After meeting the Riders at San Jose Airport we headed to a local hotel to literally get 40 winks, before a 6am start to make our taxi – ferry – taxi ride to Santa Teresa. Jamie flew in from Canada and was just 2.5 hours delayed, Angela flew from London a few days before and so had already acclimatized but Lee had travelled from the Shetland Isles, Scotland and set off on Wednesday afternoon to get a 17 hour ferry to Aberdeen, followed by a flight to Heathrow, a flight to Madrid and finally Costa Rica, so this Sunday morning final leg of the journey was exciting times!
We arrived at Don Jon’s, the super chilled surf lodge, which has a hammock for each guest, literally. People are subtly swinging everywhere. The breakfast Burittos are incredible, there is free wifi so we can keep you all updated with this blog without any excuses. After a tour of the town aka a 1km long dirt road/ beach, we eased into the Costa Rican way of life by heading to a beach BBQ and Reggae night and watched the sunset, whilst enjoying the days catch of Tuna and Shrimp.
Needless to say an early night was welcomed by all and in the morning, after a pre-surf breakfast Burrito, we met Elijah, our surf coach for the next six weeks. Elijah is a local kid who rips in the water and is an extremely talented surf coach with the perfect balance between patience and persistence, pushing everyone further than they could ever have hoped. Lee did really well, catching her own waves with perfect form and almost standing up on the first lesson. Jamie is a wakesurf instructor back home in Canada so was like a duck to water and Ange is fearless approach saw her catch some of the biggest waves of the day!
The beach itself is really long, at least 2 miles, with peaks scattered all the way, so I was stoked to get a sneaky surf in after the lesson.
Jasmine (the one taking the sick shots you’re going to be seeing the next two months), Lee, Jamie, Ange, Joanna, Elijah and I are currently chilling out going through the photos of this morning and yesterday’s surf, before we head off for our first Surf specific Yoga session. It’s 8.40am, 27 degrees and we’ve surfed and had breakfast… Pura Vida.
