Eating at the Casa.

$3.50 A Day
Esterillos, Costa Rica 9am, dec 30th

Eating out is cheap in Costa Rica. Good and cheap. If you are going to local spots, not expensive touristy spots, then you can get a good meal from around 1300 to 3800 colones - which is around $2.50 to $7. But Shawn needs to save money, and so do I, and groceries here are cheap - IF you are buying locally eaten stuff - not cereal or pasta. So every day Shawn and I walk down to the store and spend about 7 bucks total. That feeds us breakfast AND lunch, for the both of us. So figure $3.5 a day a piece, and that's buying us breakfast and lunch ($1.75 a meal). For breakfast we have Cam and Eggs (see recipe below), or some concoction. It's almost always in a tortilla. This morning for breakfast I fried an egg and put it in a tortilla with beans, avocado, tomato and onion, and some hot sauce. Always hot sauce. Washed it down with some hot tea and coconut cookies. Costa Rica has the most delicious cookies in all the world - and a very wide assortment. Today I loaded up on my favorites, COCANAS. They are muy deliciouso. I also got Galletas con crema and Tuareg - natural coconut cream filled cookies. We have been going out to dinner at night - I think more as something to do than anything.

Last night the "fish truck" went by. It's on no schedule (surprise surprise, tico time) so if you catch it you are lucky. They drive by with the days catch of fresh fish. For 4,000 colones...around 8 bucks, we got a HUGE filet of fresh mahi mahi, cleaned and all. Tonight Cam is going to cook dinner. Sauteed fish with coconut curry rice. Cam is who Shawn and I spend most of our time with. Everyone else around here is very nice, but Cam is the best for sure. His mother is Colombian, so he looks like one of the locals and obviously speaks flawless spanish. He is very well educated, but fell in love with Costa Rica and was over the hustle and grind of the States. So now he lives in Costa, teaching English in San Jose. He comes down to Esterillos on the weekends, though he is on holiday at the moment. He's fun to eat with, surf with, and hang with. Good people.

Right now we are just hanging at the house. It's only 9am and already so much done. The swell is dwindling but I can't complain because the water is beautiful. We surfed Bejuca, a few minutes up the road, this morning. Just cam, shawnie and me. Bout waist to chest high, super clean, super blue water, but 20 minutes between sets. Going to lounge around, read, swim, listen to music, play music and nap. Pura Vida.