool, jacuzzi and swim-up bar, this
 place rocked!!!

We showered and headed down to the pool for a dip and a drink. It was almost too hot to sit in the pool, but 
the rain cooled everything down. In the afternoon (after a quick nap), we headed out to our first adventure –
 Zip Lining. We didn’t have high expectations, but we couldn’t be more wrong. It was a BLAST!!! So much fun
 and a real high adventure experience. People that zip line in other places will probably be wishing they had 
our experience. The spectacular sight of us flying through the jungle canopy at 40 miles per hour; Awesome
and unforgettable!