January 26, 2026 - March 30, 2026 -- Costa Rica
Written By: Wendy
It's been a while, but we've mostly just been living plain old house lives in one place for the past 6 months. It has been a refreshing and much needed reprieve from travel. We've been able to realign and figure out what we truly want while we have the time and space to relax and not constantly think about where to go next and what to do. We have been able to just be - what a concept for us! We settled into a comfortable routine for a while. We were able to get to know the librarians, sign up for kids' activities, have a consistent nanny and date-night, and watch the seasons change at our favorite parks and trails. We even got to experience what life would be like if we didn't have a car for 2 months (thank you to the def fluid that ended up in diesel tank and to all the parts being backordered!). But after being in the same place for 8 months, we knew it was time. Time to travel again, time to change it up, and time to experience new experiences.
With encouragement from our travel buddies that we saw the the Solar Eclipse with, traveled throughout all of the East and New England with, and met up with in Jamaica, we decided to meet up with them once again in Tamarindo, Costa Rica for 2 months to try out the worldschooling thing. When we left Salida in late January, there were still a lot of unanswered questions rolling around in our minds. Would we buy a house in Salida? Would we move back to Wenatchee? Would we travel again in our camper? Would go international? Would our kids go to school? In the States? Would we continue to homeschool? We had a very hazy vision of our future and what our life would look like when we got back from Costa Rica. We had some family commitments and a wedding in the spring, but other than that, we had zero plans and about 100 ideas for our lives past June. We decided Costa Rica would answer all our questions. Or at least we hoped it would. So with all the questions rolling around in our heads and waves of nerves rolling around in our stomaches, we left Colorado in the single digits and snow and headed for sunny 80 degree Costa Rican weather. Little did we know just how life changing Costa Rica would be and how it truly would answer all our questions and lay out a clear path for us.
Our time in Costa Rica started off with a few days in San Jose. It was alright, and we made the best of it, but I will say that I would skip it in the future. The slightly sketchy hotel and the 6 hours of windy mountain roads that caused Parker to puke about 10 times throughout the drive could definitely be skipped, I suppose. Suffice to say, we did not have the smoothest introduction to attempting to live aboard. On our first night at dinner, after a long day of travel and very difficult time trying to find our hotel in the dark, Parker broke down at dinner after not finding any familiar foods on the menu and cried in my lap for about 15 minutes. We realized this might be harder than we thought. Things quickly turned around, though, and after San Jose we had 3 days in a luxurious bungalow tucked away in the jungle, complete with our own private pool oasis and just a 5 minute walk to the most stunning beach. We were greeted with fresh cold coconuts and scented towels, and I knew that we'd be alright. We washed off all the puke from the drive, and we soaked up the slow luxury of those 3 days that we were not used to. The kids woke bright and early with the sun each morning at 6:00am and were splashing in our pool by 6:30. We had homemade tropical breakfasts with fresh fruits and farm eggs, and we were greeted by the howls of howler monkeys and the chirps of parakeets wherever we walked. We were also reunited with our friends after not having seen them for 6 months, and we were all overjoyed to see each other and spend an afternoon catching up together on the beach with the kids splashing in the shallow waves or catching hermit crabs as the sun slowly set into a ball of fiery orange into the ocean in front of us.
Our 3 days of luxury came to an end and we then made our way to where we'd be staying at for the next 2 months, just outside of Tamarindo. We'd be staying in a large apartment complex that is across the street from the school our kids were enrolled in. Our travel buddies, would be staying there the entire time as well. It was a large complex with 3 pools, walking trails perfect for bird watching, and many families that we would spend hours with at the pool. It was a short drive to a climbing gym, hundreds of restaurants, and we had our pick of several different beautiful beaches within the near vicinity. We had a swim teacher come to our pool once a week to give our kids swim lessons, and we could walk to school each day along a tree covered gravel road that was lined with birds, monkeys, and tropical flowers in full bloom (we walked this road after essentially playing frogger to cross a busy highway, but details details...) It wasn't long before we were head over heels in love with Costa Rica and all things Costa Rican - the way of life was slow and easy, the people were kind, the food was fresh, and life felt good. Scott became a whole new person, and I have honestly never seen him so happy and so at peace. It rubbed off, and our whole family seemed to be the best versions of ourselves.
