Brandon Fuller

Costa Rica - Day 1 - Arrival

The big trip is upon us. Kim and I have not vacationed without kids since before there were kids in our lives. We love taking our kids but they always put a damper on the pace a bit. So we decided we would like to do this one by ourselves. Luckily, my parents thought it would be a great idea to come stay with the kids for a week. What a way to really bond with their only grandchildren.

So my parents flew into Denver yesterday and setup shop to run the show for a week. This entailed getting Herb some Pepsi and M&Ms and showing my Mom the routine. Kim got her all set by making a handbook (20+ pages) that described what to do for every day, every event, every situation. I think they are going to be just fine.

My Dad drove us out to the airport at about 9PM for our 12:10 AM flight. We were on a non-stop from Denver to San Jose, Costa Rica. The flight was uneventful. Pretty much everyone slept but me. I can’t sleep on red-eye flights anymore I guess. Plus I was on the aisle and kept getting random people grabbing my seat as they made their way up the aisle. So after some winks and blinks, we were landing about 5 hours later. Here is the airport from up above.

The San Jose airport was nice from the start. Seemed like it had been expanded or made over in recent years. We made our way through immigration and customs really quickly. Suddenly, we were out on the street and off in a new country. The next step was to board our smaller charter flight to Quepos. San Jose is in the middle of the country but Quepos is on the Pacific coast. It isn’t that far from point to point but there is a mountain range in between so we chose to take the 30-minute flight instead of the multi-hour bus ride. Unfortunately, I booked the flight with a long layover so we had to wait a few hours before moving on. We then got slapped with a delay. Let’s go!

It was a 12 person plane and it was a bit windy out so a little bumpy. However, the scenery was awesome and reminded me a lot of California and then some of Hawaii.

As we hit the coast, I recognized the area from the pictures and knew our hotel was close. It is out there on the furthest point. Apparently, they blasted away a bit of the mountain to make room for the hotel.

The plane did a big 360 after flying over the runway. Then it was time to land on the smallest runway that I have ever been on. Looked like they cleared a row of plants just for our plane to land. The runway was just long enough. We departed and headed into the smallest airport I have ever been to.

Ok, it isn’t the best video but I tried to take a few minutes of video of the landscape on the plane. It was loud so I didn’t feel like narrating. Kim and I chat near the end if you hang in there for that portion.

We jumped in a group shuttle with one other set of folks and headed toward Quepos. It was just a few miles until we were in town. However, we are south of town so we quickly exited that area and headed a few more kilometers (miles are not allowed to be discussed here) and turned off the road onto an unpaved bumpy-as-hell road out to the point where the Hotel Parador would end our journey.

We arrived to drinks in the lobby and fresh lemon hand towels to wipe off our dirt. We were a couple hours before check-in so our room was not ready. Crap. We just wanted to crash, eat and clean up. “Sir, your room isn’t ready but we could upgrade you to another room, which is ready right now”, says the check-in dude. Sold. Our new suite was on the higher floors with a great view of everything around. A tour to be posted later. For now, it was time to eat. So we cleaned up and headed downstairs to a nice Costa Rican style lunch. While eating, we saw some iguanas just walking through and playing welcome wagon. Kim wants to see monkeys but these were a good first step.

After lunch, we hung out at the pool and swam a bit. While lounging, I pulled out my iPhone and I had a great Wifi signal right at the pool. Kim was like “do you have to be on your phone constantly?”…yes? Hey, as a geek, it is just cooler to check and respond to emails from shores of Costa Rica. It is amazing you can do that at the same speed as when I am out to eat back at home. So I answered a few messages and did some brightkite posts and logged off.

Kim decided to take a nap but I wasn’t ready. I knew that if I laid down, I would have trouble getting back up before the next morning. So I grabbed my 405, my new PI trail shoes and headed out the door to get some sweat out. The road from the main road to our hotel is a non-paved nasty up and down piece of thing. But great for running and hurting. I tried to pound the hills and was always a little more motivated when I passed a tour bus. “That guys is running this!”, they would chatter. Love that. Got to the main road and headed south a bit to see what was that way. Spotted some places to eat that I had read about before turning back when I ran out of sidewalk. If no sidewalk, there is nowhere to run. The road is a 2-lane with no shoulder so cars have to go around you. Not the best to run on. On the way back to the hotel, I dropped down a trail and headed down to the closest beach to our hotel to gauge the distance and drop to see if my pregnant wife would be able to hack it. No problem. Grinded back up the hill and into the hotel property. Got an hour in on the run but not a lot of distance. Oh well - but I love those exploratory runs in new places. It is one of my favorite things to do and learn about where I am. Hope to keep getting out there every day.

We ate an early dinner at the hotel and headed to bed early. The lack of sleep caught up with me finally. It is good to be tired.

View all photos from this event.