After postponing international travel the past two years we were delighted to travel to Costa Rica for the kids’ spring break.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There were so many things we loved about this trip! We stayed in vacation rental and experienced a slice of daily life. We walked to the market, bakery, fruit shop and restaurants. We enjoyed ice cream three times (RJ’s favorite part of the trip). We waved to neighbors, saw kids playing soccer, saw women hanging laundry and encountered thin dogs meandering about.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Our house was an oasis with beautiful tropical plants and a refreshing swimming pool. It was adjacent to a pond that hosted ducks, geese peacocks and other birds. The strutting peacocks were a daily source of entertainment and named by the kids “Sir Struts-A-Lot”, “Sir Squawks-A-Lot” and the peahen was named “Penny”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Our adventures were thrilling! We soaked in the 25 pools heated by the volcano at Baldi and had lunch with views of the volcano. We went white water rafting and saw a flock of Toucans cross the river. We rode on horseback through meadows, canyons and river beds to get to a large waterfall. We took stairs down to the waterfall, swam at the base and counted 512 steps as we marched back up. We went on ziplines and a did a crazy Tarzan swing (all but Kristel did the swing). From above the forest canopy we had an amazing view of steam coming from the volcano. Finally we silently walked with a guide who showed us sleeping sloths, a howler monkey, turtles, lizards, frogs and birds of the rainforest.<\/p>\n\n\n