Rachel In Costa Rica: Another Tamarindo Weekend

Okay, so now on to this OTHER weekend before last.

The week before this weekend was the last week of classes, so on Thursday we had a big presentation, and then on Friday we took our final exam for the month. Oh, and I guess I can't forget to mention that it was my birthday on the 23rd, so Tuesday night we all went out and had a great night, and then the rest of the week was spent trying to prepare for the presentation and exam. We also went to the opera on Thursday night, which was probably a mistake as far as being responsible (Wendy and I were up until about 3am that night studying and then packing for the weekend...the test was at 8am), but was a very interesting experience nonetheless. Wendy, Alyssa, Bernie and I got all dressed up and went to the Teatro Nacional, which is their nice, fancy theater here in San Jose. The name of the show was Gala Lírica, and it was basically like a recital; different piece of music being performed by different singers, sometimes solo and sometimes two or more of them together. At the beginning we were all a bit iffy, because the first few performers left much to be desired in the musical abilities department, but then the talented ones came out, and it ended up being a blast. I was also hesitant because in the past I've found opera to be a bit...well...boring, but it ended up being only about an hour and a half long show, including intermission, so it wasn't bad at all. It was nice to see the inside of a historical building in San Jose, and feel a little cultured at the same time.

So this past weekend was a 3 day weekend (we had Monday off), because it was the end of our intensive month and because all of the other 60 or more students from our program were arriving and had orientation on Monday. Thus, we had kind of a free weekend with no official excursions planned. Most people decided to head to Montezuma, which is more in the southwestern area of Costa Rica, in the province of Puntarenas. My friends Wendy, Walker and I decided instead to head back to Tamarindo, because Walker loves to surf and Wendy and I had a really good time the last time we were there.

There aren't really any words for that weekend that describe how incredible it was. It wasn't so much that we did a bunch of fun, new things. It was more about the atmosphere of the weekend. Tamarindo is becoming a very touristy place, but right now it's in the down season, so there are the perfect amount of people there; a really good mix of locals and visitors. You don't have to make reservations, the beaches aren't too crowded, and you still get a sense that you are in a different country instead of feeling like you could be anywhere in the world surrounded by the same kinds of tourists. The hostel we stayed at is named La Botella De Leche, which means The Bottle of Milk. It´s this absolutely fantastic hostel where pretty much everything but the rooms is open air with roofs over it, and it has a courtyard (complete with a shower to rinse off yourself and your surfboard), a communal kitchen, and a common area that is like a living room, with a computer with free internet and a television and lots of comfortable places to lounge. The rooms each have their own mini porch area with a hammock and some kind of seat. It is a very comfortable place, and the community there is great, because everyone is there for the same reason: surfing, hanging out at the beach, sleeping, and going out at night. It´s great. Here are some pictures:

Wendy celebrating our awesome room at the hostel

Walker lovin' his surfboard (tabla de surf)

The courtyard (see the sweet shower?)

Outside of our room

A few of some of the other rooms at the hostel

The communal kitchen

The common area

So anyway, the weekend consisted of pretty much everything I listed above. Though my friend Wendy and I are not surfers, we met a ton of them, and hung out with them during the afternoons and nights, when they weren´t surfing (the time to surf is at high tide early in the morning and then again in the late afternoon or evening, until it gets dark). Wendy and I did try surfing though...we each got up and rode a wave about 2 times out of about 100 attempts, haha. It was still really fun to keep trying and trying, though, and the water in Tamarindo is pretty shallow, so it was not very scary to fall off the board. I did get knocked pretty hard on the left side of my head once, but that was at the beginning of the session and trust me, I did not let it happen again. Ouch. It was also nice because usually people hire surf instructors, but we had our new friends Cole and Bryan there to teach us, so all we had to do was pay $10 for rental of the surfboards for 2 hours, and we were good to go. That was just one afternoon, though. The rest of the weekend we were able to lounge around at the beach, walk around to different fun restaurants for breakfast, lunch, and dinner (although we did cook a few meals in the communal kitchen, which was pretty fun: chicken nuggest, macaroni and cheese, smoothies, and toast...very cuisine), and then go out at night, which usually required multiple nap times the following day, because in Costa Rica the parties last until 4am.

The best part about this weekend was the commmunity and the shared interest for world traveling. We met so many amazing people who had been traveling for months. A few examples include:

:: A group of five rowdy, obnoxious, hilarious Australian surfer dudes who basically loved three things - partying, girls, and surfing - who had been traveling around the United States, Central America, and who were on their way to Canada to live there for the entire snowboarding season, "until the snow stops falling"
:: Two Canadian guys (Bryan and Cole, who I mentioned before), who are actually snowboarders from Vancouver traveling around Costa Rica and Nicaragua for a couple of months
:: Two guys from Denmark, both athletes who wanted to try their hand at surfing
:: A dreadlocked 40-year-old man named Steve who was also from Australia, who grows pot in his backyard for a living
:: Another Canadian named Mike who was traveling alone and ended up decided to travel with Steve, Bryan, and Cole
:: An incredibly good-looking couple from Germany
:: A random smattering of other people who were traveling alone, mostly from Europe, who ended up meeting other people and deciding to travel with them because they were all going the same direction
:: Two British guys named Will and Ollie, who we met on the bus on the way back to San Jose from Tamarindo, and who we ended up hanging out with the next night, singing karaoke

And others, as well. We were all staying at the same hostel, sharing stories and talking about the best places to travel to next, discussing religion and sociology, and watching trashy movies and television and napping on the couches, or else cooking and playing cards, before all heading out in a group to see where the best place was to go for the night. The vibe of the weekend was fantastic, and I felt like I could live like that forever. It inspired me (and Wendy) to go on a world trip of our own someday in the next few years, and it really reaffirmed my belief in experiential learning, and the benefits of living out of a backpack for months, actually taking time to learn about the world by meeting people and being spontaneous and open to other cultures. I now have no doubt in my mind that I am going to do that someday.

So anyway, after a long weekend of all that amazingness, Wendy and I had to get back on a bus for an almost 7 hour bus ride back to San Jose. We were both pretty whiny and complainy about having to leave, but we plan on going back again in a couple of weekends when Cole and Bryan are there again (they have the luxury of being able to decide to spend their last couple of weeks in Central American in Tamarindo), so I guess I'll just have to wait until then.

Here are a couple more pictures from that weekend: