After a night in Madrid, we landed in San Jose, Costa Rica, and quickly made it to the Budget counter, only to discover that the 4×4 SUV we had ordered well in advance was not waiting for us. The agent said that they ran out of cars, and since this was not a prepaid reservation they had no obligation to keep a car for us. I contacted carrentals.com, through which we made the reservation, and noted that they did charge me in advance for the insurance waiver, and the polite agent (once I managed to get to one – all in chat of course, no way of getting a human on the phone) said he was sorry, but the best he could offer us was a refund. Fortunately, in the nearby Payless counter they did have 4×4 models available. We refused the kind offer to rent a cheaper 2WD model, and ended up paying 50% more for a model which was smaller than what we had originally ordered. We decided to take their comprehensive insurance package, with a reduced deductible of $300, and not the significantly cheaper basic insurance with a $3,000 deductible. By the time we picked up the car from an off-terminal location and headed out, some of us were a bit hungry, so we stopped at a restaurant we found in google maps, not far from the rental car lot. Tamar saw the menu and said she would rather look for something to ear in a nearby grocery store, so I went with her to look for one, while Lilach and Daniel stayed and coped with the food which they later described as rather bad.
After am hour’s drive we reached our sweet B&B for the night – Casa Rio Blanco (guess which river it was named after), near Guápiles. Soon after we arrived, around 6pm, the sun set, and the Canadian expat from Calgary who was supervising the place showed us the lovely little garden, with the red-eyed tree frogs roaming in it, and their egg-batch under a leaf overhanging the tiny decorative pool. A night tour of the garden later on revealed quite a few interesting insects. Wonderful welcome to Costa Rica!
Family Trips 