Monteverde Trip: Day 1

Wow! what a great little trip we had to the beautiful mountainous town of Monteverde. 

First of all, I'd like to thank Steve Jobs. Because of him, Sean and I can drive in relative peace and quiet for hours on end. Steve, you have given me the gift of sanity on many a crazy day or long car ride.

Peter builds all kinds of amazing things in Minecraft! Also, Jackson IS wearing pants despite what it looks like in this picture :) my kids aren't fully clothed all that often here in Samara!

Baby Ella was content with some cookies and soft animals. This was her first car trip in her big-girl carseat and I'm convinced she feels like one of the crew now instead of like a baby. 

The road to Monteverde was AWFUL! These insane dirt roads are in such bad shape, I don't know how they get the goods and services they need to supply all those stores and people up on the mountain! But the view made up for the jostling journey. Monteverde is up above the clouds, as you can see we are almost above the cloud line! In the evenings the clouds roll into town and everything is misty and mysterious.

Yay! Pavement! They had sporadic segments of asphalt up until a certain point. I think the roads are just too hard to maintain with all the rain that comes. Driving through the jungle mountains was so beautiful though! 

After we arrived and settled into our BnB, we went to dinner at a small restaurant (they're called Sodas here) next door. We ate the traditional Costa Rican meal of Casados (rice and beans, small salad, fried plantains, and your choice of meat) and sipped some amazingly delicious Guayabana nectar! Yummm.

This cute girl Sophia was the restaurant owner's daughter. She was so happy to have some other kids to play with! She was 4 yrs old and shared all her toys with Elora. She brought out her dolly and Ella was SO enamored with it. I realized that we don't really have any "girl toys" at our house, maybe Ella needs some little dolls and necklaces. Sophia did Elora's hair, taught her a game, and wiped off her shirt when she spilled her beans. What a good little helper! 

This is our breakfast room where we spent many hours. Our hotel room was great, but if all 5 of us hung out in there for very long we got a tad claustrophobic. It was nice to have another space to go read, play games, etc. 

I taught Peter how to play chess and he caught on like a fish to water! I was amazed how quickly he learned the rules for all the separate pieces. What a smartie pants! 

Papa lovin up baby girl. She looks so tired in this picture, I'm sure we all were by this time! I'm trying to get her used to a bottle again so she doesn't feel like I'm her walking food machine. She's going to be 13 months old tomorrow! I'm not sure how much longer Ill nurse her, but I'm thinking its time to start tapering. 

Our cozy wooden room. Baby girl slept in her pack and play in the shower! We had 5 beds so I got to have a bunk bed ALL by myself :) And of course bunk beds mean blanket huts! 

Sean was a night owl and got the chance to see a sloth climbing across the power lines! Isn't it cute and fat? It hangs upside down while climbing. 

More coming soon about the rest of our Monteverde trip!