Brandon Fuller

Costa Rica - Day 7 - Departure

Today was our final day in Quepos. We woke up and went to breakfast. The breakfast at the hotel every day is a complimentary buffet. Always a good mix of hot food and fresh fruits, plus cereals and an omelet station. Here is a bad picture (because it was my only one) of Kim scooping up.

This was our usual table where we sat and enjoyed the view while eating.

I had forgotten to take pictures of the other pools. Probably because we didn’t spend any time at them because we were always on the go. This is the main one with the swim up bar.

Look Sydney and Reagan! Daddy had to save Mommy when a big bad croc got into the pool.

Kim, master photographer, took this crappy shot under the overhang. But the point was to show the suites tower that we stayed up in. Gave us great views.

We packed up quickly and had time to spare. So we just sat on the balcony. First time!

I was trying to be all “Corona” with this shot but I think you get a better view of my new PI trail shoes. They worked well. Tight at first but broke in nicely over the course of the week. They are water resistant. We got Kim some Vasque Gore-Tex trail shoes right before we left as well. Glad we did — not — we never saw a drop of water other than the ocean. Guess when they say dry season, they mean it.

We grabbed a cab and went back over to the miniature Quepos airport to wait for our plane. While there I was checking out the guidebook and matching with all the other destinations you can fly to here. Many folks come into Costa Rica via San Jose (of course) and then travel all around using these small flight services.

The road home starts here.

I commented to Kim that there was no tower. She noticed a small shack to the side and we figured that was it. However, out front, there was a weight bench and two guys were doing bench presses. Nothing like getting in a workout at work, I guess.

There was only one other passenger on the plane with Kim and I so we spread out and watched the sights. I will spare you a video this time. They farm a lot of palm oil out here. You can see the plants very distinctly from the air. Apparently, this used to be used in food until everybody figured out it was unhealthy. Now, its mostly in cosmetics and such.

One last look back at Puerto Quepos. Our hotel was out there on that point that curves around the bay. You can see that big rock/island out from there. See that in my panorma from the balcony taken earlier today.

This was along the coast just north of Quepos. All that green bush near the coast is the mangrove area that we traveled yesterday.

Time to relax on the short flight.

Hey, Dad, they race here too!

Time to land — thank, god. It was a short flight but it got really funky over the mountains and the little plane was all over the place.

Since this wasn’t the US, I left my GPS on for the flight. Thought the map view of the flight path might be cool. We went 51.48 miles with an elevation gain of 16252 feet in 21 minutes, which is a moving pace of 0:25. View my full GPS data.

We checked into our hotel and decided to go for a walk over to the shopping area. We hadn’t done that much yet and we have two girls that will be expecting stuff on return. The more familiar brand names started appearing over this direction.

And in the shops, what did we find? More Costa Rican wildlife. You can take these home apparently!

It is rush hour in these parts. Everyone is stacked up going into San Jose. That is it in the distance with the taller buildings. We are outside of town towards the airport for our early morning escape. First flight back to the USA in the morning.

It was a real blast to finally make it to Costa Rica. We could have brought the kids but it was a really nice not to have to worry about their comforts all the time — like where the hell we would get Mac-N-Cheese at! Thanks to my parents for taking a week away from their lives and spending it with their grandchildren at our home. I am sure they developed a deeper relationship with their grandkids over the week. Plus, the 60-70 degree temps that Colorado enjoyed this past week couldn’t have hurt either.

Hope you enjoyed following along with our trip. I debated the live blog because it takes a lot of time — but it always ends up giving much more detail for us when we look back on our trip in the years to come. This was our first visit to Central America, but I guarantee it won’t be our last. Costa Rica has 60+ national parks/preserves. Lots to see in so many areas and they are really glad to have you. So to Costa Rica and those we met along the way — Pura Vida!

View all photos from this event.