Walking, walking, walking, walking (Santa Rosa)

Wednesday: We had lunch with some missionaries that Kelsey,  Ben, and Joey had met at a church here in San Jose. One couple invited us to their house for lunch, and then 2 other missionary couples came over for lunch as well. It was pretty laid back (salad, chips and salsa, chili, bread, and brownies) and was a lot of fun. We played 2 truths and a lie and spent almost all afternoon talking. I didn't get home until around 4:45, then I worked on my presentations for ecology.

Thursday: I skyped with Emily! We had a skype appointment to go over my honors literature review for my thesis. Deanne stopped by and I chatted with her a little bit. It was fun and also helpful : ) I felt bad because I color coded it for myself and then referenced that for Emily. I forgot she's color blind and my color code did nothing for her. I had lunch with mis amigos then had class as usual.

Friday: After a lazy morning and a pb&j sandwich for lunch, Kelsey, Hope, Ben, and I met at Hopes house (Joey had already left for Panama). We went to the school and rented Oh Brother Where Art Thou then played some ninja. I actually won one game!! Then we decided to walk to Parque La Sabana. On the way there we stopped in this courtyard to watch some men playing a game. There were three green things that looked like bowling pins and they each had three little nuts with washers on top of them. Each man would use a stick to push a tennis ball at the pins and try to knock the nuts off without knocking the pin over. We watched for awhile, then the creator of the game (a really nice old man) taught Kels, Hope, and I how to play. Hope and I were tied but no one could knock the last nut off, though we hit the pin repeatedly. We finally asked "El Champeon" (the old man) to do it for us. Then we chatted with someone that Ben and Kelsey had met at church the night before. He just happened to be walking through the same courtyard that we were in, despite being in a city of millions. It was pretty cool.

We continued on to the park, which was A LOT further than we thought. When we finally got there, we sat around, talked, and watched some people play volleyball. We played fetch with this dog who loved us but kept hating on men with beards. Then the dog (who we called Charlie because he looked like the dog from All Dogs Go to Heaven) followed us around everywhere. We saw the new stadium that China built then left the park for the walk home. The dog followed us all the way to a plaza near downtown where he got distracted by all the pigeons (thank goodness, because we didnt know what we would do with him once we all got home).
We finally made it home. I showered and ate dinner, then a bunch of people met up by the highway and walked 20 minutes to a soccer field, where we watched Ben and Sean's game. It was a nice, relaxing (free) and fun thing to do on a Friday night. After the movie, I went to Hope's house. Kelsey played the guitar and we had a little singalong before Ben, Kels, Hope and I watched Oh Brother Where Art Thou (and devoured some popcorn). The movie ended at 12:30, and Kels and Ben went back to their houses while I stayed with Hope so she wouldn't be alone. Overall, we decided that we had walked a bout 10 miles that day.

Saturday: Left Hope's house and walked next door to the school for my field trip. We had to wait for our teacher, who showed us still drunk from the night before, and one of the students who was a little late. There were only 12 of us, so we all got a lot of room, which was super nice for the 6 hour drive. When we got to Santa Rosa, we had a late lunch and put all of our stuff in the rooms. We had a girls room and a boys room, and the bathroom was co-ed. The stalls were marked for a specific gender, but it was all in the same room. Awkward.
We all hiked to La Casona, which is an important historical site for Costa Rica. It is where the Costa Rican army fought off William Walker, who was trying to take over Costa Rica with his army of mercenaries. This is the only battle Costa Rica had to fight for its independence (the first time it was given to them when all the other Latin American countries gained their independence) so its very important. It was cool to see, even though there weren't a lot of artifacts there. Apparently, in 2001, two hunters were angry that they kept getting caught illegally hunting at the park and burned a lot of the building down. At La Casona, we hiked to a lookout point, which was absolutely gorgeous. We just sat and looked at it for a good hour.
While we ate dinner, one guy in our class convinced our teacher to let us walk to this beach (which was 8 miles away). We couldn't go at night because we didn't have enough flashlights. so we decided to go really early the next morning. We went on a short night hike, where I saw two scorpions fighting. One had babies on her back. It was really cool until they froze when they noticed us and we had to head back. Then we went to bed around 9 p.m.

Sunday: Good morning! 4 a.m. and we were up, getting ready for our long hike. We finally ended up leaving around 4:40, after waiting for our professor and getting a sack breakfast that the cooks made for us. We hiked for about an hour in the dark. I didn't have a flashlight and was relying on staying close to people. I was continually tripping, then I got the "bright" idea to walk in front of the person with the flashlight. It was a bad idea. I fell flat on my face. So embarrassing lol. I was fine, and learned to walk behind the flashlight.
We saw a lot of cool things on the walk, like monkeys, a tarantula, iguanas, birds, and more. We stopped around 6:30 for breakfast and finally reached the gorgeous beach at about 7:40. We stayed there for about an hour and a half, relaxing and taking pictures, before we started the hike back. And the hike back was TERRIBLE. Literally, an entire hour was uphill. I drank SO much water and worked my body so hard, but felt very accomplished afterward. We had hiked around 16 miles! Whitney, Derek, and I walked together the entire way back, and we got back to Santa Rosa around noon. We had lunch (though I was too tired to be very hungry) and took quick showers. Then we packed our stuff and headed back to San Jose!

The bus trip back kind of stank because we didn't stop at all, and I couldn't sleep like everyone else was. We made good time, though, and I got home at 6:30. Perfect timing to eat dinner with Ana and the girl that's living in the room next door this week. Her name is Jamie, and she and her friends are spending their spring break here taking Spanish classes. That's dedication! She is in class ALL day long, then Thursday and Friday the school is taking them to see some volcanoes (no beach for her, though). Then I skyped with people and went to bed!

Monday: Had a relaxed morning, trimmed my own bangs, then had bible study during lunch. The pizza place I went to ran out of pizza, so I thought I was going to be late. Turned out fine though, and we had a great bible study led by Rachel Braun. Afterwards Rachel and I got some cake then walked home. I took a little nap and worked on homework for the rest of the afternoon. I found out that my research for my honors thesis got approved! After dinner Rachel and I went on a grocery run, and now here I am blogging. I am sore and tired, but excited to start Spanish again tomorrow : )

Pura Vida!!