Back in Business

We apologize to our faithful blog viewers for the long pause and warn you, this is a long one! Brendan and I have been back in the States more or less since we returned from Mexico in late July. Much has changed since then! In regards to Los Adobes, the Puerto Escondido find, we decided it was not in our best interest to join a partnership with two Mexicans we didn't know. Yes, many of you may have thought us crazy for ever considering it to begin with and in retrospect it was a bit ridiculous. What we learned from that experience is priceless nonetheless.

We were living in Vermont during this time of decision making and renting a small but very cute studio apartment in the tiny town of Bridgewater. Brendan enjoyed his first true rural Vermont living experience. I think it seemed even stranger to him than Nicaragua! In November, the spectacular wedding of my cousin Sarah Turner, now Sarah Lidz and her man, Jono brought us to Puerto Rico for a week. We took advantage of the trip and looked at a small lodge in El Yunque, the tropical rainforest on the east coast of the island. We thought it was a very interesting place and liked it enough to pursue the idea of buying it and went home with intentions to make something happen there. The holiday season was coming at us full force however and we found it nearly impossible to communicate with banks in Puerto Rico. As a result we found ourselves drifting from the place and lost some level of interest. Brendan returned home for the Holidays and I joined him shortly after to bring in the New Year in Washington DC.

As the excitement of the holiday's came to an end, we found ourselves at a loss for what the next step should be. We had been using up the last bit of our savings and were pretty much tired of living out of our backpacks. It seemed it was almost time to put the guest house search off for a while and behave like most people our age, jobs, apartments etc. A frightening thought, I know! As usual, I was spending my morning browsing real estate websites when I stumbled upon what looked like an incredible bungalow lodge for sale on the Caribbean coast of Coast Rica. The place had been built that year and, according to the ad, needed to sell quickly due to family issues. So, with nothing to lose, Brendan and I decided to fly down to Costa Rica on a last ditch effort to see Tierra de Suenos.

A wise decision indeed! The flight to San Jose was quick and easy and we raced to make the last bus going to Puerto Viejo on the Caribbean coast. The beginning of the drive was beautiful, up and over lush temperate mountains. The sun went down once we hit the lowlands close to the coast and we drove through miles of banana plantations in wild anticipation as we inched closer to Puerto Viejo.

As the warm evening breeze of the humid Caribbean touched our skin, we remembered some of the reasons we started this search to begin with. Sounds of reggae music poured out onto the streets and a wirey dread locked man approached us asking where we were headed. We told him Tierra de Suenos in Playa Chiquita, trying to hold back our excitement. He wasn't sure of the place, but fetched us a cab. The drive out to Playa Chiquita is only 6 kilometers from Puerto Viejo but feels a bit longer due to the slow and bumpy dirt road. Making our way to the end of Playa Cocles, a long surf beach that that precedes Playa Chiquita, the road began to narrow and lush jungle took the place of any hotels or restaurants. This rural stretch lasted for a few minutes, then we spotted the glowing sign peeking out from the lush garden , Tierra de Suenos! The manager greeted us at the front entrance and walked us on a well lit path through the rainforest to our bungalow titled "Orchid Oasis." We stepped into the beautiful bungalow and knew in a second this was the place!

Tierra de Suenos is made up of six 1 year old bungalows, a two bedroom owner's house, a reception house with full kitchen and a palm roofed yoga studio. The grounds are stunning, overflowing with birds of paradise, palm trees, banana plants and a hundred others who are not yet familiar to us. There are five adorable sloths that live on the property as well as butterflies, hummingbirds, toucans and more. Each bungalow is made from beautiful hard wood, has its own deck with hammocks and adarondack chairs. They are situated close together in a U shape to maximize the amount of forest on the land. Everything in the bungalows is handcrafted, including the bedframes and mosaic showers.

Tierra de Suenos enjoys the best of all worlds. Playa Chiquita is a quiet village with three restaurants and two grocery stores as well as a community center that offers yoga and capoeira. It is a quick bike or taxi ride to the lively town of Puerto Viejo where there are bars, clubs and a variety of restaurants, but far enough away to not be bothered by all the noise . It is smack dab in the middle of all the best beaches in the area including the darling Playa Chiquita itself which is a 3 minute walk from the lodge. The area is considered the most diverse in Costa Rica with it's mix of Afro-Caribbians, Hispanics who have moved from more urban areas and indigenous people of the area. Ex-pats from all over the world have begun to flock here as well. The most incredible aspect of all this diversity is the very mixed nature of the groups. People in general live in harmony and honor the true meaning of the Costa Rican phrase, Pura Vida.