We quickly settled into a comfortable routine of taking the kids to school, the going to a coffee shop with our friends to get some work done or have an intention circle with them and check in on each other. Afterwards, we'd try out a new place to eat for lunch, pick up the kids from school and immediately head straight to the pool where we would splash and chat with a constant rotation of new and familiar families until the sun set and we went in for dinner. We often kept the party going with poolside potlucks under the lights while the kids swam under the stars. At least once a week, we would take the kids to the beach before school and go for a sunrise stroll and swim before grabbing a quick breakfast from one of our many favorite beachside cafes and then dropping the kids off to play outside with their friends all day at "school." I put "school" in quotes there because it was definitely not a school in the traditional sense, but much more child-led, nature centered, summer camp feel. Whatever they did all day, our kids loved it and thrived in that environment with all the socialization and time outside. The slept hard each night, and couldn't wait to go the next day.
After having traveled so quickly throughout the US, averaging about 9 days in place, it felt great to be in one spot for 2 whole months and be able to settle in. We were able to find our favorite places and return to the them. We made friends with other traveling families passing through and ex-pat families that lived there permanently. We repeatedly saw locals and learned about the true Costa Rican culture through them. Many locals were confused when we told them the length of time we were staying. We weren't tourists, but we weren't ex-pats either. We were there long enough to be repeat costumers, but no long enough to have a completely invested relationship. Once the locals realized, though, that we weren't here for just a few days or a week, something shifted and we could be more open and real with each other. We loved truly getting to the heart of the culture and to try out places off the beaten path, especially in Tamarindo since it is a location completely dominated by tourists.
I know I have talked about this in other posts, probably several times, but the true magic in the travel community is in the amount of truly intentional time spent together. This is what truly made our time in Costa Rica so rich and unforgettable and has, honestly, made us want to continue to travel. We have come to realized that no matter if you are in a group of campers in upstate New York or southern California or a bunch of nomads and ex-pats from 5 different countries in Costa Rica, nomadic families band together and love to spend intentional time together at the drop of a hat. It might be a Thursday night and you invite 5 families out at the last minute to go to dinner together, and they will all be there. Or maybe a walk on the beach and breakfast before school and work on Wednesday morning, and everyone will be there. There is something special in people being in a different place that is outside of their norm and only being there for a finite amount of time that makes people prioritize time together. It is pure magic. After being in Costa Rica for about a month, Scott and I realized that we had spent more time with several families in that 1 month than with all of the families that we had met in Salida in the 6 months we knew them. Whatever the reason - work, stress, school, after school activities, family obligations, complacency - people are just not as spontaneous or intention in "normal life."
One great example of this was on my birthday. I turned 36 while down there and after hemming and hawing about how to celebrate, I eventually sent a message to the other families we knew that lived in our same apartment complex. At this point, we had been there for less than 3 weeks, so they were fairly new relationships, but everyone I invited showed up. We all went into Tamarindo for dinner together at a Food Truck garden and then walked down to the beach to watch the sunset. The kids all splashed in the ocean waves as the bright red-orange ball set into the ocean and cast a breathtakingly beautiful light on the scene. After the sun had set and the kids exhausted themselves in the surf, the dads took all the kids home while the moms when bar hopping and clubbing for the rest of the night. It was an epic night fueled by tasty drinks, loud music, dancing, and deep conversations. At the end of the night after realizing that might be the last birthday I spend clubbing, I was just so touched by this group of women, some of whom I recently met that showed up to celebrate with me.
