Surfing is all that really mattered

Hey hey hey :) Yes yes its been a while and I am sure my many many avid and dedicated readers are finding it hard to get on with their lives not knowing what I am doing in mine, but never fear! I am here now. Hush hush. Well these last couple days have been a blur of totally amazazing and then totally sick out of my mind. Buuuut lets start from the beginning. Its Friday morning, butt crack of dawn, standing in a misty park in San Ramon, birds singing lullaby s, Ticos staring at you everywhere you go, all kinds of romantic right? A group of students here decided to head to Jaco for the day to learn how to surf, enjoy the beach, and just get out of town. We were on the bus for about three hours, taking two different buses and it seriously only cost about $4. Crazy right? Once we got to Jaco, which is a total tourist town and I was immediately in love with it, we had a delicious breakfast.

Pancake and fruit breakfast yum yum

Awww look at all of us gringos. Left to right: Dan, Alex, Andrea, Molly, Zach, Ungung, Me, Michelle, Aubrey

It was so weird, so many people were speaking to us in English. That never happens here in San Ramon, hardly anyone speaks English, so it was a really nice break. Once we had breakfast we took a nice stroll down the beach to meet up with the USAC students from Puntarenas, who where having surf lessons. (btws USAC is the program through which I am studying abroad and they have students from America in three different towns here in Costa Rica)

Beautiful South Beach, Jaco

There were so many Ticos trying to get us to stay in their Hostels and rent their surfboards and take lessons from them, it was crazy, but you really get used to being constantly stared at with a group of American girls and especially having blond hair, which apparently they go nuts over. Not that I can blame them ;) So we rented a board for $10 for the whole day and our friend Dom from Puntarenas showed us how to pop up on the board and we practiced on the sand then just took off into the water with our giant longboards. I was able to stand up on my second try and on the third try I rode the wave all the way into the beach. Yeah, Im kindof a badass.

So surfing was pretty much everything I hoped it would be, completely and absolutely amazing and I cant wait till I get the chance to do it again. My friends Molly and Michelle were able to get up on their first tries, freakin ballin!! We had a pretty legit teacher though.

Loooong board!

Left to right: Michelle, Me, Molly, and Dom

L to R: Alex, Me, Michelle, Molly

After some amazing time on the beach we ventured a little farther into town and did some shopping. So many shops, so little time. There were so many cool little statues and figures it was hard to see it all in one day.

We were going to spend the night in a hostel back in Puntarenas so we had to catch the bus back again and it gets dark so early here, like 6:30, but we made it onto the bus, wet and sunburned so it was a pretty miserable bus ride and there was this man who kept coughing and coughing and all I could think about was oh please dont let me get sick...dun dun dun foreshadowing!

At the bus stop just waitin..

We arrived and we got to our "hostel". So I have never stayed in a hostel before but ummm no. This wasnt even technically a hostel, it was just some students house that had like a ton of rooms. And I may be a messy person with clothes and stuff everywhere, but I am clean. The pillow used to be white right? No, it was 50 shades of disgusting, brown and yellow stains everywhere and there were no towels or anything. I was trying not to be all picky and girly but man it was bad. And while I was showering in the nasty shower (with my shoes on) the lights went out. Whooo anyone seen the movie Hostel? Yeah thats what was going through my mind.

Nasty nasty nasty

In the morning, Saturday, we met up with our professor and went on a boat to Isla Tortuga to do some snorkling, which of course was AWESOME!! The fish were so close you could reach out and touch them! We were technically having class so we had these underwater boards you could write on and takes notes with but it was so easy.

Thats what I call Snorkling Sexy

There were so many different species of fish we got to see and there were Pelicans everywhere.

Pelicans atop Calamari, clever clever

One of the young men that was driving the boat kept diving down to the bottom and catching little things for us to see up close, he even let me hold a little starfish :)

At one point we were just swimming around looking for fishies, and out of no where BAM my leg feels like its on fire! ATTACK OF THE JELLYS!!!!! For real, I got stung by a jellyfish right on my leg and it really freakin hurt! I made a b-line back to the boat and about the exact same time I yelped out another woman get stung as well. In the process of getting everyone back in the boat, about five people got stung! It wasnt unbearable or anything, but it hurt! We put vinegar on it to dull the sting and there are no species of jellys in CR that are deadly so we didnt have much to worry about. It left a pretty nasty mark there for a while though. By the end of the day I started having this nasty scratchy feeling in the back of my throat (the plot thickens...)
Well I wake up Sunday morning with a wonderfully nasty head cold. Great. Once again I had to get up at the butt crack of dawn, they seem fond of that here, and I was so sick I thought about skipping the field trip but it was to a volcano and I really didnt want to miss out. Well it was a really long bus ride to this Volcano where it was super wet everywhere and there was a lot of mist hanging out, which probably wasnt the best for my respiratory system. It was the Poas Volcano and I guess the crater at the top is supposed to be pretty fantastic but it was so misty we couldnt even see it! We also went to Los Piches which is an old sugar plantation but there really wasnt much to see or do. Kindof a bust and I really didnt feel all too great. For the past two days, Monday and today, I have been just laying in bed missing most classes sleeping. If I dont get feeling a little better by tomorrow I am going to have to go to the doctor. Other than that bit of fun, life is still keepin on :)