Two Weekends: Two Adventures!

What a fantastic two weeks we have had! We've had two incredibly adventurous weekends with two solid work weeks in between. Two Sundays ago Ivan and I met up with the San Jose Kymco Scooter club. We happened to catch a small group week, as it was just us, the leader, a 27 year old super scooter enthusiast named Ever and a charming couple in their late thirties named Jimsy and Eric. All of us had some version of a Kymco Scooter with CC's ranging from 275-500, so we were all stocked and ready for the open road. Our trip took us  down the autopista for a while and then on to a beautiful, curvy back road through some of the most beautiful mountains, hills and small towns. It looked like we were in the Shenandoah Valley, not Central America! Each small town has a town center with a lovely church, so passing through each town brings something interesting to look at. It took us a bit more than an hour on the road to reach our destination: Zarcero. Zarcero is a small town with an incredible central plaza, notable for some crazy and beautiful shrub sculptures and a beautiful church. 






We spent most of the morning into the afternoon just lounging around the plaza enjoying the day. On the way back we passed through a different set of towns, including Sarchi, famous for their artisan furniture and "ox carts", a Costa Rican-specific artisan craft that consists of a brightly painted ox cart wheel sold at great expense. On the way back we also hit some rain but I was surprised at what a non-event it was with all the rain gear on. The bike handled great and we are looking forward to going again. 

This past weekend Ivan and I celebrated our two year anniversary on another bike trip! This time, we headed for the beach. We left early Saturday morning bound for Playa Manta, one of the closest beaches to San Jose and known for having calmer waters. We found the road there just fine, but then nearly pooped ourselves hobbling over 3.5 kilometers of holey, dirt road to get finally to the beach. But it was such a great beach! The water was indeed flatter and the beach was smaller than Esterillos Oeste but lovely, palm lined and perfect for a relaxing day. We left around two after we discovered that the high tide literally pushes you all the way back into the trees! Once we were up off the sand we figured it was time to go. We headed to an Air BnB I had found that was about a half hour on the way back to San Jose, off, we discovered, another dirt road! This one was only about a kilometer. At the BnB we met the lovely Claudine, a Luxemburgian transplant to Costa Rica who had a "casita" (little house) in her back yard by her awesome pool. The casita was adorable and the "backyard" was a professionally designed tropical garden surrounded by jungle and, of course, with a really great pool. We swam, we rested, we even walked back to the main road to eat dinner at a great little soda right on the corner of street. It was just such a great find! The next morning, Claudine cooked us breakfast on her porch which overlooked the jungle and was so high up that you could see the coast and ocean, not to mention all of the scarlet macaws playing in the trees! Needless to say, we very much enjoyed our little anniversary trip! The only downside was getting caught in the rain on the way back....and choosing NOT to put on our rain gear. I won't make that mistake again!