Baers,

Good morning from a Courtyard by Marriott property just a mile from the San José, airport. This has to be the worst-timed vacation in human history. But I booked it and paid for it a year ago, and it seemed like a bad decision to lose all the money. Plus, we can probably use a change of pace and who knows how this will turn our hearts (and Karen’s command of Spanish) towards Latin America.

We said goodbye to Christopher, Sheena, and the Connor-Monster yesterday morning after a really great visit at 124. Connor is endlessly entertaining and so, so sweet. His Daddy and Mommy roll their eyes a bit because they know he isn’t always that sweet. But we get to do the grandparent thing and have him when he’s adorable.

Our flights from Indy to Newark and Newark to San José all went well. I always have an intense feeling of ‘something known and yet unknown’ when I land back in San José. We zipped through passport control, baggage reclaim, customs, and car rental in a way that puts our own country’s ‘late-Brezhnev-era-airports’ (as they were called in a Wall Street Journal article yesterday) to shame.

We have the typical tiny and somewhat beat-up SUV of uncertain make and model under us. Even the short number of miles we had to drive in rain and darkness and lots of traffic last night reminds me of how different driving is here ….

We’re dragging ourselves into activity at this moment in the hotel room. We’re both looking forward to the drive today to what looks like a fabulous AirBnB property out in Guanacaste near the Arenal Volcano. First we need to stop by a pharmacy and see if we can stock up on one or two of our prescriptions for a song and without a script. It’s always so much cheaper outside the US.

I had one very affirming conversation with a guy flight attendant on United last night as we were en route. He was a Latino and heard me talking to another passenger in Spanish as I was waiting in the lavatory queue. He asked me if I was a Tico and then went a little crazy telling me my Spanish was exactly Tico Spanish and that I ‘could pass for a Tico’ anywhere. That’s always nice to hear, even if exaggerated. But then he went on to say how expensive Costa Rica has become … more expensive than the US was his take on it. I know I was feeling that things were getting to that point back when we left in 2004. We’ll have to see.

We have Chopin piano music playing to ease us into the daylight hours.

Everybody at the airport, car rental, and hotel last night were exceptionally friendly and nice. This is one of the things I enjoy so much, although you do run into the occasional bozo.

A hurricane hit here (the first since the 1800s) a few days ago and took 9 lives. The country has really rallied to take care of people who’ve lost their homes. They just found the body of a little girl who had been swept away. Her situation became a galvanizing national tragedy and they just found her body last night.

Karen is ‘picking up words’ but realizing ‘how fast everybody speaks’.

Off to the races,

Dad/Dave