Costa Rica Continued.....

We got up very bright and very early Monday morning to travel to Los Chiles which is within a stones throw from the Nicaraguan border.  If my memory serves me correctly as the crow flies it was only around 200 miles from Tabarcia to Los Chiles, but remember travel in Costa is measured in time not miles.

I can't explain to you how arduous travel is in Costa.  The main roads are pretty good (I'm a country girl and quite used to bad roads) but the roads to remote areas are something else.  There are hills that are straight up and straight down, hairpin turns nothing like nothing I have ever seen here and the drop offs are well....once I made the mistake of looking straight down out of my window and really wished I had not done that.
The Costa Ricans are used to the roads and they drive like they are in the Mississippi delta where it is flat and straight and you can see for miles ahead.  There were many times when drivers passed on double yellow lines, up a hill, in heavy traffic and everyone in the van collectively held their breath.

Lots of people drive scooters, which are a great way to get around locally.  And these scooter drivers are very brave they pass and drive right through the middle of you and the on-coming traffic.
On the way to Los Chiles we ate here.  The food was great and the view...well it was indescribable. 

We were advised that the trip would take about 7 hours, which included bathroom breaks and stops to eat.  But, there were detours because of construction and we wound up traveling for 11 hours.  But I guess it was God's intervention, because it really didn't feel like that long to me.  Now any other time, (and David will validate this) about 2-3 hours in a car for me is about all I can stand and about all you can stand of me.  Because by that time frame, I'm squirming and ill as a snake. But I truly enjoyed this journey.  Getting to see the real Costa Rica was very inspiring and interesting.  It would be like coming to Mississippi and riding the back roads of Carroll County and the delta.  You get to see how people really live.  We saw coffee plantations, pineapple plantations, hill sides covered with that greenhouse cloth stuff under which they were growing fern and other plants.
Oh yeah, all those plants that we buy at Wal Mart and Lowe's--corn plants, bougainvilleas, impatiens and on and on, grow wild on the roadside. 


Coffee plantation that you can tour



We arrived in Los Chiles and were very excited by our accommodations.  David and I had our own room, with a wonderful shower.  We hadn't slept in a full size bed ever...but it was quite cozy. :-) I'm smiling about this because we are both fluffy.

#4 Grandchild Avery who is quite the worrier was having a conniption fit because she thought "her Nonna was sleeping on the floor, and her Nonna can't sleep on the floor," would not be satisfied until I took this picture and sent it to her.
So after 11 hours of travel, we then walked around in the community, told people about the clinic we were having the next day and invited them to church.

I just love this picture of David...as we were walking through the outskirts of Los Chiles, handing out tracts and inviting people to come to church and the clinic....and I just love that little dog. 
After our visiting in the community, we had church.  Again we sang, praised, prayed and had a sermon...two sermons in fact because there were two preachers there...again I was worn out.
We returned to our rooms, had a light meal, devotion and fell into bed.  (Oh I was so happy I could take my two showers a day--a small prayer answered)  We were to be up early Tuesday morning because we were heading into a remote village for our first clinic....and you will find out how God broke me.
I will leave you with this last picture...and thought.  We are all pieces, sometimes broken pieces, and God can put them all together to make something beautiful and useful...just like this alley way between our rooms.

 

 

 

To be continued...........