The plan was we'd leave at 8, and by god Pita and I were in the car at 8, as was all our shit including bags and hats and towels and chairs and cooler and phones and books and a big butcher knife wrapped in aluminum foil. And we were ready to go. But Yvanny and Floria kept running back into the house for this or that, who knows what, and so it was 8:20 before Yvanny took the wheel of Floria's fine Nissan and we hit the road.

As we crossed a bridge I recognized the rio that we'd been on for the wedding the previous night. I'm starting to understand the lay of the land.

Just a few kilometres outside of Limon we pulled onto the right to a fruit stand where Pita rolled down her window and gave her order to the shopkeeper. "No, not those bananas, do you have some fresher ones," etc. We got mangos and the shopkeeper sliced open a watermelon and gave Pita a taste test before we bought it. And with fruit to keep us cool on the beach, we were on our way again.

I started recognizing landmarks from my previous trip to Lilan and Cahuita with Senor Paul. As always (as it was in India as well) I'm amazed when I can see the ocean and the land in front hasn't been developed with neverending rows of houses and hotels. I guess it's my capitalistic American mind wondering how can I exploit these incredibly valuable resources. But I guess Euros since Columbus have been tackling these same issues and, really, who am I...?

And then we were upon Cahuita and past it, and the environs started to appear very developed. There were large QT-style gas stations and new, small houses grouped in planned neighborhoods. And then there they were... tourists on bikes, surfers in dreads, yoga studios and pizza joints. We whipped into what I discovered was a big (by CR standards) US style grocery store with wide aisles and US products, and at that moment I decided ahhhhh, I could live in Puerto Viejo. We grabbed some cookies and gatorade for the beach and headed a little farther south to Cocles.

Now, Cocles is my ideal of tropical beauty a la Gilligan's Island. We parked in the shade on the side of the road where there was a nice wide sandy path through the trees onto the beach. We set up our chairs on a bedsheet in the shade while Ivanny went out into the full sun.

Floria and I took a long walk along the water while we tried to communicate in Spanglish. We crossed a rivulet flowing from the mountains into the ocean, maybe 10 feel across and 2 feet deep. It was so delicious to feel the layers of cold, fresh rainwater and warm, salty ocean water slipping together as we stumbled across.

After walking back to our camp we floated and splashed in the warm ocean waves amongst uber-white German surfers for an hour and then hit our chairs to eat some fruit and watch other Germans playing paddle ball.

Behind us in the shade a group of young men were sitting on a bench drinking beer while two bicycle police were handing out tickets. Floria and I decided that since drinking beer on the beach is legal, they must have been smoking ganja. Oh well, live and learn.

About 1 we packed up the beach, went to a "slow food" pizza joint with an ocean view, and an hombre sleeping off the night before in a hammock, for a delish pizza. And then headed home so I could get ready for my first night of class in Limon.

We pulled over to a tiny booth on the side of the road to buy hand crafted coconut oil. And in a small crossroads Pita called for Ivanny to pull over to the right because some guys were selling freshwater fish on the side of the road. After interrogating the men to insure freshness and negotiate a price, they brought a scale to Pita's window to seal the deal.

What a perfect way to start my first week teaching in Limon.