Day 1 in Costa Rica

Derrick and I decided to drive into Houston the night before to avoid having to get up at 3:00AM and driving to Houston on Sunday morning and take the risk of being late. We wanted to leave out of Houston to avoid a flight from Austin to Houston which can be crazy at times. We knew we were making it on the flight because there were 60 open seats, but only 2 first class with 4 people ahead of us :( But... we did get an exit row completely to ourselves so we stretched out and played sudoku on my Nook for most of the time:)

When we got off the plane we headed straight out of the "airport" (2 old plane hangers with no doors... nice airport haha) and into the "shark tank". For anyone that has traveled out of the country you know that there are tons of people standing there saying 'come with me, where you go?'. We already had pre arranged transportation (the best way to go when traveling out of the country) and it was fantastic. They were standing right there waiting for us with our names on a sign. They grabbed out luggage, walked us to the van, cranked the a/c, and away we went. All in about 3 minutes we were out of the airport. We went through Swiss Travelers and they did a fantastic job of getting us to and from the airport.

When we arrived at the hotel it was raining but we were starved so we didn't care! We headed into the hotel and were greeted with a drink on a silver platter from a serve in a tux. Fantastic:) We checked in and were in our room within 10 minutes of arrival. We quickly unpacked, changed into our suits, and headed down for lunch. It stopped raining by that point so we enjoyed the view from lunch and then went on a little tour of the place. We stayed in the pool area for the day and planned to visit the beach the next day. The sun came in and out exchanging itself with rain and cloud for 15-20 minutes at a time. We didn't mind because it was warm enough in the pool and we put our stuff under an umbrella. We enjoyed lots of drinks from the swim up bar and then headed in to nap. When we woke up we showered and headed off to dinner at the buffet. At the hotel there are 3 restaurants that are included in our cost but you have to set up reservations first and we didn't get a chance to. The buffet had a ton of options but I was still exhausted to even want to eat. We headed back up to the room and were asleep by 8:30. Not too exciting of a day but we enjoyed ourselves and relaxed -- that's what vacation is for:)

Exit row with no one in between - can't complain:)

Costa Rica from the air

At lunch - the view was wonderful

Walkway to the beach and pool

Derrick in front of the hotel

Pool area

Swim up bar and little cove area - where we spent 75% of our days

Pool area again

Swim up bar:)

Lounging in one of the jetted coves

Rain clouds coming in - no big deal to us:)

Moved to the hot tub

I think we were in the water too long -- Derrick was pruning so bad his fingertips were caving in

Off to dinner for the first night:) And yes, Derrick's shirt says 'There's Gnome place like Texas' - only in TX could you find that and be proud to wear it!