We hung out in our amazing villa, ate dinner and then in the jacuzzi on the porch.

We woke up the next morning to what sounded like a raspy dog barking- but it was a howler monkey. I have not seen monkeys since we were in Barbados umpteen years ago, and those are much smaller green monkeys, so I jumped up ready to see the largest and loudest monkeys of them all, in their natural habitat. I hopped in the outdoor shower with sounds of nature all around. At 6am, I left the villa and walked around the resort to check things out. I started with a walk across this bridge – with howler monkeys jumping from tree to tree above my head. It was incredible so I sat there silently, watching them play and having the best time early in the morning. I walked to the end of the bridge and found the pool, the spa, the yoga studio literally hanging in the jungle. There are no words for this place.

I went back to the villa to get Dallas and we headed to breakfast. The views of Arenal from the outdoor restaurant were fantastic. We had an amazing breakfast with the most delicious Costa Rican coffee, then I headed over to yoga. We chilled for the next 4 days, eating, drinking, relaxing and just taking it all in.

The main pool area is gorgeous.

One night, we headed to EcoTermales Hot Springs and had dinner there. A huge buffet of Costa Ricans delicacies. It was something to remember. The thermal springs range from 99° F to 106° F and there is also a freshwater waterfall and pool if you need a change in temperature. This is a cool place to check out with a full bar at the hot springs. We enjoyed it here and the food was unbelievable.

My 40th birthday, I woke up to this. Then started the day with a green juice.

We stayed on property all day – there is so much to see here.

I went to a yoga class with the amazing Christina Kajal.

We grabbed coffee and went on a sloth hunt.

Passion fruit and rum was my birthday drink. The bartender made sure we were well taken care of.

For my birthday dinner, we went to Asia Luna on property. Let me just tell you, this was one of the best meals we had while in La Fortuna.

We did a coffee tour while in La Fortuna – because we love coffee – and especially Costa Rican coffee. This employee was busy picking coffee beans and stopped for a minute so we could take his picture. So happy. Costa Rica is known as one of the happiest countries on the planet – here is the proof. Then we placed beans in a roasting drum, and they turned like a rotisserie. When the beans smelled right, medium roast, they were poured out, cooled and grounded where when then made coffee to drink.

On Day 6, we were a sad couple loading our car, having to say goodbye to all our favorite people at Nayara. Driving away from this little piece of heaven was hard. We drove almost 4 hours and what an adventure it was. We saw wind turbines all over the country. Costa Rica has run almost entirely on renewable energy for 300 days out of the year for a few years now. It is impressive, such a clean environment, another reason that makes it the happiest place on earth. We drove through so many little towns along the way and finally stopped at a roadside restaurant to eat lunch.

As we were getting closer to Tamarindo, where we were staying during our last leg of the trip, we came up on another little town and as we were driving along the main strip, we realized we had landed directly in the middle of a funeral procession. Apparently, everyone walks behind the casket from the church to the burial site and somehow, we had ended up at the back of it. It was hundreds of people walking down the street – taking up the entire road. We still talk about the time we got stuck in a funeral in Costa Rica.

We finally arrived in Tamarindo and drove through town, which is located on the beach. We headed over to our hotel, Capitan Suizo Beachfront Boutique Hotel. We stayed in the beachfront bungalow for 5 days. The atmosphere and temperature were a stark difference from the rainforest, so it took us a few days to adapt to the heat. The beach was outside our front door on one side and the gorgeous pool on the other.

We had an outdoor shower in the back and monkeys jumping from tree to tree over my head. Showering with monkeys’ overhead is an experience!

Tamarindo has some fabulous restaurants. We ate at Patagonia Argentinian restaurant multiple times. They had fantastic empanadas that I could not get enough of.

We went into town each day so I could take a yoga class in the morning, then next door for a smoothie at Costa Juice. We typically went back to the hotel in the afternoon and Dallas would surf. Afternoon showers would often hit, and we would sit on the porch until they passed. That was our little routine every day while In Tamarindo.

One day for lunch, Dallas could not wait to buy from this guy, so he had that. I had something else.

We also ate at a restaurant on the beach, named La Purruja Restaurant and Bar and La Pachanga, and were serenaded by a local violinist. Hilarious and he was so good.

Also, El Coconut was great.

Our last full day mostly included this.

That night we walked down the beach to take in the very last sunset. It was fantastic.

There always seems to be a debate over which is better – Costa or Hawaii – and now that I have been to both, I would have to go with Costa Rica and a big part of that is the travel time. We are on the east coast, so it is much easier for us to get in and out quickly. Costa Rica, we will see you soon, and next time with the kids.

Our very last day, we ate breakfast and took our time to drive to Liberia – the airport we were flying out of. This is a great airport, small and very simple to get in and out of. The drive time was only an hour or so. We dropped our rental car across the street from the airport and the shuttle drove us over – it was all easy and seamless. We flew out of Liberia at 1pm local time and arrived at RDU around 11pm EST.