TRAVEL TIPS: Hotel makes or breaks trip!

Where you stay will make or break your trip. The typical tourist accomodations and tours will end up giving you the impression that Costa Rica is no bargain. Your expenses will be sky high eating in the typical tourist locations, enjoying the expensive hotel accomodations, etc.

Telling about the place we stayed at on our trip in July seems in order! Because it provided an atmosphere that was hospitable, affordable, and gave us many experiences with the Costa Rican people not in the tourist industry there.

Our lodgings may not necessarilly be everyone's cup of tea, but I'm hard pressed to understand how anyone would not love the place! It was located in the hills above Grecia, Costa Rica. It provided a launch pad for our adventures, which included reasonable drives to Poas volcano; the town of Jaco, where the surf is world famous, Grecia itself, Costa Rica's capitol San Jose, and several small towns that surrounded it in the Central Valley.

The couple that we rented our 1-bedroom apartment from were Mela and Richard. They settled into Grecia following their immigration from Poland and living in Texas for 15 years.

Richard could not be silent about the wonders of his new home and country! The facility he built there is now about four years old. He and Mela bought the property and built their home - with three downstairs apartment that now provide income for them.

"La Pura Vida" is the watchword for these expatriates in Costa Rica, and also their guests! The pure life, the tranquillo life! My wife and I spent hours hiking about the hillside roads, meeting local people and learning the area. It was surrounded by coffee plantation "fields of beans" and dreams for my wife and I.

And our host, Richard, was extremely familiar with the ins and outs of Costa Rica! He maximized the value of our trips by including many, many side, "must see" stops.

Among them was a highway bridge that provide us with views of dozens of crocodiles in the mud and swimming about. Not all flowing waters have crocs, but that one did!

"This is where Tico husbands bring their wives if they mis-behave" joked Richard.

His familiarity both with the culture and language was tremendous help as we negotiated in the marketplaces he showed us, Richard even linked us up with a bit ot "medical tourism" when we visited a local doctor for a health question.

We ate at cafes and restaurants well known to Richard. All this for gas money and for his time. Some places were more than others, but all were reasonable.

The point is that having a guide as a part of the deal was a great benefit. We were able to take in everything we had hoped to take in.

Plus there were the fellow guests in the other apartments to provide comaraderie and their individual stories.  We had an anethesiologist who was building nearby after serveral trips to the area and the decision to build that home.

The couple from Texas, Both in love with Costa Rica.  Both looking to finding a way to stay.  The husband would be coming back next to find and set up a household.

The facility was cleaned by a local school girl, who was both very competent and friendly.  My wife and I were very impressed with the cleanliness of our apartment, which was her handiwork!  She also accompanied Richard, my wife and I, on trips to San Jose and Jaco!

All in all the lodgings we picked turned out to be excellent and I'd highly recommend that any one wishing to join that experience go to this link for their web site: Escape in Costa Rica