We recently signed a buy/sell contract and plan on closing the deal on February 25th. A friend of Brendan's from DC, John Hurley is funding the project and will be our partner in this endeavor. We will be moving down there to live and manage after close. The closing date is exactly one year and one day from the time we started this search last year. This seems to be an auspicious time of year for us! We imagine that we are going to run into countless obstacles as we learn the ins and outs of the business and plan to maintain this blog through it all.

Tierra de Suenos already has a website that we will change a bit to make more our own, but please check it out: www.tierradesueno.com For the best viewing of the photos in the upper right hand corner click on them, then click "view album", then "slideshow"!


After The 25th, reservations are open. Come visit us and see what it's all about!

Los Adobes

Mazunte is a small layed-back town on the Pacific coast. The water is blue-green and clear as can be. One can easily forget what year it is by the amount of hippies floating around. A typical night in mazunte consists of sitting under an umbrella, toes in the sand drinking Corona and eating an unbelievably delicious Pescado Empapelado (fish in a bag,) grilled to perfection by one of the sturdy El Pescador family girls! We Stayed at a place called El Posado Arcitecto, designed and run by an Italian guy. Our room with a view was built into the cliff directly in the center of the two beautful beaches. The room had some unique features including a swinging bed, proving to be more interesting than comfortable! We played a nightly game of vollyball against some very impressive five foot tall mexican girls...they beat us everytime! After spending a couple lazy days in Mazunte, we headed an hour north to the hot-spot Puerto Escondido.

Once a small fishing village whose economy was enhanced greatly by selling turtle meat and shells Puerto is a now a popular tourist destination for surfers and beach goers alike (and a safe haven for turtles). The Puerto Escondido area consists of five beaches. Playa Zicatela, where we stayed, is famous for the Mexpipe, a world renowned wave. Only the most experienced surfers or experienced idiots dare to risk their lives for an incredible ride. Surfing has quickly become my favorite spectators sport.
















Just as our trip was nearing an end and we were still not completely sure of our next move, an opportunity presented itself to us here in Puerto. A small hotel called Los Adobes was recently put on the market. A middle aged couple bought the land and built this quaint hotel with a swimming pool and garden 10 years ago. They made improvements little by little and maintained it beautifully. Unfortunately, the couple has been plagued with health problems over the years and the wife has recently passed away leaving the hotel in the care of her children. By happenstance we arrived to see the hotel just before the children came down to sort out loose ends and prepare it to be sold. We had a chance to stay at the hotel for a week, meet with the children, who are both in their 30's, several times and also with the real estate agents(two Americans that have been living and working in Mexico for 20 years).

This small hotel is what we have been searching for. It has an excellent location just a short walk from the beach, restaurants, bars, internet and shopping. It is beautifully designed with adobe walls and a palapa (palm) roof. With a few touches and a lot of energy we know we can have Los Adobes overflowing year round.

We are moving ahead with the support of the family, the real estate agents and the hotel staff (Estella, who has worked there for 9 years) to raise the money and take the necessary steps to be the new owners.

From here we're stopping in a mountain town called San Jose on the way to Oaxaca where we will reunite with Abigail, Angie's dear friend from home. After a few days there we are going to Mexico City as our last stop before two back-to-back family reunions in Colorado. We'll be fine tuning our business plan along the way and keeping in close contact with the family and real estate agents. Keep your fingers crossed for us and before you know it you may be relaxing by our pool in Puerto Escondido!!!!

Mexico!

At last we are in Mexico! In Tulum we got our first glimpse of the Yucatan`s Caribbean coast and we were blown away. The sand is whiter and the water brighter blue than we have seen. Our Experience here, however, was quite bitter sweet. The long strip of gorgeous beach had a number of overpriced, poor quality bungalos. We opted for the cheapest one and that was a mistake!

Our bungalo was the most atrocious excuse for a hut we had ever seen. It mainly consisted of sparsly arranged sticks leading to a poorly made palm roof and a half sand, half concrete floor. We thought it was pretty bad but decided to ruff it for the night. The worst was yet to be discovered when we payed the twenty bucks, more than we had payed almost anywere else in all our travels. Before bed we scoped the place out for whatever strange animals may be lurking, blew out the candles and it began. Smack, smack, smack! We were under attack! Mexican mosquitos were shockingly persistant. No amount of deet could desuade them from their feast. Not even the sand storm blowing in from the spaces between the sticks could distract them from their mission to devour us! Instead of sleeping, we spent the entire night fighting for our lives.

