And the Rain, Rain, Rain, Comes Down, Down, Down...

Hola!

This is days 33-38, Sunday to Friday of my journey in Costa Rica. It has been raining 

everyday this week here on the mountain. I was not able to do much due to the weather. 

It's been a funny weather pattern this week. Couple days it has rained all day with

 lightning and thunder. Most days were funny...it rained then the sun came out,

 then it rained and then sun would come out; all day long for days. 

This one was the day before the rain came along. 

Nice picture of behind the main house. 

Christopher is installing a new light fixture;

 a much needed light in the main room of the main house.

Here what the new light fixture looks like...pretty!

Since it's been raining Tammy and I spent time working on panties this week.

Tammy and I made 27 panties for mothers with children that are poor.

I started on making panties for my younger niece. I now know how to use the sewing machine. 

I am still fine tuning the foot pedal for speed in sewing. I tend to go too fast and goof up. 

Patience is required when using the sewing machine. At least it is for me.

I finished the panties for my niece. She is going to love the bold colors!

Here is the walkway between the bodega and the main house.

I often go thru them throughout the day between the rain and the sun in the day.

One day it was raining hard and thundering outside. Poor Scooby was terrified of the 

thunder and snuck into the house hiding underneath the stairs. Remember he is an outside dog.

 But he was terrified that day… he just had to sneak into the house for his own security, 

hoping not to be seen. So cute!

When we got a break from the rain I was able to take a picture of the most unusual plant 

I ever seen here in Costa Rica. It is a cactus plant. My brother would love to see this. 

He has a great interest in special plants. This I think would definitely fit in his

 special variety of plants. Too bad I can't take it home with me to show him. 

Taking a picture of it for him is the best I can do.

End of my week here in Costa Rica. I now have 5 days left of my trek here. 

I am so excited about going home. I miss my family and my dog. My cousin

 Tammy is not happy with me when I say I am excited that I have 5 days left.

 It's been a long journey, but guess what? I am feeling soo much better then 

when I first got here. The main reason I came here is to get well.

 I am feeling much better and ready to go home.

Please pray for good weather and safe traveling this coming Wednesday. 

It is the day I travel to go home to NJ to a small town named Port Republic

 that has a special place in my heart. Its a beautiful peaceful quaint little town.

I will post another blog before I head home next week. 

Adios and good day my family and friends.

Jen

The Adventure Continues...

Hola!

Now it is Thursday-Saturday, days 30-32 of my trek in Costa Rica.

Here is Scooby in a cardboard box. Isn't he cute? Scooby is getting attached to me. 

He runs to me every time I go outside. All the dogs are outside dogs here on the farm.

 For some reason people don't really talk to their dogs like we do back home. We think 

of them as pets back home, but here they think of them as guard dogs… they don't talk to them.

 I talk to these dogs here. The dogs love me talking to them. I can't help it, I love all dogs.

Tammy and I made mini bread to go with the main entree for tonight… Yummy!! 

Tammy and I made roasted garlic white bean hummus.

Today we hoped to go to the valley and visit people. We stopped at Belinda's house

 on the way down the Mountain. This is Tammy, Belinda and I on her beautiful porch. 

\They just built it in past year. Remember the houses here are quite small. 

So people spend most of their day outside of the house.

Here is a really good pic of Jesus relaxing on Belinda's porch.

The sky started to look greyish and cloudy so we decided to leave for the valley before it rains. 

As we were heading down the Mountain, we came to the river and discovered 

that the machine was blocking the road to the river. We were disappointed that we 

couldn't cross the river. Sadly we turned around and headed back home up the Mountain.

Here is something for you to experience what it is like to ride up the Mountain. 
We got stuck on the way up and Jesus had to go backwards then go forward trying to

 get ahead on the dirt road to get home. Like I said, “Roller Coaster ride.” Enjoy the video.

Thursday night Christian, Christopher and I played a board game.

 It is called, “Ticket to Ride, Europe”. It was quite an interesting game of trains.

 I enjoyed playing the game with the boys.

I now have a roommate in my room. It's quite a small roommate, Gecko. 

I allowed him to stay there so he can eat all the spiders around the room. 

I was happy to have him in my room.

Friday morning I woke up and it was very very cold. I didn't bring anything warm to Costa Rica. 

Who would've thought that it gets cold down here in a tropical rainforest country!!

 I had to borrow a sweatshirt and a blanket to stay warm.

Beautiful day here on the farm. Clear blue sky. I discovered something. If you look closely

 in the picture, you can see another Mountain in the faded area. I didn't know that

 there was another Mountain behind the one we can see. Most of the days were cloudy 

so I couldn't see it until today. It was an absolutely beautiful scenery from the horizon.

Saturday afternoon Tammy and I went for a walk on other side of the Bodega. 

This is a nice picture of Tammy and I.

Here I am with a walking stick. I was very grateful to have a walking stick.

 It really helps me with the ground on a slope.

Beautiful picture on the walk.

There was a large crevice in the ground. I wasn't sure I would be able to cross over it. 

So Jesus and Christopher helped me cross the crevice. 

On the way back, behind the bodega there is a giant boulder.

 I decided to try to climb up on it.

I made it on the bouder! Yeah!!!!

Another picture of me on the boulder.

Here is a good picture of Christian.

Here is one of Christopher playing a game on computer. 

Here is a sweet picture of the new Lamb. She is soo cute!

End of my days 30-32 of my journey in Costa Rica. I now have less than 2 weeks left

 of my trek here in Costa Rica. I am looking forward to seeing my family again and my dog

Copper. Oh I really miss my dog! I decided that I am not leaving my dog behind when I 

go on another trip in the future. The dog is going to stay with me from now on. 

