New Years in Monteverde, Costa Rica

On New Year's Eve, we piled into our friends’ jeep and went to their home in Monteverde, Costa Rica. A town in the cloud forest on the Pacific side of the Continental Divide, it was settled by American Quakers in 1950 fleeing religious persecution in Alabama during the Korean War (Quakers believe in non-violence). Costa Rica had recently abolished it’s army, had amazing weather, and at the time, land was cheap.

Our friends’ home is beautiful with an even more beautiful view which looks out over the Gulf of Nicoya and the Nicoya Peninsula! On a clear day you can see the Pacific Ocean beyond. Austin is a student in my department and a documentary filmmaker. His wife Wendy is a teacher, but is taking the year off to be a full-time mom. Their daughters Anna (11) and Bella (8) are Autumn and Chloe’s ‘BFCR’ (best friends in Costa Rica). They get along great and have so much fun together!


That night we were all tired so the girls, thankfully, decided that they wanted to celebrate New Years at 11pm, which is midnight in DC and NYC (our friends are from the Newark, NJ area). We watched the ball dropping live in Times Square online then went outside where the girls ran around banging pots and cheering (they don’t have many neighbors on their side of the mountain). Then the hotel down the road put on an amazing fireworks display – at 11pm! We guessed this was probably because they cater to tourists, mostly from the States. It was great, although it was all too much for the dog, Nene, they were ‘dog-sitting’ who took off into the woods – they found him the next day across town at his house.



Other things we did while in Monteverde included lots of hiking through the forests, visiting waterfalls, eating ice cream, and attending a Quaker meeting (that’s what they call their church services) and potluck. We also visited a café that had dozens of hummingbirds flying around feeders – man, are they fast and quite beautiful! The girls got their fill of cute animals while we were there, too. Anna and Bella have a dog and the girls had fun dressing up the her and Nene for a ‘doggy fashion show’ (as you can imagine the dogs were just THRILLLED about that!) We also visited their friends’ farm where the girls got to see dogs, cats, chickens, turkeys, guineas, and goats – including a baby goat born on Christmas Eve! They also got to pet horses all around town.



The daily sunsets from their front patio were amazing and so was hanging out with our friends. The bus ride home was long – 4.5 hours to San Jose and then another 45 minutes to Ciudad Colon – but it was worth it!

Christmas in Paradise

While many of the North American students went home to the snow and cold for the semester break, most other students stayed in Costa Rica or traveled through the Caribbean, and/or Latin America. Patrick went home to Falls Church to visit family and friends, but the girls and I stayed where it was warm!

Christmas Eve was spent baking sugar cookies from scratch (for Santa), tracking Santa’s progress online, and going to Christmas Eve mass. Christmas morning we gathered around the ‘tree’ that the girls had fashioned out of plastic garland, a wire coat hanger, a plastic stool, and a clothes hamper. They made all the ornaments themselves, too. Santa was generous bringing clothes, soccer balls, candy and more.

It was an amazing Christmas!!

Class Field Trip to Puerto Viejo de Sarapiquí, Costa Rica

While taking a class on Forests, Forestry, and Peace, I had a three day field trip to Puerto Viejo de Sarapiquí, Costa Rica. My professor was kind enough to let me bring the kids, so they had a three day vacation.

First, we drove to Santa Clara, 3 hours northwest of San Jose to talk with a professor at the Instituto Tecnologico de Costa Rica (Technical Institute of Costa Rica, a major university). He told us how they are working with farmers to reforest the country using selective breeding (of trees, not the farmers.)

Next we drove to Sarapiquí, which is about 3 hours northeast of San Jose. There the kids hung out at the hotel, Hotel El Bambu (http://www.elbambu.com/) and swam in the pool while my class traipsed through the rainforest, at times in the POURING rain. I’ve been dryer swimming in the ocean! It was a lot of fun. We heard howler monkeys, and I saw a poison dart frog (about the size of a quarter, bright red with royal blue hind legs) on a log. It was also very interesting as we learned about tree plantations, sustainable logging, and Payments for Environmental Services (PES).

PES is a system where money is paid to private landowners to conserve or replant their forests. It is a very popular program that has a long waiting list, but not enough money for every interested party. Ideally, businesses that depend on clean water would pay the landowners upstream to help maintain that quality. Examples of industries now in the program are brewing companies and hydroelectric plants.

On the way home, we stopped at one of the hydroelectric plants and got to go inside and see the large turbines. The owners of this plant pay into the PES system since trees help prevent silt from being washed down the rivers that then damage the turbines, which are very costly to repair or replace.

The kids had a lot of fun. They loved the pool, getting to eat at ‘sodas’ (little, usually family-owned, fast food restaurants), and they even learned how pick a coconut off a tree, break it open, and drink the juice. We saw lots of beautiful scenery from our bus windows, like waterfalls, as well as pineapple and sugarcane plantations. I am very grateful to have such a great UPeace community to make it not just possible, but also so welcoming for my kids to join us when I need to go on these trips.

PS: In a later class, Water Security and Peace, I got to return to Sarapiquí for a day trip along the Sarapiquí River. We saw howler monkeys and iguanas in the trees, amazing birds, and caimans on the river banks!