The following day we deliriously viewed the impresive ruins of Tulum. Those Mayans sure knew how to pick a spot! The rock temples look out over drastic cliffs onto stunning turquiose water. Iguanas sunbathe all over the ruins keeping a watchfull eye and giving an even more ancient feel to the splendid sight.

After exporing the ruins we high-tailed it out of there on the first bus to Mahahual, a rapidly developing fishing village. There were few tourists but apparently during the high season three cruise ships a day stop and fill the place with thousands of people....glad we weren`t there for that. The day we arrived there was a fishing tournament and Mexican families filled the restuarants and beaches, drinking, eating and having a good ol´ time. Men were posing with giant sword fish and various other beautiful fish while others cheered. We watched one woman impress her family by opening a beer bottle with her teeth. We happily joined in with margaritas, tacos and even a shot of Tequila on the house! We spent two relaxing nighs in a very comfortable, clean, mosquito free bungalo and took an over-night bus to Palanque.

Palanque is said to be the most amazing of the Mexican Mayan ruins. Tourists have been coming for years so it is very well set up. The town itself is 8 klm from the ruins and is typical with street food, a popular central plaza called a ¨zoculo¨ in Mexico and people out and about everywhere. We stayed at an old hippie/backpackers spot on the edge of the ruins called Panchan. Panchan is a group of bungalo operations set in the jungle. Our second floor bungalo was screen on all four walls with a deck and jungle surrounding. We observed two beautifully colored tucans chatting with each other for five minutes on a neighboring tree.

We Spent an entire day climbing temples and catching blurps about where we actually were by nearby tour guides. The ancient city of Palanque is actually 15 square Klms but only 7 have been escavated and made availabe to viewers. Although very touristy, one feels set back in time while experiencing the spectacular crumbling buildings set deep in the jungle.

We toured some of the areas incredible waterfalls en route to San Cristobal de las Casas. The drive was five hours up very winding, steep roads. San Cristobal is in the heart of Chiapas. High in the mountians, the town is buzzing with a young, excited crowd. The constant music and art create a very colorful atmosphere. San Cristobal has a wonderful indiginous market with beautiful hand-weaved blankets and other crafts. We have spent most of our days walking around taking in the rich culture and drinking the region´s famous hot choclate. We have also spent many hours philosophizing with a group of recently inspired Isrealis. The three of them just completed a four month yoga/meditation retreat in Guatemala and are full of very interesting concepts about the earth and it´s people (everyone will instantly attain enlightenment sometime after 2012 once NYC is buried under water). Two of them are joining us on the 12 hour bus ride to the Oaxacan coast tonight. Back to the heat!

Road Trip

View of farm in the Azuero.


Church in Chitre.

Rush hour in the Azuero.

The taxi to Isla Caña.

The hired car watchman in Laguira, the launch town for Isla Grande.

The view from Isla Grande.

Portobello locals.

Portobello.

The fort and customs house of Portobello.

We spent the last week cruising around in a rental car with Stuart, an Australian we met in Nicaragua, Bridget, his Panamanian girlfriend and Bram an American friend of theirs who´s studying in Panama City. Stuart was traveling down from Mexico handing out flyers for the hostel he owns in Panama City when we met and discussed our plans. We decided to team up, rent a car and explore beach towns that may be in need of a good guest house.

The driving was great thanks to the good roads in Panama and the beautiful scenery. We saw a good deal of the Azuero Peninsula which is known as the heartland of Panama with its frequent traditional celebrations and Spanish colonial architecture. We stopped in various towns on the western side of the peninsula often turning down side roads to check out the beaches. Aside from the occasional surfer they are pretty empty with nice views of nearby islands and long stretches of a black, brown or baige sand.

We spent one night on Isla Caña searching for sea turtles who come annually to bury their eggs in the sand. Unfortunately, it´s a little early in the season and we weren´t lucky enough to see any. From an island in the Pacific we drove all the way to an island in the Caribbean. It was a long day, but the beach waiting for us on Isla Grande was well worth it.

On our last day we wandered around Portobello and Nombre de Dios, two of the first settled areas in the Americas. Portobello has several pieces of an old fortress that sit right on the water and an old customs house that saw much of the gold collected in Panama before it was shipped to Spain.

For now we are on to Mexico, but we are content to know that Panama has some great possibilities.

Órale.

