Vacation Travelers Group Blog

I’m floating in a natural hot spring under a black velvet sky sparkling with a million sundry stars. I’m savoring the luxurious feeling of the rich revitalizing minerals as they wash over me, relaxing and invigorating my mind, body and soul.

I can feel the occasional deep earthly vibration from Arenal Volcano’s rumbly tummy. I think to myself, “Is this real? This is perfect. This is living.”

The next morning I step outside onto the terrace to enjoy my morning cup of Costa Rican coffee while wild blue morpho butterflies float and flutter about the garden. Iridescent hummingbirds buzz around an array of exquisite flowers.

As I enjoy a delicious plate of fresh cut papaya, pineapple, and mango, I can hear monkeys playing in the nearby trees. I look up to see baby howler monkeys swinging from branch to branch in a lively game of chase while their parents watch from close by.

It’s time for me to return to my home in the city. As I drive back to the Central Valley, I promise to return to Arenal’s hot springs soon…but not too soon. First, I need to continue my goal of visiting new places in Costa Rica every other weekend.

Costa Rica is the land of biodiversity and microclimates and it’s possible to drive 15 minutes in any direction and experience completely different climates and landscapes. White-sand beaches, black-sand beaches, deserts, volcanoes, national parks, rivers, waterfalls, jungles…it has everything.

Even in the Central Valley, the most populated part of the country, you are never too far away from secluded nature. It’s easy to find yourself surrounded by lush green jungle, a kaleidoscope of flowers, and a menagerie of animals. You can have this in your backyard if you wish. For me, this is a huge part of the magic of Costa Rica and the main reason I chose to live and work here.

A second factor in choosing Costa Rica as my international home was the proximity to the United States, my previous home. Trips back to the southeast to see friends and family are easy, short, and relatively inexpensive.

In order to live in Costa Rica and afford this type of lifestyle, I teach English at a local university, 30 hours per week. I have no prior experience teaching English, but had no problems finding a job here in Costa Rica. I even found a company here who were willing to sponsor my English-teaching certification.

Most companies require certification to teach English in Costa Rica and some will even offer a work visa.

The average monthly salary for an English teacher in Costa Rica is $1,000. This doesn’t sound like much compared to a normal wage in the States, but it is 2.5 times the normal Costa Rican salary of $400 per month. For $1,000 a month, I get a nice place to live, groceries, transportation money, and a budget for frequent trips to the beach, hot springs, or other areas of the country.

For my next trip, I’m planning on going to the Osa Peninsula to explore Corcovado National Park and to swim with the dolphins.

Close your eyes. Picture yourself swinging back and forth on your own personal hammock, listening to the sounds of the rainforest. A toucan flies by and lands on a nearby tree, the buzz of the natural world is humming around you. You’re full from your completely sustainable, fresh homegrown meal, which included a perfectly cooked fish you caught yourself from a nearby pond. You’re remembering the hike from earlier when you felt water fall from a fresh waterfall…

If you want this dream to be a reality, you’re ready to plan your next vacation to Chachagua Rain Forest Hotel! Minutes from La Fortuna and Arenal, Chachagua is a beautifully manicured oasis of comfortable luxury. You will leave the property relaxed, inspired, and engaged with the world around you. Join us!

The builder La Laguna working hand in hand with the Teran family in May of 2004, gave shape to what is now the only golf course to the east of San Jose, the Monteran Golf Course. The Club House opened in June 2007, the Driving Range in February 2008 and in May of 2008 was the opening of the cafeteria with food service.

This beautiful course was built on a coffee plantation, under the direction of the American architect Douglas Beach who gave shape to the 9 hole par 3 course and driving range inside the Condominium Monteran development. It is a semi-private course.

Different companies have held tournaments and golf events on this course, with different prizes for winners ranging from golf carts to cars.. Companies also hold business seminars and meetings as well as social gatherings in the beautifully designed club house.

The course and its outreach to the community continues to expand in Costa Rica.  The Saint Gregory School is currently promoting the fact that it is the first school with a golf academy.  The Monteran Golf Course wants to continue tom be innovative and be involved in the Costa Rican community.

This course is designed for the business man that wants to get a quick round in the couple of hours before work, during lunch, or after work.  It can be enjoyed by anyone that wants to enjoy the Costa Rican scenery and an excellently designed Par 3 Executive Course.

Next Tournament

The Monterán Open, Don “Fernando Felipe Terán Alvarado” Cup

Entry Fee 30,000 colones (about $60)

PAR FOR THE COURSE Y DISTANCES
Par 54 – 18 holes
Blue Tees: 2.243 Yards
White Tees: 1.878 Yards
Red Tees: 1634 Yards

TYPES OF GRASSES
Greens: Teaf-Eagle
Fairways: Bermuda 419
Roughs: Bermuda 419 y Jengibrillo

GOLF SHOP
Has a selection of golf equipment that you need to play the game, as well as an assortment of clothing to help you look stylish on the course.

