Day 2

The kids didn't get to sleep until close to midnight (EST) last night, and we all had to be up by 7:30 to check in by 9:00, for our 10:55 flight to Liberia, Costa Rica.  Everything went well (with the usual whining and complaining that accompany traveling with 3 kids).

We arrived in Liberia to a much improved airport.  2 year ago you got off the plane via a set of stairs at the end of the runaway and went through customs and everything in an open-air building.  There was a roof but no walls.  This time we got off into one those little tunnel things that led us right into an enclosed building with air conditioning.  The airport was very nice, but I do kind of miss the old "rustic" one.

In customs, of course they decided that we were the ones that needs all 10 of our bags searched.  Lucky us!    The customs agent didn't speak english so we brought Genevieve over to him to translate.  She was very shy at first so Dane tried to help out too.  The agent was more interested in talking to the kids and finding out about where they were learning their spanish than the contents of our bags.  Genevieve is nervous that her spanish isn't good enough, and doesn't realize that most people are impressed with the amount she knows.

Our driver was waiting for us with his sign "Ami Taylor" :) and loaded up our 10 bags.  We had a little bit of rain at the airport and a few minutes more on the drive to Samara.

We stopped in Nicoya to do a little grocery shopping, and then arrived in Samara around 4:00.  We unloaded our bags into our villa and headed toward the beach to get something to eat and play.  On this one outing we ran into almost everyone we know in town. Just down the road G & D's friends mom recognized us and we said hello.  Then Genevieve's friend Amanda saw her in the distance and called to her.  Their greeting was very cute.  Genevieve wasn't prepared for the cheek kissing that they do here. Then we saw the owner of Villas Kalimba (where we lived in 2010).  At dinner, Didier - the kids surf instructor from last time walked past us and said hello.  Then we saw Eddy - the groundskeeper of VK riding his bike.  Lastly we saw Daniela the receptionist from VK on the main street.  I saw other people I recognized but don't know very well.  It was all pretty amusing and reminded me how small Samara is.

We are back in the villa getting settled for the night.  Fans are running as we are attempting to live here without A/C to save some money.  We'll see how it goes!