Part III (of III)

Sarah: And finally...here's Part III.

As David and I don't have anything other than tourist visas, we are still required to leave Costa Rica every 90 days. May was shaping up to be a busy month with groups, professors, and researchers, so we needed to quickly renew our visas as soon as the semester program ended. SNU provides us with a stipend for the purpose of visa renewals, and anything we spend on top of that stipend comes out of our own pockets. Rather than doing what we would normally do - take a 12 hour bus ride to Nicaragua or Panama and find a place to stay - we decided to do something a little easier.

We had always seen these promotions for a Caribbean island called San Andres, owned by Colombia, in the daily newspaper. The deal was for 3 nights, and it was all-inclusive, including airfare, airport transport, and of course lodging and all food. David and I aren't the type to be drawn to all-inclusive resorts, and usually enjoy finding a smaller, more locally-run lodge, that gives us the freedom to explore the area and eat where we want and do what we want. However, being that our visa renewal trip came up in between the end of a busy semester program and a busy May with people in and out of QERC, we decided to go for it. We only had to pay a small fee extra on top of our stipend in order to get the complete experience. And it was worth it!

We really enjoyed a few days of complete relaxation, reading by the pool while the bluish-greenish ocean waves crashed behind us. The resort is owned by a company called Decameron, and there were a number of Decameron resorts on the island. The deal was that we slept at the one we had booked, but could take advantage of any restaurant or pool or facilities of any of the other resorts at anytime, which was a part of the all-inclusive package. Every day we explored a new pool to sit by and relax, new beaches to sit in front of, and new restaurants to try. It was just what we needed in the midst of our busy schedules!

One interesting thing about the island was that we only saw 3 other North Americans the entire time we were there. San Andres is a very touristy place to be, but for tourists from Colombia, Costa Rica, Argentina, Brazil, El Salvador, etc. Being a Caribbean island, the majority of the people were of African descent, and that often means that English is widely spoken. If that was the case, we didn't experience much of it! We hardly heard any English spoken the whole time we were there. It was very fun and an interesting experience to be in a tourist location where the industry caters to primarily Latin Americans.

Upon our return to QERC, we welcomed a researcher named John Morrow and his wife Melissa. They are here for an entire month while John is working on a project for his Master's degree at Penn State. He is looking at the model of the Chacon family and how they've come to develop the valley and the decisions they've made along the way, looking closely at how the environment has impacted their choices and how they've impacted the environment in regards to conservation and sustainability. It has been a lot of fun to see his work progress as he interviews many family members and they open up by showing him old documents and pictures from the last 50 years.

We also welcomed Point Loma Nazarene University for a few days while they were here in Costa Rica for a Tropical Ecology course. Dave Cummings was the professor in charge of the course, and we have enjoyed getting to know Dave over the last year. His students were a great group and we are hoping some of them will be interested in joining our semester program in the future.

Messiah College is another group that came for a couple nights at QERC. They kept a busy schedule and were going to spend around 3 weeks traveling between Costa Rica and Panama. The oddest encounter with that group was seeing a friend I graduated college with, Craig Dalen, hop off their bus! I had no idea he even had any association with Messiah, nor that he would be showing up on my doorstep. He and his wife were along as chaperones and it was fun to catch up with Craig and meet his wife Tashya.

Finally, John Cossel from Northwest Nazarene University, is currently back at QERC with his family for a week. They have a total of one month in Costa Rica while John is doing some preliminary work with herpetology, primarily with frogs. David especially has had a good time going out at nights searching for frogs in our puddles that form on a daily basis from all the rain we are now getting.

And that's it for now! You are all caught up on our lives from the past couple of months. Actually, we do have some more exciting things to share about QERC that I will be posting about in the next few days. So be sure to check back here soon for even more fun things going on in our lives.