Playa Conchal - Shell Beach

Abi with a piece of blue plastic, here she is proudly displaying her birthday cake she just made, Happy Birthday!

Lily with a chunk of wet wood that she had a lot of fun playing with.

The power went out this morning and so Corey had to leave and find somewhere with internet so he could do his conference call for work. When he came back, he told us there was some construction going on and that the power would be out until 2. No power at home provided means he can't work, so looked like an ideal time to go to the beach!

While he was gone, Corey scouted out how to get to Playa Conchal, or Shell Beach, which a secluded beach that you need 4 wheel drive to get to, cause there is a little river. We parked in Brasilito at a restaurant where we ate lunch first cause it was starting to rain, then we started to walk the short distance to Playa Conchal. Playa Conchal is actually part of a nature reserve area and an exclusive resort - Paradise Resort - that we could use our timeshare at, except there is an all inclusive fee for each person each day, which puts it out of our budget... but we still took a tour on the way and that was fun - we got a ride in their little concierge tour truck. Kids thought it was fun. Anyway -

So first the resort tour, then lunch at La Casita Del Pescado where we tried all different kind of Costa Rican specialty drinks and ate french fries and hamburgers, then walking to the shell beach. A truck full of teenage boys offered us a ride, which the kids were excited to accept. They got to sit in the back of a truck while it was driving!

Me, Abi and Lily inside the car, Wes and Ethan among the 10 people in the back.

We arrived at Playa Conchal and were amazed that it really was a beach made of shells - tons and tons of broken shells. No sand, just shells! This beach is hogging all the shells! It was really cool, and you sink into shells when you walk more than you do walking on sand, we learned, so it was harder to walk and doesn't feel good on your feet. Mel was a little disappointed that she couldn't build a sand castle, she had even brought a leaf from home to be her flag. Oh well. We pretended it was a beach of small diamond and had fun rolling around in it for about 10 minutes when it started to rain. We all ran up the beach for cover under a tarp that the beach patrol guy was hanging out under. He said that there is an ocean current that brings all the shells to this beach. And the steep beach and rocks cause the ocean to break them all up, creating the beach we were beholding. Pretty neat.

The rain didn't last too long, and we headed out again and had a fun fun time digging, burying, hanging out in the tide pools, and playing Shell Man

Joe as Shell Man

Ethan trying to get covered in shells so he can be an even better Shell Man.


Wesley really impressed the big boys with this move that made him able to get lots of shells on his face, making him now a true contender for the Shell Man title.

The waves were fast and aggressive and the beach was pretty steep, so there wasn't a lot of shore for the waves to die out on and they'd come crashing up and then quickly retreat. There were some rocks on the north end of the beach that provided some protection, that was where we were hanging out the whole time. Joe and Mel in the safe waters of the tide pool.

Mel started the burying by working on Abi, she looked so cute lying there patiently letting herself be covered.

Highlight - Corey burying all the kids -

Lily got out before the final touches were finished.

Playa Conchal receives 4 out of 5 stars for being really cool for the kids and for not being dirty for the parents - little shells are a lot easier to brush off than sand. Our overall experiences today only gives 4 stars for the rain and the slight extra effort required in getting to the beach.

Flamingo Beach

It rained all day yesterday and boy, did we get an ear-full from the kids. Ethan is the top contender for best complainer for some of these beauties: "I don't want to spend the whole time in Costa Rica just sitting here!!! We aren't doing anything!!! We haven't done anything fun! Is this what it's going to be like the whole time?!?" It hasn't been that bad - swimming's been fun, right? Or the beach on Monday? You forgotten all that? He's probably just mad that we haven't repeated it? (Slight crush on the girls, me thinks. I don't blame him, they were cute).

Below is a photo of Mr. Top Complainer complaining after we first arrived at the beach today about how the salt water was KILLING his toe, wail, cry, scream, wail - he had three small scratches on his big left toe, which said scratches he got from the edge of the stairs in our pool at home. He wanted a bandaid, but I didn't have one. I tried to explain that a bandaid wouldn't keep the salt water out anyway, but he didn't hear/listen... We've got a communication barrier between us.