RESERVACIONES
Reservations are made directly with the course director and must be made before coming to the course.

GOLF CLASSES
Monterán offers classes for every age and skill level.  These are offered in group sessions on individual.  Cancellations must be made 24 hours ahead of time.

GOLF CARTS
Golf cart use is not mandatory on the course.  Maximum of 2 people per cart..

DRESS CODE
Being appropriately dressed is necessary in order to play. Jeans, shirts without collars, and metal spikes are not allowed.

EQUIPMENT RENTAL
Clubs are available to rent, women’s, men’s, children’s, left and right handed,

PRICES
Monthly Memebership – 52,800 Colones per month (about $105) – play as many times as you want each monthCart Cart - 10,000 colones (about $20)
Greens Fees – 18,500 colones (about $37)

Contact Information

For questions or more information please contact Sebastian Benech, Commercial Director

Sebastian Benech is originally from Uruguay and has been helping develop lost lasting relationship with businesses, clients, members and guests since the inception of the Monteran Golf Course.  He has knowledge of the course, and can help answer any questions you might have, help schedule any business promoted tournaments and meetings, and get you going with your membership to the only golf course on the east side of San Jose and only Par 3 executive course in Costa Rica.

Phone Number – 2273-6440

Email – sbenech@naret.cr

Website – http://www.golfmonteran.com

Black Beauty Mariposa Villa is a massive 4,424 square foot, three-bedroom holiday home, located in the province of Guanacaste, Costa Rica. The translation for “Mariposa” is “butterfly” and we are curious to see if you can find the reasons behind the name. Here is a description from the project developers: “Though nestled into the terrain, Mariposa gives the appearance of fluttering above Costa Rica’s lush Northern Pacific coast.

Its towering height and open spaces features an uninhibited union of earth, ocean, and a luxurious modern eco-lifestyle. An enveloping exterior garden bridged by a glass circulation spine connects and subtly separates the interior living spaces & entertaining areas from the private bedrooms.

Whether entering directly to the master bedroom from the corridor, or descending stairs to the family room and guest suites below, Mariposa’s intimate spaces provide ultimate privacy, while expanding one’s experience of picturesque nature, vivid sunsets and deluxe amenities.”

If you are interested in experiencing the National Wildlife Refuge, or would just love to relax in one of the world’s most famous travel destinations, you can book the villa all year long, for costs ranging from $550 to $700 per night.

Images and Booking information

Costa Rica: Conserving Turtles and Our Sanity

Travelling is not always for the faint hearted. I found this out the hard way during my four month trip around the world last year with my friend Rachel. What follows is the first of my honest, not-found-in-Lonely-Planet accounts of travelling, detailing all we experienced on a single day as we journeyed through Costa Rica, from a hostel in the capital, to a sea turtle-conservation project deep in the Caribbean jungle…

After an early start one morning, Rach and I found ourselves hanging out in the hostel kitchen, packing up a highly nutritious breakfast/brunch/lunch/general daily food-ration of Pringles and Mediterranean herb crackers, in order to fuel us as we cracked on with our day of intense travelling.

The first part of our journey was a coach to Sixaola, a small village on the East Coast of Costa Rica which would take six delightful hours. For the most part this drive was fairly pleasant, interspersed only with a small and gratuitously angry man demanding to see our tickets literally about once every 10 minutes, as if we could somehow have leapt off the bus and swapped places with a ticketless hooligan in between times.

As the journey wore on, we began to pass through some highly questionable living arrangements, otherwise referred to as ‘towns’. This sowed a seed of panic in my mind, as we had been told to get a taxi from Sixaola to the beach itself – a mode of transportation which appeared very much absent from the ramshackle, rustic scenery that whizzed by. When we eventually arrived in Sixaola, my fears were proved vaild. We alighted next to a highly suspicious looking Panama border, standing in a dusty dirt track surrounded by bags, and a cellophane-encased pillow that Rachel had for some reason insisted on buying. Seeing nothing vaguely resembling a taxi in the surrounding area, we decided the best thing to do in the circumstances would be to stand still and argue. Presently, a kindly man cruised over and asked if we were looking for a taxi. Despite every morsel of information I had ever read about taxi caution and safety, we gladly confirmed that a taxi was indeed exactly what we desperately wanted. He seemed to acknowledge this, but then just wandered off, leaving us alone and confused by the roadside.

What felt like an eternity later, he returned with some highly jovial individual driving a pick-up truck. As much as this seemed like a well-seasoned recipe for mugging/general advantage taking, we slung our bags in the back, and clambered into the sweltering cabin. A few minutes of stunted Spanish conversation followed, which consisted mainly of the driver continually yelping ‘vamos Gandoca!’