Even though building community was a huge part of our time in Costa Rica, one of the highlights was the side trip we took with our travel buddies to La Fortuna. We went for 4 nights, and man did we make the most out of that long weekend and packed in all the sightseeing we could. We started off the 5-hour drive with stops at Llanos del Cortez waterfall and the Arenal Volcano before arriving at our Airbnb in La Fortuna. The next morning, we were up and ready to go on a hike through the Mistico Hanging Bridges park. This might have been my highlight from our whole 2 months. At first I was concerned when we arrived to find our jungle hike on a paved path. Was this going to be another tourist trap through the "jungle?" Shortly after hiking away from the entrance and hoards of tourist waiting for their guides, I knew that we would not be disappointed. We instantly saw and abundance of different lizards, spiders, unique bugs, and tropical birds. We opted to do the hike without a guide, thinking it might be difficult for our group with 4 young and sometimes wild kids, but luckily Scott and our travel buddy are exceptional at spotting birds. We saw several different types of stunning motmots, tanagers, hummingbirds, and even a toucan. We saw a troupe of spider monkeys on full display throwing poop at the people down below. Yes, no joke, poop throwing monkeys in the treetops above us. The most breathtaking part was the hanging bridges that were anywhere from 150-300 feet above the forest floor below. On the first bridge, we all felt a bit uneasy with the sway of the bridge and the ground so far below that we couldn't even see it, but the views of the Arenal Volcano and the surrounding foliage and mountains distracted us. By the 16th and final bridge, we were all walking across with ease and laughter as we took in the views and sights. We ended our day with a twilight soak in the "El Choyin" natural hot springs in the river on the way home. The 4 kids splashed about in the warm river, looking for fish through their goggles while the healing mineral water soothed our sore muscles, and we watched more tropical birds flit about from branch to branch. "It's good life" was all I could think. The rest of our side trip was spent learning about animals and how to protect them at animal sanctuary, Proyecto Asis, getting some date time in to explore the town of La Fortuna kid-free, and tubing down the Rio Celeste, which was also incredibly epic and beautiful to tube down the gatorade blue river with sloths climbing in trees above us. What a weekend!
Shortly after our adventures to the jungle and inland Costa Rica, it was all too soon time to say good-bye. Before we left, though, we knew that we needed a good-bye potluck with all our friends and what better food to serve at a potluck than pizza?! We didn't have our pizza oven, and we knew that finding pizza flour would be incredibly difficult, if not impossible, so we made do with what we could find. We bought some pre-made pizza crusts and made homemade sauce. We cooked up pizzas in our toaster oven, and they weren't half bad. We had a poolside potluck with other yummy foods from all our friends that were still left from the past 2 months. The kids splashed in the pools and ran around the apartment complex until well past all their bedtimes. We knew that it was time to head home, but none us seemed to want to leave. We continuously told our kids "5 or 10 more minutes," and then we'd launched into another deep discussion of travel or parenting or family and 30 minutes later, we'd tell our kids, "Really, truly only 5 more minutes." After about 3 rounds of this and when tired kid tears became more frequent, we all decided to call it a night. With slightly heavy hearts, we said good-bye to several good friends not knowing when we'd see them again. But we were good at this. We'd perfected this by now. Saying good-bye was part of our lifestyle. It never necessarily made it easier, but it was always, "See you down the road," or now, "See you somewhere else in the world."
As we prepared to leave, Scott and I both grew more and more upset. We had conversations about staying and how we could make it work. We technically didn't have anywhere we really needed to be in the States. We seriously considered it, but ultimately we decided it wouldn't work. We had several commitments back in the States in April and May, and we couldn't completely abandon all our family and friends from back home. So with heavy hearts, we begrudgingly boarded the plane back to the States to see what would await us when returned to Colorado. The main sliver of hope that was keeping us going was all the future travel plans we made while we were in Costa Rica. Airbnbs had been booked, flights had been bought, and deposits were made at other worldschools for the next year. We knew that while traveling, it is the best time to make other travel plans, we did it all. We were looking forward to seeing family and friends again and another Colorado summer, but we couldn't wait for all the adventures we had planned. Costa Rica has answered all the questions we had rolling around in our heads in January, and we realized that we did not want to stop traveling, at least not yet. Our kids were still young, they didn't have strong opinions, our work was still incredibly flexible, we were financially in a good place, and we all absolutely thrived in Costa Rica. International life was calling us, and we decided we'd answered the call.