Well, this morning it looked like a rainy day again, but we decided to try for the beach anyway, and had a GREAT time. We left our home around 9, it was about a 20 mile drive to Flamingo Beach, so about a half hour. We took a shortcut to the beach (unbeknownst to us at the time). We were riding a steep dirt road over the mountain and a steeper and narrow paved road on the way down, and thought we had reached a dead end at some nice homes on the south cove of Flamingo beach. We decided to head back to where we got on the mountain path and get back on the main road to see if that lead to the main beach, but as we came to a fork in the road I couldn't remember which one we came down, and so we took the one that went toward the beach, thinking if it wasn't the right road over the mountain, then it would probably lead us to the main beach. I didn't think all the people in those cove homes which were really nice would tolerate driving over that steep dirt road everytime they were coming or going. Luckily I was right, and we quickly arrived at a beautiful spot on the beach and had it practically all to ourselves.

Joe, always prepared with his nose plugs.

Joe and Ethan spent the first hour and last our of our time there jumping in the waves. A great activity for young boys (not sure what happened to cure Ethan's toe. Glad he was able to switch off his complain mode). Mel was busy making a sand castle, and it made me think of the differences between boys and girls, men and women. Men/boys looking for adventure and excitement, women/girls looking to create something beautiful... (as much as resources will allow - a stick with a dead leaf for her castle's flag...) and settle down and make a home. I have some of that in me still, I know it's there, wanting to make a house somewhere our home. It just keeps getting pushed to the end of the line of things to do. Corey has said that a home is on his list of acceptable purchases, so that's good. :)

I like something Corey said today, that the ocean provides a perfect combination of exhilaration and calmness for families and kids - Parent's and kids will get calm just watching and hearing the waves, and then you can send your kids out to get up close with the waves and burn some of that energy off while they slightly fear for their lives.

Lily of course loved laying in the dirt, here she is poking it with a stick.

She was so funny, I loved it. I'd try to dig a hole and it would fill up from the water that was in the sand, and of course she assumed it was a little tub for her and crawled right in it and just sat there contently, I was laughing. Corey got some video of it on the Flip Camera, but I don't know how to upload that... I'll see if he can later.

Abi, Lily, and I got a slight sunburn on our faces and backs - we haven't been out as much as the boys who are all turning so dark - their tan line from their swimming trunks is become quite the contrast of white skin to dark skin. They are almost Ticos! (Ticos are what Costa Rican's call themselves).

Abi loved throwing dirt

Wesley was busy building mountains

Hyrum, Ethan, and Joe played in the waves with Corey or I looking on - some of those waves seemed to be pretty big.


Melodie built sand castles, Hyrum joined her while Joe and Ethan kept at the waves.


Eth and Joe joined in on the sand after a while and they had a "sand castle contest".

I asked who won, and they don't know. I guess since we left in a hurry when it was raining, there was not time for the judges to choose a winner. Next trip to the beach I guess.

We stayed there till 1:00, at which time we packed up cause Abi was hungry (no surprise, she eats constantly) and thus fussy. Corey took her for a walk...

...then shortly after he got back it started to rain.

And I even documented my self photographically today

See! I was at the beach, too!

I give Flamingo Beach 5 out of 5 stars for small crowds, beautiful surroundings, lots of shore space to dig, good sized waves - not to big or small. Great beach. We'll be sure to come again!

Key Largo

Today we took a drive down to the Florida Keys. 

Corey toyed briefly with the idea of driving all the way out to Key West, which I think would have been fun if it was just Corey and I, but we decided against it, thinking it would be too long for the kids. Once we got to Key Largo, we searched google to find a beach to go have lunch at. Melodie was in my car and found Harry Harris Park which was just another 10 minutes ahead of where we were at. It had a playground. Sounds perfect. So we decided to do that. We pulled up and they indeed did have a playground. And some blue dinosaurs! Peter was happy. 

He sat on the brachiosaurus, then moved over to the triceratops. I sat in the shade and watched him. 

The rest of the kids had gone over to the cove and were having lunch at a table. It was a bit windy and our sandwich bags blew away. I went to fetch them. The kids all went to the water to try out the snorkeling gear we borrowed from Uncle Mark. 

