Lasagna, house salad, dinner roll, and a caramel brownie.
This was the very basic yet much appreciated meal service we received on our flight from DFW to San Jose, CR tonight. Having grown up in an era in which airplane meals were commonplace, I was surprisingly happy to find a return to those times in this era of "$5 for pretzels".... I guess I don't fly internationally that often. As I was eating (and overappreciating) this glorified Lean Cuisine, it dawned on me that this would, in fact, be my last food pre-Sanctuary. Yikes.
Don't get me wrong, I'm very excited about this whole thing. Really, I am. But look, I have to level with you..... I'm more Hilton than hostel. I absolutely love/live to travel, love the adventure and the new experiences, but I generally like to do it in a comfortable, familiar way. Nowhere is this more true than in the culinary department. When I travel, one of the first things I do is research all our dining options - what's near the hotel, where are some cool local must-dos, what does Yelp/Trip Advisor say we can't miss, etc.... I don't like wasting meals on vacation - they're a big part of the experience, and in some cases I'll craft a schedule around certain restaurants we just must try (none of this should be a surprise given the formidable nature of my ample waistline).
This trip is different.
In so, so many ways. Our meals for the next two weeks will essentially be (from what I can gather) rice, beans, and chicken a couple of times a day, and they're basically just something we do to refuel between sloth-based activities. This is, from what I gather, a microcosm of this whole experience. There will be no seven course meals, no midnight buffets, no umbrella drinks, no floor shows to attend. If I'm expecting turn down service, a refreshed ice bucket, and a 8 o'clock reservation (a booth, if you have one please!), I'll be sorely let down.
Yes, for all the traveling I've been fortunate enough to do in my life, the next two weeks will be like nothing I've ever done before. Rachel has had this long standing desire to come do this, to volunteer at the sanctuary, to disappear into the jungle with bugs and snakes and crocs and humidity and no A/C and.... ahem... anyway, I decided it was only fair. We've done the Hyatts and the Marriotts and the cruise ships, and it's time to take that leap and do something different. It's her turn to inspire our summer plans, an area that is often squarely in my domain. And so, tomorrow morning at sunrise, the folks from Interbus (a Costa Rican bus service) will pick us up here in Escazu for the 4 hour drive to Aviarios Del Caribe Sloth Sanctuary, where I'll get up before 6am each morning, work 9 hour days in a Central American jungle in July, and attempt to sleep with no A/C.....
.... and I couldn't possibly be more excited.
Friday, June 29, 2012
Thursday, June 28, 2012
Friends, family, and even perfect strangers:
We invite you all to join us as we depart on our adventure of a lifetime. Who are "we"? We are Paul and Rachel, from Frisco, TX. Keeping things short and sweet: We are young, we both work in education, and we both love to travel. And what is this "adventure" I speak of, you might ask? Well. Tomorrow afternoon, we will be sitting on an airplane en route to...THE SLOTH SANCTUARY, near Limon, Costa Rica!!! We will be spending two weeks staying on-site at the sanctuary as official sloth sanctuary volunteers.
You may be asking yourself any number of questions right about now...Why would anyone in their right mind want to spend their vacation volunteering in the jungle? And what the heck IS a sloth, anyway? In order to answer these questions, I would highly encourage you to take 1 minute and 28 seconds out of your day to watch this video:
I had the unique opportunity to visit the Sloth Sanctuary on a day trip to Limon about 10 years ago, and I have always wanted to go back. It was an experience that really stuck with me, and at the risk of sounding incredibly cheesy, there is something almost magical about these zen-like little creatures. I don't know how I convinced Paul that this is how we should spend two weeks of our summer vacation...I guess he must really love me...and I'm thinking that the above-posted video didn't hurt my cause, either. Softie.
You may wonder why it is that sloths frequently require rescue and/or rehabilitation. There are a few reasons for this. First, sloths live in the treetops. In fact, they only descend in order to go to bathroom, which happens about once a week. Due to their incredibly slow-moving nature, they are sitting ducks once they are on the ground (sadly, one of their greatest predators so happens to be humans who use the babies for tourist photos, or sell them in the pet trade). To that end, if a baby sloth falls from the treetop, the mother often calculates the prospect of retrieving her baby too great a risk, and leaves it on the ground. Additionally sloths are frequently burned when the attempt to climb telephone poles. They also tend to get hit by cars, since it takes them such a long time to cross the street. Anyway, you get the picture. These guys are not really designed to be on the ground.
