Not Rice and Beans

Since the terremoto last Thursday things have, thankfully, been a lot quieter here. We have still experienced the odd temblor but nothing too bad. This last week has seen us consume some good food which has proven to be a nice change from the rice & beans, or omelettes that we seem to have been living on a lot (but not all) of the time.

On Friday we took the bus down to the neighbouring city of Alajuela, primarily to check out that the bus went past the airport and the location of where we are hiring a car for next week's visit of Zoë's parents. We took advantage of our trip to Alajuela to have lunch in a fine Tex-Mex eatery that we discovered on our previous trip here. It is called Jalapeños and although it is small and looks more like a fast-food location than a restaurant, the quality of the food is excellent. Zoë had a Quesadilla (to help satisfy the withdrawal symptoms of lack of cheese she has been having since arriving in Costa Rica - cheese here is VERY expensive compared to the UK) and Colin tried a Chalupa for the first time.

On Sunday we went down to the centre of Heredia to see if we could find a bar/restaurant that might show the Steelers playoff game (to help satisfy the withdrawal symptoms of the lack of American football Colin has been having since arriving in Costa Rica). We ended up in a nice place near the Palacio de los Deportes which did have a TV showing sports, but unfortunately at this time it was showing the Man Utd Chelsea game and not NFL (one of the few times Colin was sad to see football on the telly). The bar/restaurant was called "El Cholo" and the owner is obviously a big FC Barcelona fan as there were flags and pictures of players and "El Camp Nou" stadium all over the walls. Despite the lack of any American football we stayed to have something to eat and drink. We went for a Plato Especial which was a fine mixture of different Spanish style tapas and they were delicious (and a lot cheaper than you would pay in La Tasca in the UK).

On Monday we met with our two Spanish teachers, Wes and Rafa, to have dinner with them and their friend Fred. Fred is originally from Oregon in the U.S. but had studied at the University of Aberdeen for a year in the 1980s. Fred had (mostly) fond memories of his time in Aberdeen and remembered various drinking establishments, some of which are still in existence. Less fondly remembered was the biting wind and freezing cold days of winter. He still has a penchant for the group Runrig developed in his time at Aberdeen. Wes cooked a delicious two course meal for us - Pad Thai with Pork (originally it was to be with chicken, but the chicken was deemed off :-) ) followed by arroz con leche (yummm).

On Tuesday we had.... omelette.