Wednesday, March 20

Good morning from Uvita! We all slept great last night. Tory and Aden each have their own bedrooms and there’s air conditioning in each room as well. Well rested kids means we all woke up in a great mood today.

This house has all new furnishings and is clean and well kept. Lots of different kitchen utensils and spices here makes cooking easy, and there’s even boogie boards, pool floaties, and plenty of beach towels to use. Perhaps the best luxury is the super-fast fiber optic internet which makes working on the computer, blogging, and watching Netflix easy. Not very “Costa Rica” feeling, but this house definitely is comfortable.

Andi had an important work meeting to call into this morning, so he locked himself in the bedroom while the kids and I stayed busy in the rest of the house. I made them Nutella toast with fruit for breakfast, they watched Max & Ruby on Netflix, swam in the pool and then Tory and I did some school. She scored 100% on her math mid-term which made us both very proud!

Andi finished his work call and joined us for lunch. I washed and chopped lettuce and tomato, and he grilled hamburgers for burger bowls. Then, the heat sucked us all into having a lazy afternoon. The kids swam. I wrote a blog post. Andi did some more work on his computer. Before we knew it, it was already 4:00pm.

We couldn’t waste away the entire day at our airbnb, so we drove down the road to Playa Uvita again to watch the sunset together. Smartly, I left the kids in their swimming suits this time!

We watched a beautiful sunset together on the uncrowded beach, and I had another one of those pinch-me moments of happiness. How lucky are we to have the chance to come down to the beach every afternoon and watch the sun go down on another day? Watching my tiny kiddos play in front of a place where the ocean meets the sky definitely left me feeling fortunate.

After the beach, Andi dropped the kids and I off at home so we could wash up for bedtime and then he ran to the grocery store for veggies, wine, chocolate and bread. All the necessities! We grilled chicken and pineapple for dinner which tasted like summertime, and then kids had store-bought ice cream cones for dessert. It was close to 9:00pm by the time we finished dinner, so we put the kids to bed shortly afterward. Tomorrow, we plan to get up early and check out the famous Whale’s Tail.

Thursday, March 21

I woke up early this morning to exercise and do some work on my computer. We planned to hike to the famous Whale’s Tail in Marino Ballena National Park today. The Whale’s Tail is a sand and rock formation that juts into the pacific coast and is only accessible two hours before or two hours after low tide. Low tide today is at 8:30am. The Whale’s Tail itself is a wonder of nature. It’s the spot where two currents come together, depositing sand on top of the rocks to create a unique, tail-shaped pattern. Interestingly, it’s also the exact spot where hundreds of humpback whales come together each year.

Aden was excited to see tractors on the beach trailering boats to the water’s edge.

Initially, we didn’t plan to walk all the way down the beach to the edge of the whale’s tail because Tory and Aden aren’t the greatest walkers in the heat. We started our way down the whale’s tail and were completely overcome by its beauty. Never before have we ever stood on a strip of land with beach on both sides of it. It was really neat!

I finally broke down and bought some Crocs (or rather, Crocs knock-offs). I am not a Crocs fan personally, but waterproof shoes are the one thing I wish I would brought on this trip. There are many times I could have used them. My punishment for not bringing a pair from home is having to sport these brightly colored ones as the selection was limited in the grocery store bargain bin.

The sun was heating up as we walked down to the end of the Whale’s Tail. Our reward for making it there was a refreshing dip in the ocean. We even found a few live sand dollars buried in the ocean floor! I’ve never seen a live one before, only broken ones washed up on the sand. These had little hairs moving on the sides.

After we played in the water for a while, we explored the rock formations. We waded through the tide pools looking for sea creatures. Andi discovered a fairly large brittlestar underneath a rock. We also saw lots of sea snails and hermit crabs.

Suddenly, we were all really HOT. I realized I put sunscreen on Aden and Tory, but forgot to put some on myself and we didn’t have any in the bag. It was time to make the long walk back from the whale’s tail anyway, but getting Tory and Aden to leave wasn’t easy. They were both having so much fun searching for sea creatures, they wanted to go back into the ocean to find more sand dollars. I explained that I needed to get out of the sun, but that didn’t stop them from whining and complaining the entire walk back to the mainland. It drives me bonkers when they ruin a perfectly wonderful family adventure with bad attitudes.

It was too early for lunch, so we stopped by the carniceria (meat store) and bought sausage and pork chops. We also stopped by a fruit & veggie stand, but nothing looked especially fresh. Andi grilled the sausage for lunch and everyone liked it. It’s amazing how playing in the sunshine all morning works up an appetite! After lunch, Tory and I did school and wrote a few more postcards. This is the only town that I’ve seen a mailbox, so if we’re going to send anything home during our trip— now is the time! After school, we swam in the pool to cool off.

The entire oceanfront of Uvita Beach is protected as part of the Marino Ballena National Park, but entrance is free after 4:00pm. We returned to Playa Uvita after 4pm to play and watch the sunset.

Andi grilled the pork chops for dinner, and it was probably one of the best meals we’ve had on this trip. Meat has been really challenging to buy here, mostly because we’re never quite sure what cut of meat we’re getting. The stars aligned tonight and we actually had a decent piece of meat and a quality grill to cook it on!

Tomorrow is our last full day in Uvita. We’re planning to take a day trip to Manuel Antonio, about an hour away.