They felt like they were doing something.

I think they saw a few fish, and they collected a few hermit crabs. I watched for any vacant table that was closer to the beach. Soon one became available and I made a few walking trips to move all of our towels and shoes and stuff over. 

Kids came back for round two of oranges and sandwiches. 

Wes decided he wanted to climb a palm tree. We watched a training video by Kap, and Lily went to find palm leaves to make Wes a figure 8 thingy for his feet. Didn't really help much. I guess we need wild hibiscus.

We tried to make it look like he had gotten up high. 

His sisters were laughing at him while also trying to encourage his efforts.

You can do it!

Hey! That is a pretty decent attempt! Way to go Wes!

Wes has a new goal to work on when we get back home. If only there were palm trees in the SL Valley.

Soon it was time to go. Natalie was the last one to leave the beach again. 

We started home, then decided we'd go in and see Far Beach, which was behind us earlier when Mel googled beaches. 

It was at John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park, supposedly the best in the state. We were not impressed and were glad we had spent the day at Harry Harris. They did have a decent restroom to use, but the beach wasn't great. And this sign made it hard to relax.

Yay - "Caution: watch out for alligators" Yikes! I mean we know they are here, but seems like they shouldn't be at a public "Family friendly" beach. The rocks were super bad to walk on too - coral rocks. Ouch.

But we stood around for a few minutes and did see one iguana, and then we headed back to the car. We paid to get into this place, so we'll just pretend we paid for the beach earlier where we got our money's worth, and that this one was free.

It was a nice drive back, I didn't miss the exit like I did yesterday (which added 30 minutes onto my drive home). Back at the room.

The kids all went swimming, except Peter had fallen asleep on the drive and continued his slumber as he collapsed on the floor.

Last night we watched a movie as a family, the Three Amigos, and we continued the tradition tonight by watching Jurassic Park. 

Peter was awake for that and really liked watching the dinosaurs! A pile of beach stuff on the table in front of them. I need to wash all those towels, yay. 

Killer man eating dinosaurs didn't phase Peter a bit. 

They watched the movie, I listened in, but mostly I've been sitting at the computer close to them catching up a bit on the blog. I finished two weeks in February that I was behind on, go me. I still have more memories to catch up on to finish Feb and March, but it feels good to get a few checked off. 

It was fun listening to the movie with them. Corey sat on the floor facing the tv screen with them, but he was also at his computer doing some work. It was a fun day at the beach and we are probably going to stay up too late finishing that movie, but that's ok. We don't have any commitments tomorrow, I think we'll go to Miami beach again. Tomorrow is our last full day here and then we check out on Thursday and drive to Orlando. 

Brazil '07 - Camboriu

Sunday night I made a little paper chain link count down to the flight home - we are all ready to get back to the states, but are enjoying our last weeks here. 21 days left, 3 weeks from tonight we'll be boarding the plane in Sao Paulo for a long 9 hour flight back!

Corey's ankle is doing remarkably well - it is still tender and hurts, but he was able to walk around without the crutches 4 days after hurting it (he tore a ligament while he was playing outside in the dark with the kids) and didn't take the crutches at all to Camboriu. We did a lot of walking, especially the day at the amusement park, but he was a champ as always.

Two weeks ago we went to Sao Paulo for a night before heading south to the state of Santa Catarina. Corey went for a BYU MBA information session thing with his friends - There are two of them who are coming to BYU this fall, so that will be fun to have them as visitors in our country, we are excited to help them get settled in for their 2 years at school. In Sao Paulo we stayed at the temple hostel, which was 3 bunk beds in a room. The kids were so excited when they saw it! I felt like we were at a church camp, but the kids got busy staking out their spots, it was funny - they are so easy to please and all pronounced "this is the best hotel ever!" ! I was able to go to the temple Thursday morning before we flew to Florianopolis.