40 Years Later

We experienced some annoying set backs over these last couple of weeks because Brendan and I both suffered bouts of illness. So we have spent way too much time laying around and not nearly enough time exploring. However, by some miracle if you ask me, Brendan´s dad tracked down a Panamanian man he met in gradschool and traveled in Europe with forty years ago! We have yet to meet the actual man, José Raul, but we have spent some serious quality time with a number of his children and grandchildren. The family we have met so far has been beyond generous to us. We first met up with Jose´s Daughter, Ana Matilda and her three sweet, highly energetic pre-teens. They hosted us in their luxurious country home in El Valle, a lovely mountain town where many successful city dwellers own houses, and nice ones at that. We were astonished at the number of beautiful homes with lush gardens, spring fed pools, and mountain views. El Valle is definitely not your typical country town in Panama. After lounging around here for a few days, we decided we rather enjoyed having a maid to clean up after us and so decided to take up their offer to stay at their home in the city.

So here we are in the bustling, metropolitan city of Panama. The day after we arrived, Ana Matilda and company actually departed for a two week cruise and left us their home. So far most of our time in the city has been spent relaxing and trying to get healthy but we did manage to take a day trip to the Caribbean coast, which was an amazingly short hour and a half drive through jungle, where we walked around an old Spanish fortress sacked by the Pirate Henry Morgan. The ruins stand on a cliff looking onto the ocean at the mouth of the Rio Chagras where boats enter the canal heading towards the Pacific. We enjoyed watching a few huge ships pass through the Gatun Locks, the first on the Caribbean side of the canal. The enormity of the canal and it´s process was entirely fascinating. We learned some financial tid-bits that surprised us. First, the largest sized cargo ship pays 280,000 dollars to pass through the canal carrying 3,000 containers, and second the Canal grosses an average of 1.5-2 million dollars in one day! Not Bad!

Our most delightful day in Panama City was spent strolling around Casco Viejo, the old colonial part of town. The colorfully painted buildings with balconies and courtyards are reminiscent of the French Quarter. This city is the oldest on the Pacific coast of the Americas first established by the Spanish and later developed by the French who came to work on the canal. Today there is a mix of cultures and a strong Afro-Caribbean vibe. Although, very run down with a long history of poverty and rent control issues, it is undergoing serious renovation and the mix of old and new has undeniable charm.

Campesinos Locos

"Campesinos locos, matando la selva". Crazy farmers, killing the forest. That´s what Edgar, our guide would say when we passed another place where the indiginous Ngobe Buglé had slashed and burned a section along the road from Santa Fe to the Caribbean town, Calovebora. It´s also what he called our group as we stumbled through our trip as only imitation campesino gringos can. The Ngobe Buglé are clearing patches of forest to build houses and plant bananas and plaintains. According to Edgar they can live on that alone and they require virtually no maintenance.

Between the president Torrijos rushing to finish the road through to the Caribbean where he owns tracks of land and the Ngobe Blugé slashing and burning along the way, it seems that the town of Calovebora, it´s surrounding coast and the journey to get there is going to change quickly and drastically.
We took advantage of our timing and set out on horseback with Edgar and Etienne, a French-Canadian we met at the hostel, to make the two day trip up and down hill after hill and through several rivers to Calovebora. The first day was 12 hours on horseback. Ouch. Etienne had never been on a horse and refused to urge his on with anything but kind words. He stayed behind. Edgar´s mule refused to move an inch unless one of the other horses went in front so it was up to Angie and I to take the lead. About an hour into the ride I got sick on the side of the road and felt woozy for the rest of the day. Halfway through the day Angie´s horse decided it had had enough of going slow and began galloping through the bottom of every downhil with her hanging on for dear life. Edgar decided to tie her horse to his mule. When we finally reached Rio Luis, where we would stay for the night, we stopped to wait for Etienne. After a while his horse came over the top of the hill without it´s rider. Not a good sign. It turned out that everything was fine. The tarp protecting Etienne´s saddle (it rained for the last 4 hours) had fallen off and when he dismounted to get it his horse decided to finish the trip without him. Needless to say, we were extremely relieved to get to our resting point in one piece. We stayed at a family´s house where we were given beds and hot food and were stared at by their children.
The next morning the four of us and a driver piled into a huge dug-out canoe with all of our bags and headed for three hours to Calovebora. The ride was exciting with lots of little rapids. The scenery was lush green virgin hills. We had to get out a few times to let the driver navigate some really shallow spots. That was fine with us. Sitting indian-style on a wooden seat after an all day horse ride is not comfortable. When we got to Calovebora Edgar set us up in a wooden house that cost $5.00 per night, total.
We spent the next three days swimming, fishing, relaxing, resting our backsides and listening to Edgar resite the sceintific and popular names of all the bugs, frogs, butterflies and birds that we saw or he tracked down.
We ate breakfast and dinner at a family´s house where we were served yams, another unknown root and fried fish for breakfast and then fried plantains, rice and fried or stewed fish for dinner. 75 cents per plate.

