December 31st, 2004

Is Canada ever a cold and snowy country!!!

We hope everyone had a great Christmas and will have a great New Year.

Well Costa Rica has come and gone. The trip was excellent with only a few minor incidents. The trip down to Costa Rica was very long. We left the house at 6 in the morning to catch a 10:30 flight. We didn't get to Costa Rica until 6:00 local time and still had a 2 hour plus bus ride to the resort. We finally got there about 8:45. Unfortunately they only serve supper until 9:30, so after we checked in and found our room we had about 10 minutes to eat.

The next day in the light we realized how beautiful the resort really is. The one pool was perfect for Ryley - he could walk in and out and most of the way across the pool. At the deepest point it was probably only 3 feet deep. The other pool had a swim-up bar, a couple of bridges, a volleyball net, basketball nets and water polo nets. It was really beautiful with lots of green areas and nice trees to sit under. There was another adult only pool that we didn't even get close to. The beach was really nice, but the water was a little rough for Ryley.

There were 3 restaurants and a snack bar. We managed to leave Ryley with Grandma 2 nights and went to the Italian restaurant for some really good food. The rest of the food was authentic Costa Rican, so it was a little different to eat, but we didn't starve, so it couldn't have been that bad.

Ryley got a bunch of fever blisters or cold sores on his chin, so he was not in the best mood for a couple of days. We called the doctor since we didn't know what it was. Eighty dollars US later and a trip into Puntarenas to get some medication we found out we had nothing to worry about.

Ron and his mother went on a jungle cruise and got to watch them feed the crocodiles by actually hoping in the water and handling the chicken to the croc. There were also lots of bird, iguanas and other creatures.

Ryley saw a few lizards and iguanas walking around the resort, so every time we walked by an area he had seen one we had to go out into the grass and take our time looking for the reptiles. Ryley seemed to really like the creatures and wanted to see how close he could get. They iguanas were definitely not afraid of people as they would walk under the beach chairs as we sat in them.

We had a 60 degree temperature change from Costa Rica to Calgary the next morning. It was about 30 degrees above 0 when we left and the next morning in Calgary in was -21 without the wind chill, and about -31 with the wind chill. Why do we live in this country again?

The day we got home we went and picked up our new puppy, Makeba. She is a black lab and is just beautiful. She is a bit of a handful, but you can tell she really loves Ryley. Stacey is having some issues getting used to having a puppy in the house, but it will all work out in the end.

I will include some of the Costa Rica pictures, but check the web site shortly for all of them.

Hope everyone has a Happy New Year!!!

Love Ron, Jennifer & Ryley

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