Costa Rica Mission & Travel Tips

Through Moody Methodist Church I got to travel with a great group to San Jose, Costa Rica. We traveled in June (2013) and the weather was perfect. We stayed in the John Wesley House in Tibas and took a bus to Methodist Children's Home (Hogar Metodista) in Coronado. The place we stayed at was walking distance to the national soccer stadium and a McDonalds. There are stray dogs everywhere.

We did construction on the children's home, taking an hour break for the daily rain that rolls through. We taught Vacation Bible School to some of the kids and played games with them. We also got to see where the older kids went to school. This children's home is truly amazing. There are home parents split into the different children's homes. There's a community area, a playground & soccer field, a chapel, a pond, and fruit trees/garden.

Constructing a children's home.

The finished homes.

We took a van to the market and restaurants. The market had tons of great souvenirs. And the food is SO good. I made this food repeatedly when I got back home and was excited to find Chayote in our grocery stores. Also try the Cas fruit/juice while you're there. The coffee is fantastic as well. We did a tour at a sugar cane place where we got to make rum & taste it. We also toured how the jewelry is made. There are many different types of wood grown here, it's pretty neat to see.

How coffee is made.

Costa Rican food. Yum yum yum.

Turning sugar cane into rum & got to taste it.

The landscape is absolutely beautiful. The weather is great too. Just when you think it's getting too hot, a rain comes through bringing a cool breeze.

The only sloth we saw up close was at the La Fortuna.

We stayed in La Fortuna for our excursions. I don't quite remember where we stayed, but looking at the photos I think it was Lost Iguana Resort. There is an awesome view of the Arenal Volcano, which sadly was never open to look at while we were there. If you stay here and want a cloud free volcano photo you have to get up early, otherwise a little cloud cap will cover the top. There is a resident sloth on site, the only one we saw up close the whole trip.

Arenal Volcano.

We went white water rafting on Balsa River. On the way to the rafts you journey a bit, but keep your eyes peeled, we saw poison dart frogs. The rafting itself was fun, it's a workout, switch sides of the raft half way through to even out your body. At the half way point they feed you fruit and make sure you're hydrated. We didn't see many animals along the river, but it was still nice. They take photos of you the whole time and it's really cheap to get a whole CD plus professional photos of Costa Rica included.

White water rafting.

We also went ziplining through the Monteverde Cloud Forest/rain forest, and again didn't see many animals except for some macaws.

Ziplining.

There is so much to do in Costa Rica. It is a vast country made of many landscapes. We never made it to the beach but I've heard it's lovely there as well. Hopefully if you visit you will see more animals than we did.

If you have any questions or want more information send me an email :)

How to help:

If you would like to help by funding Hogar Metodista in their mission click here.