One of the reasons we have been choosing to rent on 30A on the gulf is the beautiful beaches as well as how quaint and pretty the towns are along that 17 mile stretch. Many of the pretty towns like Seaside, Rosemary and Alys Beach are way out of our budget but there are small ones like Blue Mountain where you can find less expensive rentals. One of our favorite thing to do is rent bikes and go for a bike ride. We only rented bikes for a day and while it was not the most budget friendly outing, we really enjoyed our ride. We only rode from Blue Mountain…

Did you enjoy Wednesday’s post about our visit to the Doka Coffee Plantation? Today is a continuation about how the plantation works. My husband and I really enjoy the tour and we have been loving the coffee we brought home. We love it so much we are having his best friend bring us some back when he goes. Doka Coffee Estate is the oldest wet mill still working. The water is 12 feet deep and separates the good coffee beans for the lesser quality ones. The good coffee has more density and sinks to the bottom. The big red box above can hold 10 cajuelas and it takes 2 hours…

The day we visited the La Paz Waterfall Gardens was the same day we visited the Doka Coffee Plantation. When looking at tours, these two locations are usually grouped together but after realizing that a tour would requite us to be on a bus for quite a while picking up people at different hotels we decided to visit these two places on our own. It was cheaper this way and gave us more freedom on getting up later and having our own timeline. The Plants This tour was really interesting and we learned a lot about coffee production. We were lucky to be the only 2 on the tour and…

Well, I wish I was back at La Paz Waterfall Gardens! This week has been a long one with lots of time spent on the phone to resolve different things, and family members taking turns not feeling well. We visited La Paz Waterfall Gardens our last full day in Costa Rica. I thought the price was excessive at $50 but I will say the waterfalls were amazing and the grounds well taken care of and quite gorgeous. The Animals After seeing animals in the wild at our resort earlier, seeing the enclosed animals was not as awe inspiring! However these are all rescue animals. There were monkeys, butterflies and felines.…

When planning this trip to Costa Rica, I had to make the decision of which coast to visit: the Pacific side or the Carribean side. The pictures I saw actually did not help the decision. I ended up basing my decision on the location of the Manuel Antonio National Park which we ended up not visiting. However the landscape where we stayed is very similar to the park. We stopped in a couple of spots for pictures on the way to Quepos from San Jose but were a bit hurried as I was ready to reach our destination. The first thing I will say is that none of the pictures…

The second tour we took while in the area near Manuel Antonio National Park was a night jungle tour with Jade Tours. This was one of the tours listed at our resort that could be booked for us and since we were in the area for just a short amount of time, we decided to take advantage of the opportunity. The tour was $55+ tax per person. I felt that the price was appropriate since it offered an experience we couldn’t have on our own but my husband thought it could have been about 10 dollars less each since it was a shorter tour. The tour including bringing us to…

I wanted to book a couple of adventures while we were in Quepos and Tulemar Resort made that booking ridiculously easy! They have a list of possible tours with descriptions and prices and the concierge assigned to you on your stay books the tours for you. You pay for them before you check out. You can communicate with your concierge in the weeks prior to your stay to set this up and ask any questions. One of the tours we chose was the ATV tour with Real Adventure. We were picked up at the entrance of the resort in a little van which picked up a few other people on…

When we booked our 2 nights at Tulemar Resort, one of the things that drew my attention apart from the nice accomodations and the pretty scenery (jungle and beach) was the opportunity to more than likely see animals living in their natural habitat. It is one thing to observe animals at a zoo or rescue center but completely different to observe those animals living in the trees and bushes around you. So when I woke up early the first morning I went on a walk by myself as my husband wanted to sleep in a little longer. The first animal I came accross was an agouti which is a large…

When we decided to stay near Manuel Antonio National Park in Costa Rica, I looked at different hotel options on Tripadvisor. I was looking for something with pretty views, not overly expensive or inexpensive and read some reviews. After looking at options around $100-150 per night, I came upon Tulemar resort which was a little more expensive but not outragious. The price per night was around $230, the views and environment looked gorgeous and the amenities looked amazing. All of the reviews were great and once my husband saw it, he said “that was the one”. It appeared that Tulemar resort would give us a jungle experience while giving us…