Playa Chiquita

As I mentioned in my previous post, I am now in Playa Chiquita, Costa Rica. Playa Chiquita is a little town just south of Puerto Viejo on the caribbean coast, and I am staying at Playa Chiquita Lodge as a WorkAway volunteer. I work 4-6 hours per day, depending on how many volunteers are working that day, and my duties include sweeping, mopping, serving breakfast, helping the guests, answering the phone when needed (which is nerve-wracking in Spanish), general cleaning and tidying, and sometimes doing laundry. In exchange for my work, I get a free room, breakfast and dinner (lunch I provide for myself), and then I have plentiful free time to explore the area, relax, read, or do whatever strikes my fancy. It's a great set-up because I get to enjoy this beautiful place and barely have to spend any money!
The lodge is very close to the beach, so I go there at least once a day, and I've gone swimming every day except for today because the weather wasn't great.

Because this area is so beautiful, I will let the pictures do most of the talking:

The main building at the lodge, which is a simple, open-air structure.

Main building, view towards the kitchen.

Main building again.

The road leading to the lodge. I love the jungle feeling and all of the tropical plants!

The house where the volunteers live

One of the guest cabins

Path to the playa (beach)

My first view of the ocean!

I could get used to seeing this everyday :)

Punta Uva, the point/beach to the south of Playa Chiquita

Very excited for my first swim in the Caribbean!

On a walk to Punta Uva

The view back towards Playa Chiquita from Punta Uva

I discovered a trail to an overlook with amazing views on my walk

View towards Playa Chiquita from the overlook at Punta Uva. Breath-taking! The picture doesn't do it justice. 

I've been loving the ocean, the jungle, swimming, exploring, and the generally relaxed atmosphere here. Even though I have to work 6 days a week, I feel so unstressed, and it's amazing. Just what I wanted for this trip, and a big difference from my trip in Europe when I had to be constantly thinking about my next step because I moved around so often. I also really enjoy spending time with the people here. When I first got here, things were a bit in flux because two of the volunteers left right after I got here, but now there are 3 of us who are all staying until about the same time, and we all get along really well. My roommate, Sylvia, is a 63-year-old woman from Austria, and she's great! She's so friendly and kind, and has so much energy and enthusiasm for life and traveling. She's traveled all over the world, and has no plans of stopping anytime soon. I hope I am the same way when I am her age. The other volunteer is a Canadian woman in her 40's named Erika, and she has also been all over the world, predominantly to several countries in Africa where she spent a lot of time living and volunteering. The three of us all bonded very quickly, and we have really engaging conversations about the places we've traveled, our plans for the future, and our thoughts about the world. Between the three of us we have had so many different experiences (the two of them more so than me), so I feel like there is so much we can all share and learn from each other. It's also cool that we are all at such different points in our lives but we still have so much in common and can relate to each other so well. And it shows me that even though everyone always says to me how great it is that I'm doing all this traveling while I'm young, I don't necessarily have to give it up as I get older. As long as I still want to travel, age doesn't have to stop me. 

In addition to the volunteers, there are three employees of the lodge, Lucho, Rubio and Marta. They all speak Spanish, and Lucho speaks some English, but Rubio and Marta don't speak English at all, so talking to them is great practice for me. Even though I still speak mostly English here since I mostly spend time with the other volunteers, I feel like I speak a pretty good mixture of the two. I adjusted much faster and easier to speaking Spanish than I expected, since the last time I spoke any amount of Spanish was over a year ago when I was in Spain. The first several days I was here I got much more comfortable speaking it, so now I don't hesitate as much, I just start talking. Understanding is getting easier too, and now when someone asks if I speak Spanish, I say "sí" without doubting myself. It feels so great to be able to communicate with people in another language! Sometimes it's still surreal to me; someone will be talking to me, and I think to myself, I can understand them, how is that possible? It's so cool! Also, my Spanish is the best out of the three volunteers, so sometimes people ask me to translate what they are saying if they are having trouble understanding each other. I've never been in a situation like that before where my grasp of a second language was good enough to take that role, and I enjoy it. Now it makes me really want to learn more languages (I did before, but now even more so). 

Along with the amazing scenery, all of these interactions with the employees and other volunteers here are what's making this such a rewarding experience so far. When I first got to Costa Rica, I was feeling a bit lonely in a way I never really did on my trip around Europe. For some reason I wasn't as excited this time around and wished that I had a travel buddy to keep me company and enjoy the adventure with me. However, my loneliness has disappeared as I have gotten to know everyone here, and it confirms the idea I had going into this that developing relationships and making memories with people are what really make an experience great, not necessarily just trying to see as many sights as possible. In Europe I wore myself out by the end trying to do so much, and even though I had a great time in Europe and I was of course looking forward to Costa Rica, subconsciously I think I was afraid I would have that same worn out feeling. But since I've decided to take it slow and focus on getting to know people as opposed to just seeing a checklist of places, I'm able to relax and enjoy things more because I can take my time and make meaningful connections. So I'm back to being perfectly content (and proud of myself) that I have the determination and confidence to travel to new places on my own without feeling like I need someone else in order to do it. 

Well, those are my updates and thoughts for now. Since I will be staying in each place I travel to for longer periods of time on this trip than my last one, and the majority of my time will be spent in one country, some of my upcoming posts will be more based on topics than specific places or cities. Some ideas I have in the pipeline are Costa Rican food and my observations about Costa Rica so far, so stay tuned for those. Thanks for reading!