Shawn told me of a local mountain road that had great views of the area, he had jogged up the mountain as part of his training. I initially took the scooter up the hill and at a later point, when I had a car, took a group of people up the hill. The road traverses […]

When I (Hetty) lived in Japan, I used to plan weekend excursions to see more of the country. In a country where the signs are posted in Japanese (obviously) I often ended up somewhere far from where I planned to go so my mantra became “If you can’t get to where you’re going, go to […]

Ward and I (Hetty) have just returned from an excursion to Tortuguero which is situated on the Northern part of the Caribbean coast of Costa Rica. The interior and coastal region of Costa Rica is very lush and agricultural. We drove through miles and miles of banana plantations and pineapple fields – all destined for […]

We recently went and spent the morning at one of Costa Rica’s most popular national parks – Carara National Park.  We pilled in the car with Joe on the scooter behind us and made our way to Costa Rica’s northernmost region of Pacific rainforest.

As part of our 3 day trip to Arenal, six of us (two couples and two 4 month old babies) travelled to see the Arenal volcano. The volcano has not been active since 2010, but it is still a sight to see and there are lots of other local attractions. One such attraction is the […]

Brittany Oliver and I (Joe) went on a three day trip to Arenal with another couple that was also staying here at the Hermosa Bungalows. They have a daughter that is just one day older than Oliver so going on a three day trip made for the same baby-mindset and also gave us an opportunity […]

Ward and I have just returned from a little adventure. We decided that it was time to explore another part of Costa Rica so we rented a car and set off for the Nicoya Peninsula. We chose this as our destination because we had heard about a small town named Montezuma and were curious to […]

Today I headed down to a Red Bull 70s Style Surf Competition here in Hermosa Beach Costa Rica. I was there for 6 AM and the event was setup, but the heats didn’t start until about 7AM. There were a number of photographers, pro and amateur all shooting the event including two in water photographers. […]

Yesterday Ward and Hetty went on a day long excursion to Tortuga Island travelling across the Gulf of Nicoya by catamaran. Brittany and I did the same excursion today. There are lots of photos from the island, and probably enough footage to do a video. So I’m going to take a few days to put […]

Today I (Joe) and another couple from Canada took an intro surfing lesson here on Playa Hermosa from Brian, who runs Hermosa Surf Vacations. The surf was unusually small today for Playa Hermosa, so there were no ‘real’ surfers in the water but it was perfect for someone with almost no surf experience like myself. […]

We all headed down to the closest bar, the Backyard Bar which holds a local surf competition every Saturday. Below are some photos from the afternoon and the competition.

Having returned the vehicle on Saturday, we’ve spent the last couple of days at home relaxing. This has been a pleasant change from the three days that we had the vehicle and felt we needed to make the most of it, which made for long, busy days. Attached are a few random photos from today. […]