Molasses Covered Honeymoon - Day Three

We woke up on Christmas morning to the sound of two dozen small bread plates crashing to the floor. It was breakfast preparation time at the Villa Alegra B&B. The owners, Barry & Susie, and their staff of three, were attempting to prepare breakfast for about fifteen guests. Even though they had probably done this a thousand times, there is always a chance for distraction and an accident, and this particular accident produced a crashing sound loud enough to rouse even the deepest of sleepers.

We wandered out of our bedroom to find two servants tending to fresh wounds, a small group of makeshift medics tending to the servants, and a completely untended pot of Costa Rican coffee. Olivia and I made a quick determination that the servants were well tended to, while the coffee might have been suffering from neglect. We poured ourselves two large cups of coffee and silently watched the commotion around us until our breakfast was served (sans bread plates).

Barry was not only the owner and concierge of the B&B, he was also the head chef. He told us that he tried to prepare a unique breakfast for his guests every morning. On this morning, he made us a pretty tasty bread pudding.

When we finished our bread pudding, we had some time to kill before our surf lesson. We asked Susie if there was anything we could contribute to the Christmas dinner. She said that she did in fact ask all the guests to contribute something for the meal and that we could get lettuce for salad and a bottle of wine.

We walked roughly five blocks up the molasses covered road to the general store. Again, wearing flip flops, and again picking stuck rocks from the soles along the way. I picked out a bottle of wine and Olivia located some slightly decomposed heads of lettuce. The cashier spoke not one word of English, so asking her to get the lettuce out of the display case caused a bit of confusion. After some gesturing and pointing and saying “Lo Siento” (I’m sorry) over and over again, our lettuce was successfully retrieved and purchased.

Part II

An employee from the surf shop picked us up in her slightly beat up Toyota 4 Runner, and drove us directly to the surf shop in into downtown Tamarindo. On the way, we thanked her for working on Christmas day. She said it was no problem and that everyone in Tamarindo works on Christmas day. It is the second busiest day of the year after New Years day. As we drove through town, I was shocked to see that every business was open and the town was bustling with people.

When we arrived at the Iguana Surf shop I was slightly disappointed to see that we were two of twenty students attending the 11 am to 1 pm lesson. I had presupposed - without asking anyone at all to confirm my presupposition - that this was going to be more of a private affair.

Each student was given a long sleeve rash guard to wear while we were greeted by the manager as a group. He introduced five instructors and informed us that we would be split into groups of four. Each instructor would be assigned a group and only work with that group so as to provide better attention to each student. This improved my spirits a little. One instructor with four students seemed like a reasonable ratio

The manager showed us how to carry our surf boards and then told us to carry them across the street to the beach. It was so crowded that one of the employees had to stop traffic to give us a chance to get across the street. We cross the street and walked a short distance along the very crowded public beach to spot that was not so crowded.

Our instructor’s name was Charlo. He was one of the older instructors. He told us that he was a local and that he was born in a small village just on the other side of a hill that he pointed to north of the beach. Our group consisted of Olivia and I and two young American boys. They were brothers. The older one was maybe fourteen or fifteen, and his brother was eleven or twelve.

Charlo dedicated about fifteen minutes to showing us how to lay on the board while paddling, popping up to a standing position on the board, the ideal placement of your feet on the board, and the ideal posture for maintaining a standing position while riding a wave.

We were then led out into knee depth water where Charlo gave us some pointers on how to hold onto our twelve foot long boards as we paddled into the oncoming waves so that it would not be swept away and caused to drag us back to the beach by the leash. This information proved to be invaluable, as in my limited history with surfing I found that most of my energy was expended trying to avoid getting pummeled by oncoming waves. With Charlo’s pointers I was able to save most of my energy for the paddling into the waves.

Now that we were equipped with the information we needed to surf, it was time to start surfing. We paddled out to chest deep water and Charlo picked a spot that would be a sort of launching area for us. One by one, we would paddle to him and he would hold onto the board while we struggled into the proper paddling position. He would very gingerly pin our legs to the board – while also holding the board steady – as larger waves came at us that he thought were too dangerous for us to attempt. When a good (small) wave came rolling in, he would tell us when to start paddling, and then give a little push and launch us into the wave. We’d do our best to paddle into the wave, pop up, and ride the wave until we fell. We would then paddle back to Charlo’s launching area and try again. It seemed to be a good system. The four of us each got about 25-30 attempts during the hour and a half that we were in the water.

