Sunday, September 14, 2008
Dies
Thursday, August 21, 2008
Nueve
We stayed this time at Casa Blanca - a place we absolutely do NOT recommend. Room was very small, bed insanely uncomfortable. But nonetheless, it was a place to stowe our stuff and sleep, best we could, for our stay. And the price was quite low. For saving money, is a pretty good place!
For this trip, Rob was out of the country for most of our stay, so we were fundementally on our own. But we made do rather well. Early on we met with Pietro to go through electrical plans to let them finish the design. On this trip we managed to convert a lot of the appearances of our plan to reality - with a better scale that the original artists rendition took liberties with.
We checked out the beginnings of construction for Rob/Kent casita. And we rechecked out property, waterfall, etc. Met a bit with Gerardo and all in all, got ourselves more familiar with the area. We ventured into stores in Parrita, checked out appliances available there, and some of the Ferriterias in town as well.
We took a good assessment of our new driveway, and determined changes we felt would be important.
Our first night at Casa Blanca, we had taken a quick run up to Alazan, but found all the guys coming DOWN the mountain and a light rain starting. We later learned that there are places on the roadway that it is best to NOT be on while it is raining... Anyway, we went ahead and turned around and decided to settle into our room, and relax a bit. By then the rain had picked up a bit - to an INSANE downpour! We figured we would wait a bit and it would pass, but two hours later it had NOT passed. Another hour after that it still had not passed. So we decided to walk to the nice second floor restaurant next door (Agua Azul - wonderful food!). Mind you we were on a mountainside. But the water was still about 3 inches deep as we walked to Agua Azul. The intensity of the rain caused a mist on all the outer tables of this open air restaurant. So all the customers were in the center tables only. We enjoyed a great dinner, relaxed a bit for the rain to let up, but alas, it didn't. So back through the 3" rain (on a slope) to our room. On the plus side, the Tucson was clean by the time the rain was over.
During this trip we had hoped to connect with our friend Mike Conley. Close, but never quite happened. We did drive the 'bone cruncher' highway southeast to Dominical through some great country and some trecherous bridges. But it was a nice trip and gave us a chance to see another developing community, and more of the coast.
After just a few days on the coast, we headed back to San Jose, another night with Steve and Rita, and back home in time for ThanksGiving.
To be continued....
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Ocho
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Siete....
In early June of 2007 Jim and Dick traveled back to Costa Rica to meet with Rob and to determine, we hoped, where we would place the roadway getting from the existing road to each of our lots (Rob, Calle, D&J and Fred). We did manage to enjoy some of the Costa Rican sea shore and you can tell from this photo, we suffered...
It was during this trip we met Rob's handsome brother Fred. We trudged through the jungle, machette's in hand figuring out a path. We agreed upon a building site for our house. Rob did same conceptually for his and his sisters house so that we could consider the roadway. We made some marks, and came up with what we thought was a path. It was a successful trip!
With our potential building pad identified, we took some pictures, made some notations, and headed back to Wisconsin to motorcycle and enjoy the short northern Summer.
July took Jim back. Gerardo and crew had cleared some brush, and we once again reconsidered the roadway. We found that our original thinking was spot on. The bad news is that it encroached on Kent and Rob's lot more than any of us would have liked, but we had to follow the contour the mountain gave us. It was on this trip Jim met Rob's mate Kent for the first time. In this picture the fellow in the blue shirt is Kent. The space in front of him is our big house intended building site. At the time, we did not have a concept of building a smaller casa, much less building one first. In this picture, if you went just beyond the trees in the distance, you would be in the waterfall. So the big house was intended to be as close as possible to that.
Also during this trip, Jim hired Pietro Stagno (architect) to create a house plan for us. Rob and Kent had hired him for their casa, and Rob's sister Calle (and John) were planning same for their casa. All in all a rather heady trip! All of this set the stage for building - and the roadway was not even in yet to our lots!!! In the end, we do have a nice house plan from Pietro, but the cost to build it now exceeded significantly our ability to build it.
