I think just about everyone I talked to in the last few months either had gone, or knew someone who had gone, to Costa Rica. Everyone said how great and beautiful it is so I had high hopes for our trip. I went with my brother, Michael, and his family – his wife, Sandra, and the kids, Alex, Krista and Rachel. We got in pretty late the first night so we stayed in a hotel right near the airport and went right to bed. We had been warned about the poor roads, lack of road signs and crazy drivers so we were prepared for the worst as we headed out the next morning. We were headed to La Fortuna, a small town and the main touring base for the area around the Arenal volcano. The road that the hotel had suggested was very windy, but at least it was paved and the signs were just fine. The windiness was tough for the unlucky ones stuck in the back of the minivan so we had to take a few breaks along the way. At the first one we had our first experience with a batido, or Costa Rican milkshake. It’s not what you would expect. There is tons of great fruit in Costa Rica (CR), and as a result, there are a lot of great fruit juices. Real juice, not the kind with all the sugar and junk added. Well, they also like to mix these with milk, and not the lowfat variety. In Spanish they call it “en leche” or “con leche”. You have to understand that Michael and family are all fruit fanatics so they dove right into these batidos. A little while later we saw a small stand with piles of pineapples and bananas. There was no sign and no one was around, but we stopped anyways. Remember, I told you they were fruit fanatics. We soon realized that the bananas were actually plantains, which are great for cooking, but not for eating raw. A guy came out from the house to help us. My brother, in his limited but improving Spanish, asked if he had any bananas. So he bent down, reached under a shelf and grabbed a huge handful and gave them to us – no measuring or counting. He asked if we wanted any pineapples. We said sure, but there was one problem. We had no knife to cut it with. No problem. He smiled, took out his handy machete, grabbed a pineapple and sliced it up in seconds and we were chowing down on fresh pineapple and bananas. When Michael asked him how much we owed him, he basically said, “Whatever.” Giving him the equivalent of 2 bucks he protested saying it was too much!
La Fortuna isn’t completely taken over by tourists, but there are a lot of tour companies offering everything from ATV tours to canopy tours. After the drive we were starving so we found a restaurant in town serving “tipical” CR food. We figured we might as well sample it right away so we tried something called “casados”. It turns out that means something like tapas, or samplers, and usually consists of a grilled meat or fish, rice, beans, and different types of vegetables and salad. We ended up getting this a number of times because it was real reasonable, with a good variety of food and for the most part very good. Our hotel turned out to be a real nice place with a great view of the volcano. 
The rooms were more like little cabins spread out over the grounds. They had a series of small pools, fed by hot springs and feeding into each other so the hottest ones were at the top. We decided to start near the bottom and work our way up. The pools were kind of secluded being surrounded by plants and trees. We tried out a few different ones and were really enjoying it until we were getting ready to leave. I went to grab my towel and stuff but couldn’t find my wallet. I hadn’t stuck it in the room safe because it was locked already when we got in the room. After searching around at all the pools we had gone to hoping to find that I had just dropped it, my heart sank as reality set in. It must have been the guy who was by himself and only stayed in the last pool a few minutes. He was real quiet and he was the only one who had come in besides us. I was pretty bummed but very grateful that I wasn’t there by myself. At least he didn’t take my passport so the vacation could go on. After canceling my credit cards and my ATM card we went back to the room to play cards. The front desk called a little while later saying that someone had turned in my wallet. The cash was all gone, of course, but he didn’t take anything else. Of course, my credit cards were now worthless, but at least I didn’t have to worry about how I was going to replace my South Dakota driver’s license!
The next day I was doing much better. We took one of CR’s ubiquitous canopy tours that was right on the property of the hotel. On a canopy tour you glide along, dangling from cables strung between platforms high up in the canopy of the trees. You’re actually strapped into a harness and attached quite safely to a pulley on the cable. Think zip lines on steroids. This one had 11 cables, some as long as 500 ft., and one that crossed over a river. One little girl was too small to go by herself but she couldn’t wait ‘til the guide would take her on the next cable. On the steep ones you could get going pretty fast, but if you “braked” too much (by pulling down on the cable with a leather glove) you came up short of the platform and had to pull yourself up the rest of the way. Michael, Sandra and the kids had all done a zip line before, but they said this was far better. I was looking forward to going on another one.
Later that day we took a short hike to La Fortuna waterfall. The waterfall was nice, but didn’t seem that spectacular. 
So far the weather had been hot and real humid so a swim in the natural pool around the waterfall sounded like a great idea. The water was pretty cool so I figured the best way was to just dive right in. The rest finally followed and we swam over to a cave across the pool. 
Getting there wasn’t easy because we had to fight the current formed by the force of the falling water pounding into the pool. At least swimming so hard helped me warm up in the water. It also helped us work up an appetite so later we headed back to our “tipico” restaurant and tried some other good CR food. As usual, it didn’t take them long to figure out that it doesn’t take long for me to get hungry. The one exception was the night I got my wallet stolen. I didn’t have much of an appetite that night. Just as we were coming to the restaurant it started pouring down rain. The restaurant was like most in La Fortuna in that it was covered, but it was open on most sides. Unfortunately, the roof was metal so the sound was deafening. The waitresses pulled a couple of small tables together near the center so we wouldn’t get hit by the spray of the rain. The rain had slowed a little by the time we ordered, otherwise I don’t think she could have heard us. When we asked if they had beer, she responded with an emphatic “Si” which made us quite happy as we were dying for some. Later we noticed another waitress running back, in the rain no less, from the store across the street with a brown bag. Inside were a couple of six-packs. This gesture of service above and beyond the call of duty, and the fact that she was quite cute, won our hearts and, not to mention, earned her a good tip. It definitely helped me forget about my wallet for at least one night.
The next day we headed out for Tamarindo, but not before taking a hike at the Arenal Volcano National Park. The top of the volcano was covered in clouds, but the hike through the lava fields were pretty cool, and it didn't stop the rest of the gang from finding there one and only geocache in CR. 
Coatis. More on these later...
The maids are aspiring artists
If we had only known....next time we stay here!
My new motto.