The town itself is very quiet. It sits on a hill overlooking the Caribbean and at the mouth of a river. They have no electricity, their water runs from a spring. About 200 people live there and, from what we saw, they do a whole lot of nothing. When the conditions are right they run out and haul in a bunch of fish. If they catch one big enough someone in the next town will hear about it and may bring their boat over to buy it from them. They eat plaintains, bananas and various roots, no greens or other vegetables. They have a school and a small health center. The beach is untouched. Since it´s the beginning of the rainy season the muddy water from the river made the rest of the coast murky, but it was still beautiful.
The journey back was less eventful. We walked to Rio Luis as the river was too low to go up, spent the night and then got back on the horses. Our horses knew they were going home so didn´t need much encouragement and we did the trip in 10 hours. For now we are going to continue searching, but, so far Santa Fe is at the top of the list.

Santa Fe

We took a bus ride over the entire width of Panama from the Pacific to the Caribbean coast in a total of four hours! The ride was up and over lush, barely touched mountains. Isla Colon, the largest of the many islitas of Bocas Del Toro overwhelmed us with the amount of Gringos, so we spent our time on Isla Bastimentos, a jungle rich island with beautiful empty beaches, no roads and a tiny town. We walked for entire days exploring beaches and the jungle interior. One day was spent kayaking to another small island where we snorkeled and relaxed in a cute little white sand cove. After a few sunny days and one tropical rainstorm, we headed back over the mountains to the Pacific coast where we spent a day in Las Lajas at perhaps the longest, widest beach either of us had seen. The waves were huge and powerful but nobody was surfing because the place was virtually vacant, a strange phenomenon. Houses are beginning to go up however and we were told by a guard that one of the new foundations belongs to a cousin of Steven Segal!

From there we took a bus to the glorious

mountain town of Santa Fe. The Small village is surrounded by green mountains and a plethora of rivers and waterfalls. The number of hikes is endless. There is a refreshing swimming hole a twenty minute walk down a steep hill from our Hostel. On the walk you pass a coffee factory producing the local coffee, Tute.

An incredible view is at every turn of every road and the climate is like summer time in Vermont all year round!

Yesterday we walked straight up hill for two hours to a tiny village called El Salto. The village is basically one large family, five small houses. We stopped at one of the little houses and asked about going to the waterfalls. Two cousins, Rosa and Jorge age 14 and 15, offered to take us. The hour walk was incredible. Each waterfall was more impressive than the last. After trusting our lives with these children, scaling rocks and climbing into caves, we were relieved to make it to the final and most stunning "charo" of them all. This waterfall was pouring out of a gigantic cave and when Jorge threw a rock at it hundreds of bat like birds flew out and into the valley like maniacs. We couldn´t figure out if they were in fact bats because of the white collar around the neck but they sure sounded like them. After swimming and hanging out for a while at one of the water holes we went back and ate lunch with the family. Typical rice and beans and a fried egg. They Successfully stuffed us with ridiculously juicy oranges from their tree and sent us on our way.

We are delighted with Santa Fe. It is a sweet town with friendly people and amazing surroundings. Tomorrow we are embarking on a seldom traveled journey by horseback and canoe to the Caribbean from Santa Fe.

Cerro Punta

We´re very excited about the guesthouse posibilities here in Panama. From what we have seen so far the people are refreshingly freindly and open. We have talked to several expats living here and they say that they are comfortable in the community. That is something that we were never sure of in Nicaragua. We are also excited about the nicely paved roads and the fact that you can drink the water almost everywhere.

The small town we are in has grocerie and hardware stores and the internet.......and few options for lodging. The biggest attraction is the numerous lush cloud forest national parks that surround the valley, one of which includes Volcan Baru, the highest point in Panama. If you´re lucky, on a clear day you can see the Pacific and the Caribbean from the Volcano. We only had the chance to explore Parque Amistad where we saw the beautiful waterfall and the panamanian tour group you see in the pictures. We hoped to see the Quetzal, allegedly one of the most beautiful birds in the world but our search will have to continue.

Aside from the nature the area is known for its produce, especially black berries and strawberries. Throughout the hillsides there are swiss-style houses with beautiful gardens thanks to a migration generations ago. Along with their architecture they brought great yogurt and cream. The main road is littered with stands selling the local specialty, strawberrys and cream. We could hardly believe how delicious it is. Our feeling about this place is good enough that we spent the last couple days exploring property with a real estate agent. She showed us some interesting prospects. For now, we will continue our search by hiking around the volcano to Boquete and keep Cerro Punta in mind.