Happily trundling along the track over hearty potholes and string bridges, the heat from the sun slowly melting the plastic covering on Rachel’s pillow onto my leg, we spied a large family waiting outside a dilapidated house by the roadside, waving the truck over. After an indiscernible conversation between them and the driver, they proceeded to clamber into the back of the truck with our bags and settle themselves down. The rest of the journey to Gandoca was spent in a concerned manner, constantly checking out the old rear-view mirror for any signs of bag-rummaging or valuable-stealing. Once they were dropped off we only had to stop for a large Iguana sunning itself in the middle of the path, which had to be forcibly shooed away by the driver with an angry yell.

After about a thousand hours, we arrived at what looked like a beach, but could see literally nowhere that vaguely resembled a conservation centre. Tired, hungry and overheated, we aggressively asked the man why he had not taken us to the address provided. He insisted that he had. This argument went on for several fractious minutes, interrupted only by me threatening to ring the language school who had organised the trip, and then realising there was no signal available whatsoever, until he sighed, flopped his considerable bulk back into the cab, and drove us about five minutes further down the road to some kind of deserted bar. Presently, a portly man in a G-Unit t-shirt bowled out, and informed us that the station was but 50 metres from where we had just pulled up. We then found ourselves jolted suddenly backwards by our jovial driver reversing at high speed back down the path.

Once we had eventually located the station and been met by Christine, one of the staff members, we were given some more amazing news by her – ‘Er, we didn’t actually know you guys were coming… you can share a room with Abby?’ And lo and behold, we were shoved unceremoniously into what can only be described as two bunk-shelves in the corner of someone else’s shed. After being left alone, we settled down on our bags, and wondered what on earth would become of us next.

After an angry and panicked conversation, Rach and I decided to make the best of a bad situation and headed cautiously over to dinner in the vain hope that we would not have to sit, surrounded by a fog of anxiety, on a lonely table. Dinner was rice and beans, something that would become pretty much the main feature of our lives as the days of turtle conservation passed by. Luckily, a sprightly young Dutch boy by the name of Elias decided to take pity on us at the dinner table and so our time was spent generally chatting to him and comparing English and Dutch culture.

Soon after this, Rach and I received our turtle-saving training and were then sent on our merry way to our first night patrol. Night patrol, a hellish ordeal disguised as a worthwhile, animal conservation exercise, comes in 4 hour shifts at either 8pm or 12 midnight. It consists of a group of volunteers/staff/locals ploughing up and down the beach in the wet, fly-infested sand mounds, until that hallowed moment when a turtle is spotted, flippering its cumbersome way up the beach to lay some eggs. I was put on patrol with our unwitting roommate Abby, and Jairo, one of the locals. After about a million silent years of trudging through silty textured sand dunes, Jairo spotted a tortuga. He instantly handed me a pair of latex gloves and a plastic bag and shoved me towards the nest with an encouraging grunt of ‘venga!’ At first, the task of bag-holder, watching as the turtle deposited her future offspring into my plastic sack, seemed like the most magical experience possible. However, as time wore by and the eggs kept coming thick and fast and my arms became less and less alive by the second, the awe was very much bleeding, slowly but surely, into intense pain. Only Jairo’s spindly weight leaning across me to grab the full bag caused me to snap back to reality from a pain-induced stupor, and soon we were back on the beach again.

By the time I returned, blistered, exhausted, aching and covered in sand at 4am, a nice clean bed was the only thing that could heal the pain. I then remembered that I had no such thing, and instead was forced to clamber in the dark under my shoddily erected mosquito net, on to a damp mattress that had become all the more uncomfortable due to the fact that the middle slat of the bed had fallen out, causing a dip in the mattress line for a delightful pile of sand to collect in. What tomorrow would bring, lord only knew.

By Emily Frost, WessexScene.co.uk
The complete versions of all my travel blogs can be found on http://idiotsgotravelling.blog.com

Costa Rica now has its very own John Lennon.

A statue of the Beatles star sits in a plaza in San Jose, reports the Tico Times. Designed by Cuban sculptor Jose Ramón Villa, the statue is titled “Imagine all the people living life in peace.” It was unveiled on Friday.

“It’s been said a million times that a city without culture doesn’t have a soul,” said San Jose Mayor Johnny Araya. “We’re working to attract tourists to more than volcanoes and beaches but also to our capital. Now people can come here to have their photo taken with John Lennon whose message of peace identifies with our country.”

Some people questioned why Costa Rica should build a statue that didn’t replicate a Costa Rican and that wasn’t designed by a local artist.

But that didn’t stop hundreds of Ticos and tourists from climbing all over the statue this weekend, reports the Tico Times, as their parents smiled and flashed peace signs.

