Manuel Antonio

Wednesday morning we wisked our visitors away on another car ride (about 2 1/2 hrs) to Manuel Antonio and stayed in a beautiful place called hotel Mariposa.
Seriously the most beautiful view I've ever seen. They served us a delicious breakfast every morning and provided us with pina colodas while swimming in the infinity pool!
We hung out on the beach and went on an awesome zipline tour! There were 10 lines, one was the 3rd longest in the world and another one was one of the fastest. We were going between 55-60 mph!
The kids did really well and loved it. They got to go by themselves on all except the 2 mentioned above. It was so hot! We had lots of stairs to climb and sweated like crazy. My 64 yr old mother did wonderful even with a cold. I think she must have sweated it out because the next day she was all better!

After ziplining we spent some much needed R&R at the pool then headed to a dinner where we got caught in a crazy rainstorm... which meant we needed hot chocolate and dessert back at the hotel restaurant.

The next day we attempted a snorkeling excursion based off of what the concierge at the hotel told us. We could have taken an expensive boat tour, but decided to drive to location instead and get our own gear. We got to the beach and rented a 2 person kayak plus snorkel gear for Mom and Natalie. Madison and Dylan rode in the boat with the women and Grayson and I swam next to it. They paddled out of the bay to the spot where the snorkeling was supposed to be. The destination turned out to be farther than they expected, so I thought I would jump in the boat to offer my assistance with paddling. Bad Idea. 6 people in a 2 person kayak... Grayson got on the back okay, but when I attempted to get in I capsized the boat. Grandma and Dylan were wearing life jackets, but not crrrazy Aunt Natalie (who it turns out can only doggy paddle very poorly-how did we grow up in the same household?) had a panic attack and lost her snorkel mask and Grandma lost a flipper. Needless to say, we flipped the boat back over and tried to get the old women back in. Oooooh Suzy... she just couldn't do it. Not with all the pushing and pulling we could offer. In the end, she hung on to the back of the boat and we headed back to the beach.
After the unsuccessful attempt we went to a beach with waves! We spent the rest of the day on a beautiful but crowded beach near Manuel Antonio Park and surfed and shopped and relaxed the day away. No Gracias was a frequent pharase

                                             We saw a sloth just hanging out in the wild.

Saturday we woke up early to drive home. On the way we stopped at our favorite beach- Esterillos and played till we were burnt to a crisp, then we went to Los Suenos near Jaco and had some lunch.
We had a great time together! Hope it won't be too long before we can do it again!