And so it begins ... Day 1 in Costa Rica

We drove down to Miami on Wednesday and spent the evening in South Beach.  We had an great evening and then headed out early Thursday to Miami airport for our mid-morning flight.  2 hours and 45 minutes later we were in Liberia, Costa Rica retrieving our luggage and catching a transport over to Tamarindo. 

This is the end of the dry season down here and booth Tina and I were surprised at just how dry this part of the country is.  Fortunately our hotel didn't suffer from that problem.

The garden area which leads to our room is a lush tropical paradise with numerous birds, iguana's, a few cats, and even a monkey or 2.

This is the walkway that actually led to our room and then the room itself.

 

The beach out behind the hotel is super wide with rather treacherous looking volcanic rocks.

But as is somewhat typical, not every place is as beautiful as other places.  This is a beach house just down the street from our hotel.

Not much more to say for today other than we're glad we're here and enjoying our experience.

Luvin' Me Some Zoom and Some Lights!!!

So ... 2 posts in one day.  Where is this all heading?

Tina and I took our walk today back out at the Viera wetlands, and I had to show off our new camera.  For a relatively "cheap" point and shoot (cheap is really REALLY relative here), it's got some really impressive capabilities.  Compared to the pics we posted a month ago, this camera is really impressive.  And even though Tina was still yelling at me to get away from the gators, she wasn't yelling quite as loud!  :)

Here's one of the best one's I got of our toothey little friends.

 Even though Tina was yelling at me like I was right next to him, I was a good 15 feet away ... and both me and the gator had our evil eyes staring at each other.  This was one of the largest ones we've seen out there and we estimated he was probably 8 feet long.

Tina spotted this next one when she saw some sort of movement around the shoreline. It's not very often you catch a gator with his dinner in his mouth.  This guy was probably 3 feet long, but he sure got himself a big ol' dinner.

We also spotted another maybe soon to be gator dinner.  This guy was probably a foot long just hanging out in the shallows of the lake shoreline.

 And not to be forgotten is another pic of our feathered friends.  Much easier to get a nice pic of them when you have a 30x zoom.

And last but not least are the plant life flowering it's way through a beautiful spring season.

And finally, to explain the rest of the title of this post, our friend Doug from work finished wiring the new workshop today and so we now have outside spots and inside lights working.

So ... no more posts for today ... ... ... I'm exhausted from 2.  :)  Until next time ...

And Now It's Dried In

And then there was a couple of roofs. Both the top roof and the extension over the outside kitchen area roof are dried in now.  The next step is to put in the new doors both upstairs on the balcony and the 2 french doors that will replace the one currently downstairs.  We're really starting to get excited about the whole project.

And here's the view from the 2nd floor balcony looking toward the back yard.  The landscaping still has a ways to go.  :)

Bye for now - Tom and Tina

PS - Pics are from the new Canon SX500 camera we just bought yesterday!  Super great camera! Being super light and having a 30x optical mag capability makes it a GREAT point&shoot camera!

A New Roof is Born

Finally!!!  HOOORAYYYY!!!

OK ... so it really doesn't look like much of a roof yet ... but it's at least starting to take shape.  Here's what the back roof looked like towards the end of last week.

 And here it is as of the end of the day today.  There's still a few more hand framed trusses that have yet to be added to the upper portion of the roof, and all the trusses from the balcony to the chimney for the covered kitchen area have yet to be added, but we're back to making positive progress again.

 This picture is actually from where I'm standing on the 2nd floor balcony looking up at the trusses they added.  The tarp isn't overly critical since they haven't torn off all of the existing roof line with the exception of the metal shingles.  What still remains is the old shingles that were there from before the metal was added.

Meanwhile, one of the guys from my work came over and is in the process of wiring the back workshop while Tina and I continue on in negotiations as to whether she gets any space in this area.  So far she wants 1/3 of the space and I'm leaning more towards 0.0000000001%.  Stay tuned for the results of the Tina/Tom Workshop Treaty Negotiations.

I also had the pleasure this week of attending my granddaughter Kaylyns grandparents day at her school.  Tina and I split up with me taking Kaylyn and her taking Ashlyn's class with Tina's Mom, Linda.  I don't have pics of Ashlyn here, but Jens blog should have them soon.

Also, another walk late last week out at the Viera Wetlands.  This little guy was only about 2 feet long and the zoom on our current camera is REALLY not that great.  As such, you can imagine Tina trying to yell at me while taking this, but biting her tongue because she didn't want to scare the poor little fella.  Awwwww ... the dilemma's that a good marriage puts people in!  :)

New posts coming soon.  Hope everybody's enjoying spring ... even our Northern US brethren who are still in the midst of winter regardless of what the calendar says. What was that good old Easter song we used to always sing?  "I'm Dreaming of a White Easter".   So I guess lets just close with ... Merry Easter everybody!!!

 Uhhhhhhh ...that's not right.  Let's try this!!!

A Hike to Lake Winder

Out west of town, beyond the Viera Wetlands that we wrote about a couple of posts ago, is the River Lakes Conservation Area.  We did a couple of hikes out there this last weekend and thoroughly enjoyed the wild wilderness of Florida.  Welllllll ... almost!

The conservation area is pretty far west of town leading to Lake Winder which is only accessible by boat (mainly airboat) or hiking.  We elected for hiking since our boat enjoys salt water.

Saturday we took a hike shown in red on the above map.  It was a 6 mile hike round trip.   It's old time Florida country side, reminding  us both of "A Land Remembered" by Patrick Smith.  We actually took a hike there Friday too, but opted for taking the path from the green arrow starting point straight down the canal to the lake.  About a 1/4 mile short of the lake we ran into a 14 foot gator.  Fortunately we scared him into the canal and he equally scared us about 20 feet back from the canal.  Regardless, it's a beautiful part of wilderness here in Florida.

Friday all we had was Tina's phone for pictures since I forgot our main camera.  Unfortunately Tina kept the phone in her sports bra so by the time we took pics the lens was all fogged up with sweat.  That's part of what motivated us to go back on Saturday.

Our fine feathered friend waiting patiently for us to pass.

Lake Winder, a seldom seen and rarely visited lake.

Looking out at the lake.

Our fine feathered friend perched in a tree.

Fly Forest ... FLY!!!

I'm still promising updates on the house soon.