On this trip I realized how much I needed to have a service dog with me. 

The service dog really does helps me tremendously.

Hopefully sometime next week if there is good weather we want to go down

 to the valley and visit people down there. We need at least 2 good days of

 good weather to dry the roads on the Mountain in order to drive down to the valley. 

I am looking forward to meet the people in the valley.

I hope you all are enjoying the blog. Soon I will add more to the blog. 

Adios(good bye) and good day my family and friends.

Jen

His Sweet Blessings...

Hola!

Here is Sunday-Wednesday, days 26-29 of my trek in Costa Rica. 

I now have exactly 2 weeks left of my journey here. 

Here is Christian trying to remember the alphabet in sign language.

 Here he is remembering the letter “R”. Both Christian and Christopher are 

doing sign language with me when I dont understand what they are trying to tell me. 

Sign language does help me understand them.

Ohh, Christopher makes wonderful Oreo smoothies. 

We had them for breakfast. YUMMY!!

When Christopher and Christian told me that there are crabs in the river up here in 

the mountain, I had a hard time believing there were crabs here. I live in NJ and we

 have crabs in the Ocean! Jesus actually found one crawling around in the yard. 

Would you believe that?!! A real live fresh water crab in the river...esp. 

near waterfalls up in these mountains.

Here is a close up one of the river crab. They say it gets quite big. This crab is a small one. 

This tree is a mango tree. I like Mangos here.

 I don't care for the ones in NJ. Nice fresh mangoes- quite tasty.

These are passion fruits. They hang off of vines high above our heads. 

I never had passion fruit until I came here in Costa Rica. 

They look similar to small size grannysmith apples. Tammy and Jesus grow them on the farm. 

A better picture of the passion fruit hanging on vines. 

Here is a picture of one of their cows. This one has big horns!!

Jesus, Christopher, and Christian getting ready to work on cutting down sugar cane.

Jesus brought out a sugar cane from among the sugar cane plants to give to Christian.

 Christian was responsible for putting sugar canes into the sacks.

When the sack is full, Christian carries them to the front of the bodega. 

The path to the bodega is very slippery and muddy. I have a hard time

 holding myself up sliding everywhere on the path. 

Here is one that has sugar cane in a cart. Give you an idea of what they look like. 

I thought at first it was bamboo sticks. But I was wrong, they are sugar canes.

Here is a good picture of the porch on the side of main house. 

I love the size of the porch. The only disadvantage is bugs. It is not screened in. 

Yet it has a great feeling of big and open space on the porch.

I am sitting on the porch sifting the rice. I am picking out unopened rice and 

separating it from the rice. Tammy and Jesus grew rice on this mountain. It's homegrown rice,

 not store bought. You need to have good eyes to see the unopened rice from the rice

 already opened and patience too. It takes quite some time to do this. 

Here is a close up picture of the unopened rice in my hands.

The electric went out just before dinner. It got very very dark inside of the 

house as well as outside. I asked Christopher to find a candle. He found one small 

tealight candle to light up part of the table. There are no street lights or neighboring

 houses near by to see some light. No no it was very dark without any light. I did not

 like eating dinner in the dark. It is what it is without electricity.

The following day after cutting the sugar cane, the Montanez boys got together and

 work on grinding the sugar cane. Christopher and Christian grab the handle and start 

pushing the handles to grind the canes, Jesus pushes the sugar canes into the grinder. 

The liquid comes out of the sugar canes and flows into a bucket. 

It looks like very hard work to do this job for the men.

Here is a close up pic of the sugar cane grinder. This time Christopher 

takes a turn pushing the canes into the grinder. I realized by watching 

Christopher doing this that he is very strong young man.

Here is what the sugar cane juice looks like after the sugar cane

 liquid is cooked after 24 hrs on an open fire. It is a thick dark brown 

syrup of sugar cane. It is very tasty with tea. I really like it.

Ohh yeah, did I tell you there is no TV, no hot water, and no air conditioner on this farm?? 

Who needs TV when you can enjoy the majesty of God's creation by 

enjoying the scenery of mountains, the lush green everywhere and the waterfalls. 

This bag is a Solar Shower, it warms the water by the sun. I was very

 impressed how warm the water was when taken a shower with this. 

I only have had a warm shower twice during my stay here in 4 weeks.

The neighbors on this mountain lent Tammy and Jesus a fan for the main house. 

I am deeply appreciative of the fan. It really does gets hot and humid up here on the mountain. 

Christopher is very good at fixing things. He is working on 

a neighbor's farm equipment. Jesus looking in to see how Christopher is doing. 

Christopher is a natural in fixing just about everything on this farm.

 

I am learning so much about living on the farm. I am also learning few things 

about technology from the boys that I never knew. Those boys really do

 know about computers and cameras. I am very impressed with them. 

I am grateful that I am continuously being open to learning new things.

Tomorrow we hope its a good weather. We want to get out and visit people. 

 Another roller coastal ride down the Mountain and through the river (literally)

 to get off the Mountain. Once we get off the Mountain, it's about an hour on 

dirt road till we hit the pavement of the road. Fun, fun and all fun traveling from

 Tammy's house to friends' house. We are looking forward to seeing Luis,

who was in a serious accident as well as other friends of the family in the area..

End of days 26-29. It's getting close to the end of my journey here in Costa Rica. 

May the Lord bless my cousin Tammy and her family in having me here. The Lord has 

been very good to us with good weather and full of events on the farm. 

I hope you are enjoying my blog. More to come when electricity and internet are available.

Jen