Machete's and Ice Cream...every girls dream.

So few days yet so much to say! Yesterday morning (Monday) Shawn, the Germans and I caught a ride with Noah. Swell was super small – waves were nearly non-existent out front in Oeste. We ended up in Bejuco and were lucky to catch waist/chest high waves with overhead sets…firing. The big sets closed up, but I was going ape shit on the smaller waves. Super fun, super fast with a really clean face. The water was crystal clear – you could see your shadow on the sea’s floor all the way outside in the lineup. Noah is a really phenomenal longboarder…tall and super lean, and graceful as could be, just not nearly as sexy as Shawn. For all of you Jersey-folk back home, I would compare his surfing to that of Brian Bowen. Super smooth and inspirational. Love surfing with him. We dried off our boards and rinsed off our feets (did I mention that Noah is a very “particular” about everything?) before getting into his truck and heading home. Arrived home just in time for Yoga and I was delighted to have a full class, with new faces! I love that people are interested in yoga and excited about the class. Among the new yogi’s were Kyle (lovely lovely lady married to a local Tico Dennis) and her ADORABLE son, Elliot. Elliot is 4 years old. His favorite yoga position is “THE DOG!!”. He participated in the first few minutes of class and retreated back to his mat for Savasana. In between he was very quiet and mindful of the class going on. I was so impressed by this young man. Another new addition was a Tica woman from Esterillos Este. She is very new to yoga, only having practiced from a book. She was weak wrists and has had some bad pains in her back. I was so impressed that it was her first class – she followed along with the flow as if she’d been practicing for several weeks. I really love my yoga classes…I feel amazing after every class, and I certainly attribute that to the great, dedicated group of students I have acquired. After yoga the Germans took Shawn and I out to lunch @ Margarita’s as a “thanks” for the dinner parties and rides to the surf. Shawnie and I both had Arroz con Camarone’s and we BOTH cleaned our plates. Pat & Legend Mike also joined us for lunch and Mike, as always, provided some quality entertainment. Stuffed to the gills, we stuffed ourselves into Mikey’s little car: Jeff, Shawn, Me, Pat, Mike and Mikey’s pooch Paloma. We had all of our boards on top as we headed into Jaco to run some errands. I went straight to the hardware store for something that I’d had in mind for several weeks now: a MACHETE. I figured with Shawn outta town for the next month it would be good for my own personal safety up on the hill and would also come in handy to help appease my agua de pipa obsession. For a little more than $4 (“Gringos should not own machetes, and Ticos should not own power tools”) I walked out of the store with machete in hand, and then headed with gang for some Italian ice cream up the street! What more could a girl ask for?! We stopped in Hermosa for some waves on the way home, and ended up a bit down the way at Tulene. The tide was uber high (which I will explain later in the blog) and it looked a bit funky. Jeff Pace, who just arrived from frigid and flat New Jersey, was frothing at the mouth and before you could snap your fingers he was waxed up and in the water. Shawn and Mikey followed, but I was skeptical and sat on the beach for a while to scope it out. The waves were decent size, about chest high…but there was so much water out there and the swell didn’t quite seem to know what it wanted to do. It didn’t help that the tide was on it either. A half hour passed, the wind died down and the swell cleaned up. As the tide continued to increase, the swell increased as well. Almost twice as big as when the boys had paddled out. I waxed up and joined the lineup, having a solid hour of solid, super fun waves. TWO great sessions in ONE day, AND a machete! BAH. Life is good. Shawn knocked some coconuts down from the trees, used the new machete to get to the agua, we refreshed ourselves with “natures natural Gatorade”, the sun set and we were off – back to Oeste. We had a beer at Lowtide Lounge with the crew, loaded up into the golf cart and came home for Shawn’s last (lets hope not) supper. I whipped up some delicious grub, Shawn packed his bags and I fell asleep on the couch. Woke up this morning, still smiling from yesterdays surf sessions and machete purchase. We checked the waves, which were truly nonexistent thanks to this freakish high tide and then came back up to the house for some tranquilo hang time before Shawn leaves for his month-long journey through Central America in a truck with Adam and Keeley. I can’t wait til he returns with all of his stories…cause there are BOUND to be a bountiful amount of off-the-wall, laugh so hard that your stomach hurts, absolutely ludicrous tales (probably poop stories). Safe travels Shawnie.

So, it’s Tuesday afternoon. Shawn left around 9 and shortly afterwards I walked down the hill to check the waves. As high as the tide came up, it seems to have retreated even faster. No bueno. I watched a podcast on YogaBabyMomma.blogspot.com (michelle’s AMAZING yoga blog) about hip opening sequences and then walked back up the hill for some Q.T. with Newman. Soon after arriving back at the house Suzie knocked on the door! She had been in the mountains the past few days, and now she is back until November 27th! Hooray! I have a partner in crime for Mojito’s this afternoon! Threw the coconut around for Newman, made Suzie and I French toast for lunch, and now we are getting ready to head down the beach. Hopefully I will catch some fun waves later this afternoon, but if not then I’ll be several mojito’s deep! Pura Vida.



quick update: sitting at lowtide right now, sipping mojitos with susie and noah, made by the WONDERFUL miss Roni! caught a ride with noah to hermosa and surfed some so-so waves. headed back to the house for some coconut curry :)