At the beginning of the lesson, Charlo had asked each of us our names. I told him that my name was Joe, or Joseph. For some reason the name would not stick. After the fourth time he asked me my name, Olivia told him to try Jose. This sort of worked. He took to calling me Jeff (pronounced Hefee for those not familiar with Espanol). Each time I would paddle out to the launching area, Charlo would say, “joo almost got that last one, Hefee! I gonna get joo into a good wave this time! Here she comes, Hefee! Joo Ready?! This one your baby! Paddle! Paddle! Paddle!”

After our 25-30 attempts, Olivia and I actually stood up and “surfed” three or four times each. Even though that percentage is fairly low, I was quite please with myself. Two times is better than zero times. So I was quite pleased and completely done in. When the lesson was over, it took all my remaining energy to carry my board off the beach and deposit it back at the surf shop. We said our thank yous to Charlo, and the shop girl drove us back to our hotel.

Part III

We changed our clothes and caught a ride into town to look for a late lunch. We selected a pizzeria where they cooked their pies in an outdoor brick oven. As we walked by their patio, we were rendered helpless by the aroma. It was not so much as a choice to eat there; it was more like a necessity. Olivia ordered a personal veggie and I ordered a personal pepperoni. Both pies were consumed in their entirety in a sort of fervor.

After lunch we decided to walk back to the hotel via the beach front. Tamarindo Beach was something in between a large cove and a small bay. To the south, we could clearly see a large outcropping of rocks that we thought was very close to the section of Playa Langosta behind our hotel. We speculated that it would only take 30-45 minutes to walk to the outcropping, and maybe another 15 minutes to our back door. We walked along the beach for nearly two hours.

It was nice to walk on the sand, but it was far too long of a hike. Olivia nearly sat down and quit several times along the way. When we finally got back to the hotel, we collapsed into a couple of hammocks by the pool.

Before long, we started hearing commotion in and around the kitchen. The preparations for our Christmas dinner were getting underway. We noticed several other guests of the hotel were assisting with the preparations and we realized that Barry and Susie were not being flippant when they said that they asked the guests to assist with the Christmas dinner. We saw guests slicing, dicing, and mixing various side dishes in the kitchen. A kitchen that was easily 90 degrees with all the windows open and no real breeze to speak of.

I made it my job for the afternoon to avoid that kitchen. Olivia was a much better sport than me. She asked Susie if she could assist. Susie asked her to take the lead on the Italian dressing for the salad. She gave Olivia and empty glass bottle and a packet of seasoning. When Olivia asked her a question about how it should be prepared, Susie very curtly told Olivia to read the directions on the packet and follow said directions. Olivia made the dressing and did not make any further offers to assist.

Dinner was served to about 25 guests. It was a very traditional menu of roasted turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, and a large assortment of casseroles. We ate ice cream and cheesecake for dessert. We drank a large assortment of wine and made small talk with the other guests. There was a mom and her three college-aged kids from Canada, a dad from northwest Washington and his two post-graduate-aged daughters, a mom and dad from New Jersey with their three high-school aged daughters, and a Nepalese man that was working in North Dakota as a child psychologist with his wife and their five-year-old daughter.

I broke a cork while trying to open a bottle of wine. When I took it into the kitchen to try to get the cork out, Barry was in there and I asked him if he had an extra jug I could pour the wine into. He located a jug and mentioned that he had some fruit juice and a bunch of extra fruit that we could use to make sangria. This seemed very appropriate for the occasion and would help cover up the fact that I broke a cork, so I happily agreed to help assemble the concoction.

After we finished feasting, Olivia and I took a very brief stroll down to the beach and watched the waves under the light of the moon. We also had the pleasure of watching a family firing roman candles into the ocean. This pleasure only lasted for a couple of minutes due to our complete lack of energy. We left the ocean and the fireworks and adjourned to our room where we collapsed into bed.