Our final destination was Balenario Camboriu, a beautiful beautiful city that was about an hour and a half north of Florianopolis. Camboriu was a lot different than Campinas, Rio, or Sao Paulo - it felt like a different counrty. We think it is what Rio must have been like 20 years ago. It was clean, no grafitti, there were hardly any windows with bars, it looked like a great place to take a vacation, and we want to go there again someday with all of you! Okay? It will be fun! It is a resort town that mostly attracts tourist travelers from Argentina. The peak season is summer (which is November through February here) so we got lucky to be hanging out in the off season - we had the whole beach to ourselves! The city is a cove with 3 miles of long beach and Atlantic rainforest. I'm attaching a Google Earth placemark to where our hotel was, and you can get a small idea of the city from this aerial view. We spent Friday in the hotel hot tub and took a quick walk down to the beach.

Saturday we went to Beto Carrero - Brazils version of Disneyland.

It's got an amuzement park, zoo, and shows. 

 

The African Mysteries show was amazing, these guys were jumping and tumbling all over the place and playing with fire and did the limbo under a bar of fire that was one foot off the ground - the limbo bar was resting on top of what looked like two bottles of beer. It was awesome, the kids were really impresses! 

They also had an elephant come out to dance and after that 9 tigers performed tricks. Corey and I were really nervous for the tiger tamer and were glad he wasn't eaten alive. Seems like 9 huge tigers vs. 1 punny human would be a no-contest in favor of the cats. He sure seemed confident there holding his little whipping stick, didn't look like much protection to me. Pretty amazing though. It was fun.

Sunday it took us a while to find the church. The Taxi driver was asking all his friends, strangers on the street, some people didn't know of any Mormon church and insisted there must not be one in their city. We saw some Jehovah's Witnesses on the corner and Corey was sure they would know where the Mormons meet, so the taxi driver pulled over and Corey asked them. They knew and pointed us in the direction but we still couldn't find it for another few minutes of doing circles around the block (lots of one way streets in Camboriu). We finally found it and it was a huge 2 story new chapel, beautiful building, elevator inside, after being worried that the Church hadn't made it into that corner of Brazil yet we were glad to see such an established ward. Seems like more people should know about it. It was a very affluent area and ward, again much different from the ward we're attending in Barao Geraldo in Campinas.

The members very nice and it was great to be at home right away even though we're a continent away from all of you. I love the Church and the gospel. The Spirit was sweet and familiar, I still don't communicate well, but they were so nice. Corey felt bad that people kept asking him if we were members - I had forgotten to pack his razor so he was not freshly shaved. I also forgot to pack clothes for him, so he didn't have a white shirt to wear. Poor Corey had to wear the same dress shirt that he had been wearing for 4 days since the MBA information session in Sao Paulo - Sorry Corey! I forgot to pack a lot of things, but we survived somehow - a family of 7 with everything packed in one big suitcase and two pack packs. Mom- talk about being minimalists, huh! Corey has a friend, Jeff, who is on a little tour of South America with his fiance Kasey - they've gone from Chile to Uruguay to Brazil - they met up with us in Camboriu and the two of them had more luggage than our family, which made me feel embarrassed and impressed by us at the same time. We had some food with them at the beach. Here are our messy kids:

So Monday was a beautiful sunny day and we spent most of it at the beach, the kids had a great time.

I left the video camera in Campinas (upset at myself for that) so we didn't get any video footage, but will try to preserve the memory somehow, cause it was seriously the best beach I've ever been too - seems like the kind of beach that vacation going people search their whole lives for. It was beautiful and the time to just relax there was a gift.

Tuesday we visited the beach again at the most southern end of the cove where some members of the Camboriu branch live, Neidson and Ana Bastos and their daughter Caroline.

Caroline is 10 years old and was so cute with our kids. 

We walked along the beach and Melodie had her work cut out for her trying to go through so many sea shells so quickly as we walked.

She found some good shells though (she calls them "she-shells" which I think is funny, but she thinks that's their appropriate name cause mermaids wear them.) We had dinner at their house which was very nice of them - and makes us feel like members of the Mormon Mafia ~

It was Casey's birthday, so we sang to her (and Ethan)

We could go anywhere in the world and more than likely find members of our church family that would take us in and feed us and do anything for us. Again, isn't the church wonderful?

