Live with Love and Laughter: Honeymoon

We went to Costa Rica on our honeymoon and had an amazing time!! We decided to use a honeymoon registry, because we already have a lot of stuff for our home, and more importantly because we love travel! So THANK YOU to all of our family and friends who contributed to our honeymoon, we had a wonderful time!

    While in Costa Rica we stayed at the Westin Playa Conchal, it's a beautiful resort with a wonderful staff, a great golf course, spacious beach, and plenty of pools. The day we arrived we explored the resort and took a walk on the beach to watch the sunset. Tuesday morning we slept in and got breakfast then played golf. The course gave some amazing views of the pacific, we had so much fun! After golf we and further explored the huge resort and discovered we could book a trip to Nicaragua, we jumped on the opportunity. Wednesday we went into Tamarindo, a nearby surfing/fishing town, and took surfing lessons. I had never surfed before, and was a bit nervous. We went to Witches Rock, because Charles had spent a week there two years earlier and loved it. My instructor was awesome and I was able to get up and ride several waves (proof below). Wednesday evening we had dinner at one of the resorts many restaurants, yum!

    Nicaragua! Thursday we woke up at 4:30 a.m. to meet our tour bus in the lobby by 5:00 a.m. to head to Nicaragua, what an adventure. We saw so much of the countryside and got some great stories out of the trip! We experienced border crossing in Central America (a disastrous affair where 50 or so 18 wheelers sometimes sit for 2-3 days before being allowed to cross). We took a boat ride on Lake Nicaragua where we saw the homes and hotels that are built on the 365 islands formed by volcanoes within the lake. We had lunch in an old colonial hotel and walked through the colonial city of Granada. Then we visited an active volcano and went to Santa Catarina, a small town on the edge of a lake in a cratered volcano. After a long and rather treacherous bus ride, dodging cattle in the road and road blocks set up to catch illegal immigrants, we finally made it back to the resort for a ~~late~~ very late dinner. We were pretty exhausted after that trip and I was feeling a little under the weather (I think I swallowed a bit too much ocean water while surfing), so we decided we needed to cancel our zip lining trip set for the next morning at 7:00 a.m.

    I was pretty disappointed that we cancelled the trip, but I wasn't feeling very well, and was quite content to relax by the pool. Saturday we scheduled our much anticipated massages at the hotel spa - amazing. The spa was beautiful and quiet and the massage was one of the best I've ever had. After our treatments we were allowed to hang out at the spa for the afternoon, so we took advantage and soaked in the hot tub and used the saunas. I loved it! We spent the rest of our honeymoon just hanging out and enjoying Costa Rica.

Here are some of our favorite photos from our trip.