Second day in CR

My brain is fried so this will be a brief rundown of today's activities.

Fell asleep writing in a journal V enclosed in my pack. I was fully clothed and I hadn't brushed my teeth or washed my face. I felt ripe by morning. I woke up around 4am. It was strangely quiet...until the gate buzzer mounted over Dad's bed went off. I struggled to get back to sleep after that. The noise picked up by 6am. My had was 6 inches from a french door with a quarter inch crack between the door...the other side of the door was the street.

I woke up around 8am EST, 7am here. Dad woke up around then too. We made white sweet bread with jam for breakfast. Interesting. Sweetly bitter coffee with sugar and no cream. I got to work on school while dad flipped through TV stations. He grew restless and went to the bank to exchange dollars for colones. I kept working on school. Finally posted final assignment around 12pm. Dad was anxious to go out and buy bus tickets, so much so that I was only allowed to wash my face and throw on a hat before leaving. I felt gross.

We took many detours on our way to the bus, which you will see in the pics. I'll let them do the talking for me! It was a very impromptu trip around the city. We didn't intend on being out long and we didn't bring the map. We caught lunch at a neat little pizzeria soda. I ordered Coca Cola light (Diet Coke). Everything here is in glass bottles so far. It's neat.

Our final stop was to the bus station to buy our tickets for tomorrow...or so we thought. Thank god Dad's a good navigator. I'd be lost without him. In preparation I learned phrases and was very prepared when I approached the window. I proudly said: "Dos billettes por Jueves las nuevo en la manana," or something like that. She said something back and I couldn't understand her...don't think she understood me either. I handed her colones, she handed me tickets. Dad looked at it and said this isn't right. About that time the teller came out of the booth and tried to explain something to us. Luckily two very nice women offered to help, they were bilingual ;) Turns out the bus we want isn't available for pre purchase. To make a long story short she refunded our money and we returned the tickets. We will return in the morning for a 9:30 bus to Cartago. I'm scared.

When we got back to our hostel I uploaded pics, corresponded with Coffee farm owners, downloaded a CR bus book and Spanish phrase app to my iphone for 99 cents, money well spent. Dad became very unsettled and decided to walk to the market and get something to cook for dinner...$5/pp was too much to spend (the hostel dinner rate). I worked out legs and did situps etc. while he was gone. He arrived a bit later with a chicken breast, 2 potatoes, 2 onions, and a 6 pack of Imperial Cerveza-Costa Rica's premium beer or 4700 colones (about 5 US dollars.) There is this chef guy here, Caesar-he is Peruvian, and he 'helped' Dad spice up dinner. It turned out really well...although I am worried my arteries are clogged! You should have seen the amount of oil my dad used to cook in!

Before dinner I braved the shower and was pleasantly surprised. Hot water. I felt great. The new pack towel is perfecto! Well worth it. After my shower the hostel people asked if we would like to be upgraded. Their service guy was working in our room all day replacing windows and doing construction. So we moved to a much nicer, much quieter room with 6 beds! All to ourselves. I get the bunk, dad gets the double.

We talked with some hostel visitors over dinner. The people here are incredibly nice. Will talk more about them tomorrow...