As we review the photo's from between early June to early July, it is obvious how much cloudier it is in Costa Rica in July. And that was certainly the case! I should mention that it was in the time between the June and July trips that we formally entered our reservation and put our deposit on lot #14. Because of that, we had our first glimmer of "owning" land in Costa Rica - and began to feel that connection of owning in a foreign country and being part of the larger world beyond the USA. It is a good feeling!
From this point forward, we were definitely on a path to our project.
Thank you for reading this far!
to be continued....
Sunday, June 22, 2008
In the beginning Part Sies
After so many sunny, warm days - we seriously considered extending our stay, and indeed, we could if we just paid a ransom to the airline and Orbitz. We decided returning as planned made the most sense. Afterall, it seemed as though we were destined to return anyway - so why not?
We bid farewell to our other fellow guests at La Plantacion, and packed up to head out the next morning. So began some discussions of how we would pull this off - and read up on details we needed to know. We landed in Milwaukee late that night. While it was clear that there was a decent snowfall, our neighbor Jason had cleared our driveway (and his; with our snowthrower). We were grateful for that.
We returned to work; and began to determine what we wanted on Lot 14 - and set about to forming an LLC to hold it all. We wrote Rob after returning home to confirm that it was our plan to buy that lot, and as soon as reservation agreements could be signed, we would...
Elvira Orly was a great attorney recommended to us, and it was through her we set up our LLC. Dick, in conversing with a coworker - came home one night with the idea of "Torrente de Agua" and we both jumped on the name. It described Lot 14 perfectly. That became the name of our LLC, and would become the name of all associated with our lot.
Of course, we had to grapple with the concept of having a home in another country. But it became our intention to build our building(s), and along with our neighbors, rent them to vacationers to Costa Rica. We felt that a place away from the crowds, but not so far that they were difficult to reach - was a potential experience folks visiting that beautiful country would enjoy.
And over those first weeks back in Wisconsin, we adapted to the notion of this purchase, and changed our personal identities to people with property in other parts of the world. Both of us had often thought that when we went on vacations... But in past travels never found anything so specific as a piece of real estate that was, at the time, undeveloped, and where between us and our neighbors we could be the pioneers for a part of a country. And indeed, in the coming posts you'll see that it will be exactly that.
So that's tonights post everyone...
to be continued....
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
"In the beginning... Part Cinco
While Rob and Herolf went off to discuss Herolf's potential interest in Lot 15, Dick and Jim stepped away - walked back to lot 14 and continued to ponder it. The price was very attractive - one of the least expensive lots. Yet it still had a view of the Pacific, and that lovely waterfall that runs about 9 months per year. Determining that it was a viable option - at a price that we didn't think could possibly remain as the property continued to develop - we decided to go for it and gave Rob our verbal commitment to purchase Lot 14.
Afterwards we drove out to the beach. This photo is of the beach that day. As you can see, not at all crowded unlike Hermosa beach just a few more kilometers towards Jaco. We've since learned that not much further towards Quepos is a great place to rent horses and ride on the beach. But in this stretch, really just a great place to enjoy the sun and sea! You can see Dick out there in the distance checking out the broad beach (low tide). But this is the sort of beach that is easy to get used to. Behind me as I snapped this picture is a long (kilometers long) triple row of palm trees spaced as natural shaded picnic areas. Definitely a great place to read a good book!
When we left just a couple days later (and immediately after a big Milwaukee blizzard had hit) Jim snapped this photo while flying back to San Jose - thinking this was the land. And indeed, it is not too far. But sadly, this is NOT the view from above. Still I included it since it is close enough to give the idea of Alazan. If you look at the first post of the casita blog series from early May, you'll see a great aerial view!
Meanwhile, it was at this point, February 24th of 2007 that Dick and Jim decided to pursue this venture. Little did we know this was just the TIP of the adventure!
To be continued....
Thursday, June 12, 2008
In the beginning, Part quattro
We then walked up to lot 10 - high point in that part of the property, and down from there lot 11 and 12 (see Lot 12 pic at beginning of blog). Lot 12 has a fantastic view of the river valley, Manuel Antonio, and the ocean. Really a beautiful spot. Lot 13, just below it, shared similar views.