I won't spend any time in this post outlining the work we will be doing at the sanctuary, because, well, then we will not have anything to blog about once we get there! Paul and I will be sharing the blogging responsibilities, and we will have internet access throughout our stay at the sanctuary. Wifi in the jungle...pretty impressive, right? The sanctuary does a lot of educational outreach, which is another area we will be assisting with during our visit. We will NOT have cell phone service during our stay, and we kindly request that you do not text us...that way, in the event of an emergency requiring that we turn on a cell phone, we will not be flooded with stuff when we power up. Though I am sure AT&T would love it if we did a little roaming in the jungle :-)
Please feel free to share this blog with anyone who might be interested. Sharing= outreach= donations for the sanctuary= good :-) You can also sign up to receive email notifications when we update our blog, using the box on the right hand side of the page. Stay tuned..forthcoming updates should be far more interesting than this one!
My next post will be from Costa Rica!!
--Rachel
We invite you all to join us as we depart on our adventure of a lifetime. Who are "we"? We are Paul and Rachel, from Frisco, TX. Keeping things short and sweet: We are young, we both work in education, and we both love to travel. And what is this "adventure" I speak of, you might ask? Well. Tomorrow afternoon, we will be sitting on an airplane en route to...THE SLOTH SANCTUARY, near Limon, Costa Rica!!! We will be spending two weeks staying on-site at the sanctuary as official sloth sanctuary volunteers.
You may be asking yourself any number of questions right about now...Why would anyone in their right mind want to spend their vacation volunteering in the jungle? And what the heck IS a sloth, anyway? In order to answer these questions, I would highly encourage you to take 1 minute and 28 seconds out of your day to watch this video:
I had the unique opportunity to visit the Sloth Sanctuary on a day trip to Limon about 10 years ago, and I have always wanted to go back. It was an experience that really stuck with me, and at the risk of sounding incredibly cheesy, there is something almost magical about these zen-like little creatures. I don't know how I convinced Paul that this is how we should spend two weeks of our summer vacation...I guess he must really love me...and I'm thinking that the above-posted video didn't hurt my cause, either. Softie.
You may wonder why it is that sloths frequently require rescue and/or rehabilitation. There are a few reasons for this. First, sloths live in the treetops. In fact, they only descend in order to go to bathroom, which happens about once a week. Due to their incredibly slow-moving nature, they are sitting ducks once they are on the ground (sadly, one of their greatest predators so happens to be humans who use the babies for tourist photos, or sell them in the pet trade). To that end, if a baby sloth falls from the treetop, the mother often calculates the prospect of retrieving her baby too great a risk, and leaves it on the ground. Additionally sloths are frequently burned when the attempt to climb telephone poles. They also tend to get hit by cars, since it takes them such a long time to cross the street. Anyway, you get the picture. These guys are not really designed to be on the ground.
I won't spend any time in this post outlining the work we will be doing at the sanctuary, because, well, then we will not have anything to blog about once we get there! Paul and I will be sharing the blogging responsibilities, and we will have internet access throughout our stay at the sanctuary. Wifi in the jungle...pretty impressive, right? The sanctuary does a lot of educational outreach, which is another area we will be assisting with during our visit. We will NOT have cell phone service during our stay, and we kindly request that you do not text us...that way, in the event of an emergency requiring that we turn on a cell phone, we will not be flooded with stuff when we power up. Though I am sure AT&T would love it if we did a little roaming in the jungle :-)
Please feel free to share this blog with anyone who might be interested. Sharing= outreach= donations for the sanctuary= good :-) You can also sign up to receive email notifications when we update our blog, using the box on the right hand side of the page. Stay tuned..forthcoming updates should be far more interesting than this one!
My next post will be from Costa Rica!!
--Rachel
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