A Perfectico Storm

The last time I wrote about Covid back in April there were very few cases here. The government had shut down the borders very quickly (quicker than in the UK) and for a few months things were kept extremely tight and under control. There were only repatriation flights. Only citizens could come in and they had to quarantine for two weeks. The land borders were closed and tourist visas were extended several times and currently up till mid November. We were due to do our first visa run in April, as you need to re-up your visa every 90 days, but we haven’t had to do one at all.  For a few months 10 people total had died and there were a handful of cases a day - and a handful of people getting better and for quite a while (around 3 months) the number of active cases was around 400-600 and dropping. Masks were brought in and there were driving restrictions. You couldn’t drive on some days and after certain times. Bars, beaches and national parks were shut. Churches couldn’t meet. Events ...

Hey there! And thank you to everyone who has been in touch checking in on us. Covid-19 has changed everything so much over the past couple of months for just about everyone... no longer are we alone in our family isolation, you all have joined us, though for a better reason than "the car is still at the mechanic and the only bus out of "town" is at 5.30am!". We are absolutely fine, in the scheme of things, and hope that all you guys are as well. On Friday 6th March at 8.40pm we were all laying on our big bed at Finca Fruition - the place we stayed for 6 weeks. Iris was asleep and all of a sudden everything began to shake, the ground moved and it felt like a great big giant was rattling the house. It stopped, and then it started again. I was scared because I didn't know what to do. We were living in a clapboard house halfway down a very steep hill. I had a deadweight child on me and it was pitch black outside in the jungle. Then it was over. Tom thought it was ...

This is part 2 of our first two weeks in Costa Rica, you can read Part 1: Three days in Costa Rica here . Hummingbird makes the rubbish weather feel better Day Four: It's still raining and windy, we could have stayed in England if we wanted weather like this, but we're off to La Paz Waterfall Gardens today so nothing is going to dampen our spirits. I could, and probably will, write a whole post about La Paz Waterfall Gardens. It is an amazing place filled with wildlife that we've never seen in real life. There's a mixture of enclosures with different types of animals as well as wild animals in the grounds of the gardens. Hummingbird acrobatics as La Paz We see birds (Iris even got to feed a toucan), insects, spiders, monkeys, butterflies, snakes, frogs, orchids, hummingbirds and big cats. The most impressive part of the day was watching some of the 26 different species of hummingbird in the hummingbird garden, they flit about so gracefully and their win...

There's a really well known (and super useful) blog called Two Weeks in Costa Rica. I think they called it that because they originally came on holiday for a fortnight (and then they kept coming back and eventually birthed a child or two here). I thought it would be good to tell you about some of the things we did in our first two weeks in Costa Rica: Day One : We are HERE! The sun is shining in San José!! When we drove down to Heathrow there was horizontal rain, terrible wind and it was cold, cold in your bones cold. We pick up our ridiculous hire car and drive ten minutes to a hotel. There is a pool. We drink cocktails. There are butterflies and dragonflies, we see a parrot in a tree. It's 27 degrees C. We've been travelling for 37 hours. We pass out. Day Two : We have amazing, delicious breakfast. It is fried banana, rice and beans, fresh pineapple, papaya and watermelon. Why have I never had this before? We swim, we eat crisps made out of bananas. I get the impres...