Something had been missing in my life and I finally figured out what it was... Say hello to Fred
Fred's arrival came just in time for another big event: A visit from the one, the only, the absolutely fabulous, Lauren Gasparine. Laur came down to help me celebrate (or rather forget) my dirty 30. And from what I can't remember, mission accomplished.
I picked Laur up at the airport in the Troop, with it's brand new engine, and we made a quick stop in the office to say hi before we paid a visit to the Cafe Britt coffee plantation so Laur could taste the best coffee on Earth.
Then it was back to the house to get ready for my birthday party at La Birreria. There were shots, shots and more shots. And these are the only pictures to prove I was actually there.
The next morning, after waking up, still wearing my dress from the night before, we made our way [slowly] down the coast to Quepos, where we would spend a few days at Manuel Antonio National Park. With the Troop packed up and my new furry friend in the backseat, we set off on our little adventure.
First stop: Roadside fruit stand, so Laur could have her coconut!
Then we saw some croc's, had some taco's and drove down a crazy dirt road.
We arrived at the hotel and found we had a front row seat to the howler monkey's playing in the trees. We wasted no time getting out and exploring the area, and even got a free show.
The next morning we hit the park, eager to see some wildlife, and we weren't disappointed. There were sloths, bugs, birds, racoons and more monkey's.
Later that night we took Fred to the hotel bar, where he proceeded to pass out on the bar stool, earning him the nickname Duf... Drunk Uncle Fred. That's my boy!!!
Our trip came to an end too quickly, and before we knew it, it was time to head back to San Jose. We packed the Troop back up, buckled Fred into the backseat and hit the road. Little did we know, our adventure would not end there. 5 minutes into the trip, as we coasted down the hill into the town of Quepos, I felt the Troop start to buck, and then it made some clicking noises, and then it just died. Uh O! Well this is no good. We are 3 1/2 hours from San Jose, we don't speak Spanish, it's Sunday morning and no one around, hmmm this is going to be fun. We popped the hood and checked around, but to any onlooker it was clear we had no idea what we were doing, so a nice man stopped and asked if we needed help, which we did! He called a mechanic friend of his, and then we waited.. and waited... and waited. No mechanic. But thankfully another nice person stopped to see if we needed help. This one knew enough about cars to know, my oil tank had busted open and I had run out of oil. Not a good sign. He jumped on his motorcycle and drove to the nearest gas station to get us some oil, which we prayed would solve the problem, but sadly, no dice. A mechanic finally did show up and confirmed, there was no way in hell we were going to be driving that car back to San Jose. Wonderful! Slight problem, we had to get Laur back for her flight, so after some serious negotiation, and my serious I mean, some tears, our new friend, called his brother in law, who had a taxi company and we could hire a van to drive us and all our stuff back to San Jose.
And as Fred and I waved goodbye to Lauren at the airport. I laughed and thought, there are no boring days in Costa Rica.
Pura Vida!
