Our Little Slice of Paradise - Two Weeks in Costa Rica!

We've been looking forward to these 14 days for some time.  We've got Josh back from school and the entire family together for Christmas in a tropical paradise.  We've got a week planned in the northern half of Costa Rica (Guanacaste), and then we're headed south to spend some time in the jungle.  The temperature is cooler than it was when we last came in March 2008, and Kim's tummy is behaving itself.  It's gonna' be fun!

This clip shows the beachfront view of the place where we're staying until Christmas Eve, the JW Marriott in Hacienda Pinilla.  Thank goodness for Marriott Rewards!

...and this is the beach we walked to get to Lola's, an outdoor restaurant nestled under some palms on what, by U.S. standards, is an essentially undeveloped beach.  Beautiful setting!  Lola, the restaurant's namesake, is a huge sow pig (the size of a cow!).  Lola was famous for trotting down to the beach and swimming in the surf.  She died last year, and now her daughter, Lola II, continues the tradition.

This is a shot of the family, seated for dinner at Lola's.  Josh and Jake decided to pelt me with rocks as I filmed.  So typical.

Mom got really excited that we got to her favorite place in the world!

A look at our room.....

Emma and our hotel

Here's a shot of our guide feeding an 8-foot American Crocodile.

On our way to Lola's

Wading through some little river

Eating dinner at Lola's

Costa Rica had the biggest grasshoppers we've ever seen. We tried to put my flip-flop right next to it to give a size comparison.

Our hotel in the more jungle part of Costa Rica

Jungle Japes

Going on our croc tour!!!

A mangrove tree and it's roots

Josh saw this croc from a long ways away. So we decided to take a closer look......

Getting closer.......

Pretty big, huh?

One of our tour guides getting ready to feed a croc

They looked a lot bigger up close

Emma and her favorite horse ever