Day 6 ... Tamorindo and ocean voyage

kids hunting shells as seen from our balcony

Today is the Weiss grandparents last full day so we thought an easy morning and a fun boat ride in the afternoon.  We hung out at the house in the morning, at low tide the kids went out to the beach to hunt for shells.

Molly with her cocktail

We started the trek to "nearby" Tamorindo.  I think it was about 15-20k away and it took about 40 minutes on dirt roads to get there!  Also, the GPS has no idea how to navigate the roads around here so we had to stop listening to her ... Tamorindo appeared to be something like the Panama City of Costa Rica (not as many high rise hotels but give it time).  Tons of souvenir shops and bars.  Still it wasn't bad ... La Fortuna (where the volcano was) was also a touristy town and kind of seemed misplaced in the beautiful mountains (I had no desire to shop or explore the town) ... Tamorindo wasn't like that, it was like any other beach town with a million shops selling sarongs and bracelets and ice cream and a pretty beach alongside.  We took a little motorboat out to a catamaran for the sunset cruise.  It was fun, a little rainy but not so much that you minded being without an umbrella since you were getting a little wet from the ocean spray anyway.  Molly made friends with a little girl whose dad worked on the boat.  She spoke English as well as we do.  After about an hour of sailing along the coast we stopped for a swim break.  They had snorkel equipment and we were able to jump off the boat and swim to a snorkeling area.  Its acknowledged that snorkeling isn't the best on the pacific side of costa rica but we were able to see some fish and it was a nice first snorkel for the kids who all did great with their masks and equipment.  Molly and Also even swam without flippers which made for a long swim back to the boat I am sure but they didn't complain.  After the swim, it was snack time and a return to shore.  We saw the sunset but it was pretty cloudy and then hopped the first motorboat shuttle to shore (and got soaked by some sneaky waves on the way!).  The drive home was fun(?) in the dark on the dirt roads but no incidents ...

the little boat that took us to a bigger boat

Alex relaxing

Drew diving off the boat - i'd give that a 4.5

Andy with the blue noodle near center, drew with the orange next to him, alex to the right with neon snorkel gear and me above him with a yellow noodle