Week 13 - Costa Rica

Caitlin and Adam want to see the studio, so we head out on Monday morning to Puerto Jimenez to visit Alan in the studio, and to have lunch with the crew at Carolina’s. After lunch we do a bit of shopping. Caits and Adam need gumboots to go out bug hunting with us, so we go to La Costa, the local hardware store to buy some botas.

Alan is desperate for centipedes this week in the studio. We only have one to work with, and it isn’t performing well. So on Tuesday we have a look around the house next door, Casa Aire Libre for some centipedes. No luck though, we can’t find any.

Adam and Caitlin are enjoying their sleep-ins. They are staying in the guesthouse on our property, so aren’t disturbed by Tayen and Saige who wake up at 6am every morning. We haven’t seen Caits and Adam till at least 11am so far, so I can’t plan any morning activities for us to do. So Wednesday afternoon we head out to have a look at Playa Blanca, about half an hour’s drive from our place. It is a beach that has a lot of coral debris on it, making the beaches look white. Costa Rican beaches have volcanic sand on the beaches, so the sand is black rather than white. Bit hard to get used to when Aussie white sand beaches is what we are used to.

Caitlin and Adam at Playa Blanca

Playa Blanca has a flock of vultures on it when we arrive, and Tayen tried to sneak up on them with little success. They are almost as tall as she is! We have a hermit crab race and a bit of a play in the water while Caitlin and Adam draw a progressive story in the sand. After we have had a bit of fun, we head into Puerto Jimenez to meet Alan for dinner and go out bug hunting up The Road. On the way back from a successful night, we see an ant eater crossing the road leading into Dos Brazos.

Vultures at Playa Blanca

Hermit crab race

Playing in the water

Stories in the sand

We have a lazy day at home on Thursday, catching up on blogs and emails and chatting to each other. It’s really nice to have Caits and Adam here and have some adult conversation at home during the day!

Caits and Adam give me a bit of time to myself on Friday (something which I haven’t had much of since we came to Costa Rica) and take the girls down to the river for a swim. Ohh, the things I would love to do with that hour or so to myself – sleep, read, sleep…but no, I figure I should look after our animal collection without the constant interruption that I usually have. Every day I spend a few hours feeding and cleaning and watering all the animals we have collected to use in the production, a process that would be much quicker if I didn’t have to supervise the kids and stop them running around the garden getting to close to bushes and plants that might be harbouring terciopellos or wandering spiders (though we have a few of those captive in our animal collection). Either that or I am breaking up arguments about sharing toys, or fights about “she hit me first” or soothing when they have fallen over and grazed their knee. All of this is part of everyday motherhood, but it makes caring for the animal collection a much lengthier job! So having some time to myself to get this job done well and quickly is an opportunity I can’t pass up.

Trip to the river

Friday night is footy night, and we have another party at the studio to watch the Cats play West Coast in the preliminary final. It was fun to have Caits and Adam there as well. This time our internet connection wasn’t fast enough for skyping the live TV back in Australia, so Alan desperately searched the internet for another method of watching live AFL games. Costa rica doesn’t have rights to broadcast live AFL games, so the normal channels weren’t open to us. In the last 5 minutes before the game, he found TVU which broadcast live TV from Tasmania (the only Australian channel available). So after putting the computer outside to pick up better signal, it was like being in our own lounge room…sort of. The Cats won, so it was all worth it in the end. Here comes the Grand final next weekend!!

Go CATS!

On Saturday we headed to Playa Preciosa in the evening to have some dinner at the Iguana lodge, and to see if we could spot any nesting turtles. After finding the raided nest last week, I thought we might be able to spot some turtles, since it’s nesting season. The beach I found the nest at is still quite high in the gulf, so I didn't think the turtles would be coming up that far to nest, but a few obviously do. There is also some good bug hunting habitat along the beaches, so we thought we could combine the two activities. Unfortunately though it started raining heavily during dinner and Adam and I had a quick look on the beach for turtles, but didn't find any. Bugs don’t like rain either, so it wasn't much good for anything. Caitlin did manage to have a close encounter with a yellow wasp though. It flew in through the open window while we were shining our spotlights out into the dark. Her screams from the back seat as it proceeded to sting her sent half of us into cardiac arrest. After it all calmed down, Caitlin was very insistent that we didn’t do that again. About 10 minutes later Alan decided to have a quick look out to Caitlin’s disgust. Alan said “what is the chance of another one coming in?” Within seconds another big yellow wasp entered the car to much panic. No one was stung this time!

On Sunday Alan took Caitlin and Adam for a walk up the Bolita trail. It’s quite a nice walk during the day, but it can be a bit daunting at night as the trail is very narrow in places, and it plunges down into darkness that seems to go on forever! We went out bug hunting again that night along The Road, and on the way Alan screamed to a stop on the road leading out of Dos Brazos as he saw a terciopello on the road. It is the first time we’ve seen a snake of any kind on the road, and great that it was a terciopello as Caitlin and Adam hadn’t seen one yet. 

Bug hunting up The Road