Wednesday we walked to the northermost part of the cove where there was another beach right next to the rainforest, this beach had big rocks for the kids to all climb on, and the sand was a different texture, more like lots of broken sea shells more than dirt. The kids buried each other and we had more time just enjoying the view. 

Thursday we went for lunch with the Bastos family again, where they made a special sea food lunch for us - we ate shark and shrimp while the kids enjoyed french fries, suckers, and cotton candy - they have a cotton candy making machine. 

Neidson makes a living for himself throwing birthday parties, most of which are huge events for 1 year old children, so their house is a totaly party house. They showed us pictures of the parties they've set up - lots of balloons and carved styrofoam figures of Tarzan or Cinderella. They looked like quite the events, and we've decided that someday we'll probably have to throw real parties for our kids - although hopefully they won't go till 5 in the morning, like they told us a party for an 8 year old girl did. I tell ya, latinos know how to party. (The wedding Corey and I went to 2 years ago in Guatemala - they were dancing till 3 in the morning, we called it quits around 1 a.m., but it didn't seem like anyone else was giving up any time soon). After the nice dinner and party at their "Casa de festa" they took us to the bus station where we barely caught the 4:40 bus on time to leave for Curitiba.

After a 3 hour ride, we arrived at Curitiba and drove to the house of the Familia Araujo. Bro Araujo is an area authority there in Brazil, we stayed at his house, he has 5 grown children, one of whom is Fernando who was the one who arranged the GMAT class that Corey taught. He is going to go to BYU next year with his wife and 2 kids. Corey says he'll definitely be accepted, he's really sharp, he served a mission in Provo, but his wife is nervous as she doesn't speak English. I know how she feels. Corey's enjoyed teaching the GMAT. There are atleast 6 people from his classes that are going to be at BYU this fall, of the ones he knows about there are 3 from Brazil and 3 from the Argentina. I think he's doing a great job waving the banner of BYU.

Well, after Curitiba, we flew back to Campinas where Fabio and family met us again (they were the ones who watched the kids when Corey and I went to Rio). They are great, we owe them big time and hopefully will have lots of opportunities to return the favor when they come to Utah this fall. So back in Campinas life is like before with the usual glitches in the system: Monday night the water quit for some reason, so we couldn't wash dishes or flush the toilets. Luckily it rained all day Tuesday, so we caught water in pots, pans, and buckets and were able to flush toilets, yay!

 No, we didn't wash dishes with that - we just ate off dirty dishes. Sueli sent someone over and the water was working by Tuesday night, so it was just 24 hours.

We are also out of gas to the stove. You order it in these 10 gallon gas "bolon" containers - we've had to fill up once while we were here already, but this time we weren't able to explain the address well enough I guess cause they never came. We might try a different company or call a friend to explain better. But as for now we are starting our 3rd day without a stove. But I'm grateful for the people in our ward who let us borrow their microwave! So today I did nuke some eggs, but mostly we're on bread and jelly right now. Did you know that they don't sell peanut butter here in Brazil? Maybe there is a specialty store somewhere that has some, but none of the regular grocery stores, I thought that was really weird, Peanut Butter, like that's one of the family food basics. So we're looking forward to coming home and to seeing all of you - looking forward to family gatherings, phone calls, for that matter even having a telephone land line, wireless internet, Peanut Butter, Malt O Meal cereal - o yeah, oatmeal, Great Harvest whole wheat bread, milk in a gallon container (they sell it in cardboard boxes here, about 1 liter), Costco, hobbies (scrapbooking!), walmart, the list could go on... The kids are looking forward to visits with Grandma and Grandpa Wride and Grandma and Grandpa Hibbert, excited to have neighbor kids to play with, they are excited to have their toys again, especially Legos and plug and play TV video games, visits with cousins (they are excited to meet your family dog, Jersh), wrestling with Uncle Neil, and of course Primary at church in English. Every Sunday when they come into Sacrament meeting (which is last) we ask them "How was Primary" and they will say "Good, but we couldn't understand anything, it was all in Portuguese!" - it's especially funny to hear Ethan say that, he seems so disappointed that none of them have learned English yet.

We love you all and love to hear from you, we'll write again soon. Love you!!