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When I mention to people I meet I live in Tamarindo, Costa Rica, the typical response I receive falls someplace between “I want your life” and “What the heck do you do all day?” Just like a day in your life, my time varies depending on projects, social events, whether guests are visiting, etc.
Avellanas (which means hazelnut in Spanish) is a virtual paradise tucked away 30-minutes south of the bustle of Tamarindo, on the Nicoya Peninsula. Ask any surfer in the province of Guanacaste if they know of Playa Avellanas and you will get a resounding, “Por supuesto” (of course). But ask the multitude of tourists in the region and you might see mostly head scratches...
Back in 2011, Sally Rice’s life was much different from today. Then, she was 55 years old, single, and living a chaotic lifestyle in Los Angeles. She’d spent 23 years as a costume designer in the movie industry, which sounds glamorous, but as she says, “Working 17 to 20 hours is stressful, and leaves little time for anything else”...
Playa Negra’s town (officially the pueblo of Los Pargos—but hardly anyone calls it that) on Costa Rica’s northwest Pacific coast is not typically on most people’s radar when they make plans to explore Costa Rica. It barely shows up as a dot on a map, and the journey along rutted dirt roads keeps away some of the less ambitious travelers...
In 2008, after many years of exploring options to fit our active lifestyle overseas, my husband, Steve, and I made the final decision to move to Costa Rica. We had plans to put our equity-heavy home in Austin, Texas on the market...
Nestled on the Southern Pacific coast of Costa Rica exists an idyllic slice of paradise called the Costa Ballena. Consisting of a 22-mile stretch of coastline, this part of the country is made up of three major towns: Dominical to the north, Ojochal to the south, and Uvita in the middle...
If I told you there is a country with a Pacific coastline of approximately just 631 miles (1,016 kilometers), yet possessing over 150 named beaches and a multitude of unofficial others, would you believe it?
It is ironic how the universe often comes full circle. When I first subscribed to International Living in the early 1990s, I never dreamed I would actually have the opportunity to write for them as a contributor several decades later...