Every detail of her place makes you smile - knickknacks that have obviously been collected over many years, mosaics and paintings on walls and cabinet fronts, flowers. It was a delightful place to spend time. There are just a few cabinas that surround the center, open-air eating area. The cabinas have a Bavarian feel and each has a sign saying either "Welcome", "Wilkommen", "Bienvenue" or "Bienvenidos" over each door.
The funniest cabina is the one that reads "Matthew Mcconaughey" over the door! He stayed in that cabina 6 years ago. When she showed us the room (we didn't end up staying in it) and shared the story she said, "Oh, que lindo!" (how handsome) with a big smile on her face.
Tuesday found Lucas and me just hanging around Santa Maria while Matt went on a tour of the coffee cooperative. We went to the playground to romp around but got immediately wet from the sprinklers! So, we wandered up the street to a place with a sign that said, "las machinas de pinball." Right up our alley. Of course, we were the only ones wanting to play at 10:00am on a Tuesday morning! They turned on the machines and with some help we figured out what to do. It is different from pinball in the states. There are no flippers. You just fling the ball and leave it up to luck which hole each ball lands in. We keep waiting and waiting for the game to end, but we seemed to have an endless supply of balls. Until, this tall kind of Dutch kind of Costa Rican guy explained that you can keep playing or stop and collect our winnings. We had won 400 colones! Definitely different from the pinball at home - no skill involved and gambling! Lucas pocketed his winnings and made a plan to stop at the local pulperia on the way out of town to buy us all a lollipop.
Then back to the park post-sprinklers and now as experienced Costa Rican gamblers. While playing at the park, we were privileged to witness a funeral procession coming through the local street to the church. It was beautiful and sad and communal.
We watched as they carried the casket from the car into the church which spurred a whole bunch of questions from Lucas about the whole process of dying, burial, memorial service, etc. We watched as people arrived - in causal clothes, in their campasino pick up trucks, in high heels and stappy tank tops...so very different from the formal dress for funerals at home. We listened for a while to the hymns as the music poured out through the open church doors.
Then it was back to the cafe at the coffee coop for one last whipped cream intense special drink before leaving this beautiful valley. Our server was named Eloisa (very fun for Lucas to share that her cousin is named Eloise). Here is Lucas lost in his whipped cream, italian soda ecstasy!
Matt loved the coffee tour. He learned a ton about a whole bunch of coffee related stuff (i.e. what it means to be shade grown) and mostly about what this particular coop is doing to make the whole coffee system - growing to harvesting to roasting - a more sustainable process. For example, when they plants trees around the coffee plants to provide shade, they plant trees that are nitrogen fixing to re-nutrify the soil and are trees that provide fruit to local birds and animals. Let's see, another tidbit he found interesting was that after drying the beans, the beans get kind of "stressed out" and they "hold on" to the "chemicals" in the bean that are what ultimately give the coffee good flavor. So, they are put in a silo to "rest" for at least 2 months to relax and release. Who knew!
We got our lollipops on our way out of town and headed up, up, up out of the Santa Maria valley back to the main highway and then south back to the Savegre River Valley and the very small, almost undetectable town of San Gerardo where we had rented a VRBO house called the Unicorn Lodge.
It's a funky house in the forest that sits above the Savegre River. It's cold and smells of smoke but it has a kitchen! Oatmeal and pancakes and fried eggs with runny yolks just like Lucas likes them and home cooked dinners galore.
The stairs to the loft are so steep my creaky knees force me to come down sideways and very slowly!
What a shock to the system to wake up and dread getting out of bed because the house was so cold! We quickly jumped into our jeans, fleece and warm hats while we waited for the oatmeal to cook. Once we were out in the sun, we stripped down to shorts and t-shirts and headed off for some hiking. Matt headed solo up into the hills while Lucas and I went in search of las cataratas (waterfalls). I am sad to say we didn't have the camera with us for our hike. It was a true adventure, and I wish I could have captured where we went with some pictures. The trail was open and easy going until we came to the first waterfall. After that it was series of steep drop-offs, old metal grates spanning gaps in the rocks, old metal stairs missing steps, rope railings to keep you from careening down the slope into the river. The most sketchy was the wobbly, suspension bridge over the river that was very reminiscent of the movie Shrek. Then down, down, down old metal stairs to the base of the second waterfall but first we had to basically repel down a rock face using an old yellow rope. It was totally worth it. As Lucas said, "the waterfall was ginormous!" It was beautiful and Lucas loved the adventure...I did, too. But kept thinking that most people might think I was a little bit nuts to bring my 5 year old here. 3 1/2 miles later we had a great story to share with Daddy.
We are leaving the mountains a day earlier than we had initially planned. We feel done here. So, we are heading out early in the morning to go explore the Poas Volcano north of San Jose. We figure it would be fun to see at least one of Costa Rica's many, many volcanoes before we leave. We will spend the night outside of San Jose and then catch our flight to Panama mid-day on Friday. We are all aware that we are in the final stretch of this journey - counting our colones to be sure we have enough for the last few things but aren't stuck with a whole bunch to bring home, saying Pura Vida as much as we can, sneaking in a volcano vista - and yet are excited for our beach adventure to the Carribean side of Panama. Lucas is hoping to swim and play with dolphins!
I will post again once we are settled on the Isla de Bastimentos in Bocas del Toro, Panama.
xoxo
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