Costa Rica part 1: La Fortuna- volcano hiking tour

We just got back from our trip to Costa Rica. It was amazing! We had such a great time. We originally wanted to go in May for our 2nd anniversary, but I couldn't take that much time off work so we went during my Spring Break which worked out better so I didn't have to make so many sub plans! I'm so glad that we were able to do such a fun trip like this just the two of us before we ever have kids. It's amazing to explore other parts of the world together and Costa Rica definitely did not disappoint. 

There was one downside to our trip. It was all of our layovers!! We thought it was smart to save a couple hundred dollars each person by taking non-direct flights. What a mistake! If possible, I will for now on just take direct flights. We spent WAY too much time in airports. We flew from Salt Lake to Denver first to spend Easter with my family. Then we flew from Denver to Atlanta and Atlanta to Florida. We got in to Florida at 12:30 in the morning and had to sleep in the airport until our flight to Costa Rica at 11. 

we were so exhausted....but could not sleep!!

nope--even sunglasses didn't help us sleep :) 

 However, the layovers were all worth it once we arrived in Costa Rica! We were so happy to be there. We had a man waiting for us to take us to rent a car. I was slightly scared about us driving there after being in the van with the rental car people. They were just making their way through lanes no matter if a car was letting them over or not! We had to drive about 2 1/2 hours to get to our first destination: La Fortuna. It wasn't even very many miles but took forever because the roads were SO steep and SO curvy. Sometimes we weren't sure if our Hyundai was going to make it up the road!! We were just glad we paid the extra money to get an automatic car.

 As we were driving we kept seeing little tiny restaurants that had a big sign saying "Soda". We thought they all were just advertising the fact that they sold soda. Then our tour guide the next day finally told us that sodas are little ma and pa restaurants! 

La Fortuna is pretty much a rainforest with the beautiful Arenal Volcano. You could definitely tell when we were getting close to La Fortuna because everything was so green, lush, and beautiful.

driving in to La Fortuna.

We stayed at the Baldi Hotel & Hot Springs. It was such a cute and fun place! So many tourists come around night time just to swim in their amazing hot springs. 

We were pretty tired the day we got there from our terrible night's sleep in the airport, so we just had dinner at the hotel buffet (which was good but pretty overpriced!) Then we checked out the hot springs and went to bed. 

Tuesday morning we woke up early for our volcano hike tour. It was rainy and overcast in the morning so it was kind of hard to see the volcano because the top of it was hidden in the clouds. 

before the hike 

just being Tarzan and Jane in the rainforest :) 

huge leaves!!

In front of the volcano that is barely visible! 

That afternoon we went to a "Soda" for lunch.  Luckily most places in Costa Rica have one or two people at least who speak English so we didn't have a problem communicating there. And thankfully the menus were in Spanish and English!!

Everywhere we went I got the most delicious natural pineapple drink.

love this man of mine.