The fireworks will indicate the start of the Festivities of Zapote, from December 25th to January 3rd. Undoubtedly, this is the biggest activity in San José at the end of the year, which attracts thousands of local and foreign visitors, who add some extra fun to their travel vacations by visiting the fairgrounds.

This is a special time to enjoy family trips and group tours in Costa Rica. The variety of surprises and activities is really big, but, among all interesting options, there is one which powerfully attracts the public attention: the Costa Rican style bullfights, where at least two hundred amateur bullfighters face a fierce bull, and try to do the best performance in front of the excited public. That is one more good reason for many people to enjoy Costa Rica tours in December.

The bullfights “a la tica”, as the Costa Rican style is known, include the bull-rides, where the riders ride the bull for as many seconds as they can, while a lot of local and a few foreign amateur bullfighters run around the bull, to touch and to face him. This show is really fun to watch, especially the moments when improvised bullfighters jump up on the fence at the last second to avoid the fierce bull.

Before this show, the public enjoy the fireworks, a comic show with a group of clowns facing a bull, and the professional bullfights, where real bullfighters face the bull to the rhythm of “ole, ole”. In Costa Rica, they don´t have permission to kill the bull, so this is not a bloody show, as occur in other countries. That is way thousands of travelers prefer spend time from their vacation travels at the Costa Rican show.

People who visit the country on December have the opportunity to know more about Costa Rica culture, and popular activities. Hotels in San José offer good discounts for early booking, and travel agencies have a lot of different favorable options for travelers.

Chances are… you’ve probably heard about, or you know someone that has moved to Costa Rica to retire. It’s not that unusual anymore, as thousands of Canadians and Americans are now living in Costa Rica full time. This amazing country is a mecca for nature lovers and people just wanting to have a better life. ‘Pura Vida’ the country’s motto simply translated, means “Pure Life” and the people living here are surely enjoying the freedom, beauty and celebration of life that living ‘Pura Vida’ describes.

This is a story of a couple that did just that, they moved to Costa Rica six years ago and are enjoying a dream lifestyle that would have taken many more years to achieve, if they had stayed in Canada. They both had busy demanding careers that were taking their toll, they wanted more freedom, more time for each other and just more… fun!They decided to search for a tranquil, rural area in a safe and affordable country with a great climate and after searching in a few different countries, they chose Costa Rica. Their names are Brian McLane and Mariel Castenada and they are now enjoying the comfort of their home and community in the mountains of Costa Rica and couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.

The name of their community is Altos de Antigua, it is located near the town of Santiago de Puriscal located 50 kilometers SW of the capital city of San José in the heart of the Central Valley. The Central Pacific beaches are 70 kilometers away, with three of Costa Rica’s National Parks (Manuel Antonio, Carara and La Cangreja) all close enough to visit on day trips. This central location is very convenient, as you can travel to the city for a day of shopping and trips to the airport — or take a scenic drive to the coast for a fun day at the beach.

Over the last 5 years, many of the lots here have sold, mostly through word of mouth and now there are only a few lots left. Because it was so successful, they decided to buy into another development, called Altos los Cafetales that is located in the same general area. This community was once a generations old coffee plantation and features wide open views of the valley, mature trees and small to medium sized lots at very affordable prices.

Both communities are mountain properties, where spring-like temperatures stay constant (in the mid 70′s), year-round. Spectacular views are everywhere, it’s safe, peaceful and comfortable, but most of all – it’s very affordable to live here long term. Living ‘like a local’ is the best way to experience the real Costa Rica. By living where the locals live, eating where the locals eat and shopping where they shop, you can live a very good lifestyle, for a lot less than what it would cost in Canada or in the US. The Costa Rican people are happy, beautiful people and though we are ‘foreigners’ in their country, they have welcomed us with open arms and continue to show us how to live a simpler, happier more fulfilling life.

So if the idea of living nestled in a lush, green valley or on a coffee plantation in the mountains of Costa Rica sounds good to you too, we invite you to join us and share the dream of living Pura Vida in beautiful, amazing, spectacular Costa Rica!

We are offering guided tours of both of these properties starting in January 2012, visit our website for more details.

Contact: Connie Dye
Phone: 1-888-835-0108
Website: www.casa-sapo.com
Email: connie@casa-sapo.com

Beyond the idealized capsule of the resorts, there lies a whole other side of Costa Rica as filmmaker Todd Bieber discovered when he and his girlfriend visited the Nosara Wildlife Rescue, a side not dressed up by the tourist industry but where those devoted to wildlife do their part to rescue animal victims of modernity.

Many of the monkeys in Bieber’s short film, Encounters with Orphan Monkeys, are left to fend for themselves when their mothers mistake the many uninsulated power lines in the country for natural features and die. Though many of the babies can’t be saved, they do what they can for those who survive.