Road Trip to Playa Hermosa, Jacó, Costa Rica - Day 2

We highly recommend the hotel we are staying in - Terraza del Pacifico Hotel Resort - right on Playa Hermosa, just south of Jacó. Our off season rate is excellent, the beach is almost deserted, restaurant not crowded and today I had the pool all to myself. Two pairs of scarlet macaws flew by. It seems, for today at least, we are the only ones here other then a group of surfers. It could be much busier on the weekend when people who work during the week take off for the weekend. Off season (also called green season) is a good time for hotels to catch up on repairs and this hotel is doing some sprucing up, painting of buildings, some dead tree removal, and so on. But none of it affects our stay. Expats know this is a good time to travel throughout Costa Rica.

Breakfast is included and it’s not some skimpy buffet. Brought to our table unasked was coffee, a selection of fresh fruit and orange juice. Then we were handed menus with a large number of items to choose from. The most expensive choice was $9.00 USD but we received no bill at the end of our meal.

My choice, a ham and cheese omelette. I stole some gallo pinto and a piece of queso fresco from Lance. 

Then we decided to go for a drive and headed south to Quepos and Manuel Antonio  This is a very nice drive on a good highway with tantalizing views of the Pacific Ocean popping up now and again. One thing that amazed me were the kilometres and kilometres and hectares and hectares of palm tree plantations. This so intrigued me that I did some research and found out from the Tico Times that these palm trees are used for making palm oil.

We turned around at the Manuel Antonio Park and headed back to our hotel. This is as far south as we have been in Costa Rica. Manuel Antonio is a place we think we would like to stay at for a few days. 

The surfers I mentioned earlier were out catching waves early this morning and I took quite a bit of video footage of them which I’ll post soon. They are amazing - like human seals. So comfortable in the water and strong swimmers.

Dinner last night was very good - large portions. Here’s what I ordered - shrimp and a white fish in a tomato sauce, stacked vegetables and two really good potatoes with cheese.

And, oh yes, drinks! A green tea martini for me and a concoction for Lance - the name of which escapes us now!