Up until today, Costa Rica has been a dreamy 48 hours of beautiful ocean views, lazy time by the pool, and equally lazy time down by the beach (just 5 minutes away). We are staying in Playa Hermosa, in a fantastic house with gorgeous views. It has the makings of a tremendously relaxing vacation, embodying everything pura vida.
Until today, when I paid $300 to get wrinkles. You know how some people pay $300 for botox to get RID of wrinkles? I did the opposite, I paid $300 and walked away with a furrow in my brow like a canyon.
It went like this. We were driving to Playa Conchal, which was reported to have white sand beaches and shells (shell hunting is my favorite thing ever). The drive there should have been an hour, instead it was closer to two because we took a route which led us on "Monkey road", which sounds cool but consisted of a dirt road that at one point had what looked to be an impassible river running over it and so we had to turn around and back track. Later we were told, "oh, people just drive over that river." We didn't.
So we finally arrive at Playa Conchal (kids tired of the car and hungry) and it's very confusing because it would appear the only way to get to the beach is actually to drive down this sand gully, and onto the beach itself, across a stretch, and then thru this little dirt road to park in the woods. We turned around once thinking we were crazy, Lonely Planet couldn't have meant this, right? When we came back a second time a guy stopped us just above the sand gully, assured us this indeed was right, and then lured us into doing an ATV tour. Super vivacious salesman, with a "special deal" for us, and as he peered into the backseat to asses the number of riders he looks at Lucia and says, "you 16?" to which she answer, "no, 12", then he looks at Gia and says, "you 12?" to which she answers "no, 9". He then said something about Gia being able to handle an automatic, but then changed his tune when he saw my jaw drop and said Ava & Lucia could drive solo, Gia would go with me, and Romeo with John. Done and done.
ATV tour was high on the older kids' list of "to do in Costa Rica". It ranks REAL low on my list. I've never actually done it before, nor truthfully even been interested. Ranked high on my list were reading, siting by the ocean, yoga, sleeping, and eating yummy food--all much less exciting to the kids.
So, we got a 3 minute tutorial on how to drive this mini car with big tires and loud vroom-vroom. Clutch, brakes like a bicycle, little lever for gas. Seemed easy enough but immediately I was nervous that I would forget the brakes, hit the gas, and run into a tree. It was the same anxiety I remember having when I first learned to ride a bike and had to remember peddling in reverse was the brakes.
Not 100 feet off into the sand trail on our death-mobiles and I look down to see a large warning sticker on the machine that says "Never permit someone under 16 years of age to operate this machine." Uh-oh.
At first I was at the head of the pack, Ava & Lucia were sandwiched in-between, and John and Romeo took up the rear. I drove a reasonable speed, right behind our tour guide. It was comfortable and slow-going, but not stressful. At some point Ava seemed to realize that she could just hit the gas and blow by me...which she did, and within 10 seconds after that, Lucia did the same.
Then I spent the next 2 hours furrowing my brow, and acquiring needless wrinkles. They were maniacs. Remember Animal from the Muppet Movie? Lucia looked liked Animal on an ATV. She kept moving arms up and down, elbows jutted out to the side, simulating her revving up her engine. She'd slow way down, and then peel out and if she could have popped a wheely she would have. Ava would thrust one hand over her head and make the hang ten sign, and then arch her back like a cat, semi-stand up from her seat, like she was a professional ATV jumper, and hit the gas.
The whole thing gave me a permanent stomach ache. Both of the girls can look into the fridge, straight at the milk and then scream at the top of their lungs, "MOM, WHERE'S THE MILK??" How would I have any assurance they would actually SEE the 2 ton boulder in the road, or the low hanging Tarzan rope branch, before serious injury? Our young, handsome Tico guide was no help at all. At the end of the tour he was showing us how to do donuts in the sand along the beach. Basically demonstrating dangerous behavior. Have you ever yelled "STOP" on an ATV at a distance to your kids? It doesn't work. At all.
The whole thing would have been hysterical if they weren't MY kids and I didn't have to worry about them flying off and killing themselves. I don't know what the accident rate with ATV's are, but I got to think it's REAL high. I'm so grateful that activity can officially be checked off the list (not to be repeated on this trip) and now we can move on to some nice walking tours of the jungle and less dangerous crap like that. Scorpions and poisonous frogs seem much less scary.
And as a final note, I'm on day three of my vacation fitness regime which is why I picked Hard Tail as my suitcase essential item for today. I'm all up in my bootie short and long sport tank ensemble and I'm going to rock my bootie shorts if it's the last thing I do. We are 300 feet straight up the hill in the house we are staying at so I'm walking the hill every night and it's steep, steeper than any hill I've walked on, probably ever, and I know it's going to kick my bootie into shape.
Signed, ME {lv}
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