My wife and I spent the last week of July in Costa Rica. We really enjoyed the diving, eco-touring and eating. It’s just a beautiful country and the people treated us spectacularly. Especially for that part of the world, they have a remarkably stable economy and political structure. With the growth of tourism, they have actually restored some of their rainforests and they have an aggressive restoration program. Very cool.
We traveled with 9 others on a trip organized through our local dive shop. While we only dove on the first two of the 7 days, there was still the familiar bonding among divers. We had a great group to share our all too brief adventure with. It was a pretty fast paced tour of the country with 3 hotels, diving, rappelling, zip-lines, beach, ATVs and horses. Believe it, or not, there was even time for a little souvenir shopping.
Not surprisingly, we were at a loss for a gift for my 16-year-old son. I thought I hit the mother lode while shopping in La Fortuna, near the Arenal Volcano, a shop full of figures of dragons, skulls and the like. Just the kind of stuff he likes. It took me a minute, but I soon noticed it was a head shop and they were all pipes. OK, not quite the message I wanted to bring home.
I settled on the Costa Rica: No Guns, No War, NO ARMY T-Shirt. He’d like that.
I have found out that there ain’t no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them. ~Mark Twain