Saturday, December 12

Birthday '09 - Costa Rica

My fifth annual birthday trip took me to Costa Rica this year, and for the life of me I can not think of a theme song for this adventure. CR was never on the menu; plan was to go to Argentina. I wanted someone of my friends to travel with me and because of an embargo; my boy could get to Argentina but could not get out. Costa Rica was one of those gems that I am glad that we discovered. The currency exchange rate was outrageous, one dollar = 600 colones, so I was rollin’ with over 300K.

There was a lot to do in the CR, one of the favorite things was to go the volcano and see an active volcano; that was pretty interesting. Plus the rain forest and they had a zip line that you could ride through the forest. In our hotel, they had massages for $25/hr, probably one of the best massages that I have ever had. Other than that, Aaron and I just chilled…..went to a couple of the clubs and check out some of the local cuisine. One place we found had the best buffalo shrimp (see pic) and shrimp ceviche….OMG!

Overall, CR was a very good birthday destination. The prices on mostly everything were extremely inexpensive. One of the drivers from the hotel took us on a tour; I wanted to stop at local gas station/convenient store to pick up some goodies for the team at work. Driver was buying cigarettes, told him that I would buy them as a tip……$2 for a pack…Wow! I guess if you smoke, CR is the place to go and stock up on them. The people were nice, food was great, tours were good, and cost wasn’t that much. Definitely a recommendation.