Medical Care in Costa Rica

We recently signed up for MediSmart, a prepaid discount medical plan. At a low yearly cost of $173 USD for the both of us, we have access to quality private health care. Specialists, x-rays, lab work, hospital rooms and operating room times offer us 40% to 80% savings on medical services. There are no exclusions for age or pre-existing conditions.

My ID card - note the mixed up names!

We also belong to Costa Rica’s socialized medical system, known as Caja (which I’ve discussed in earlier posts). We use it regularly. However, there are times when we want to see a specialist without having to wait. Last week, we went to our first appointment with MediSmart. I had made the appointment on line. The web site has an English version so very easy to navigate. I indicated which specialty I wanted and up popped a list of the appropriate doctors with their bios and photos. You can indicate which time of day you want your appointment for, if you want to see a particular doctor and if you want Spanish or English speaking. The next day I received an email with a selected doctor’s name, the date of the appointment and two appointment times I could select from. I just had to select the time I wanted and send back an email.

We took the bus to the Coca Cola bus terminal in San José, planning to take a taxi from there to Hospital Metropolitano, where MediSmart is located. It was pouring rain when we got off the bus and we did not have an umbrella. We were right in front of the Mercado Central, San José’s largest indoor market, established in 1880. We were going to go in and look for umbrellas when, lo and behold, our Water Guy appeared. He’s the fellow that has sodas, water, and snacks for sale at the bus station. He will also make sure you get on the correct bus, load your purchases into the bus cargo bay, and find you a good seat on the bus. He speaks Spanish, English and (I think) French.

We told him we needed an umbrella and he said, “Follow me”. Into the market we went, and he took us to a stall where we purchased an excellent quality paraguas. Then off we went to Hospital Metropolitano. My doctor was on the third floor and I didn’t have to wait long to see him. Total cost for a consultation with a specialist, a bit of minor surgery and lab work was 90,000 colones, about $180 USD. He will also be emailing me the lab work results. If anything further needs to be done, I can take his paperwork to my Caja doctor and have it done through Caja or go back to the MediSmart doctor.

For us, we like having two medical care options. MediSmart is worth looking into.

They’re Here!

And we’ve been expecting them! Army ants - they have been working their way from house to house and we were next on their list. I first noticed them Sunday morning while I was outside. My feet and lower legs started burning. I looked down and there were ants everywhere and they were biting me. The bites really sting and two days later I can still feel the bites.

Army ants are called “cleaner ants” here because if they get into a house, they will clean every surface of dead or live insects, dirt, food crumbs, etc., and then leave. Your house will be spotless! You may as well go out for several hours because they will leave when good and ready. We managed to keep them out of our house this time and they headed towards our gate and the road.

Here is a short video I made of them swarming over our hedge and laneway:

Tropical Storm Nate, Costa Rica - October 2017

On Wednesday, October 4, 2017, Costa Rica was slammed by tropical storm Nate. At our house, we experienced strong winds and rain, rain and more rain overnight and all of Friday. Fortunately, we only experienced some water ingress into our house and flooded areas and mud outside. Water was surging down the road and the drainage ditches. It sounded like we lived next to a river. Our electricity and internet stayed on. Much of the rest of the country fared much worse. By Saturday, the storm had headed north and the sun came out.

Rivers were overflowing banks; houses were destroyed and families uprooted; schools were closed; roads and bridges were damaged and destroyed; farms and plantations are under water; roads were closed and many areas were/still are without electricity.

At our property, the total rainfall for the first seven days of October, 2017, was more than the rainfall in all of October of last year:

        First seven days of October 2017 = 13.29”/33.76cm. 

        All of October 2016 = 12.83”/32.59cm.

October is the rainiest month on the Pacific side and the driest month on the Caribbean side.

On October 6, the online newspaper AM Costa Rica reported at least six dead, 377,000 people without water, and 7,000 in emergency shelters. Deaths were attributed to landslides, falling trees and car accidents.

Lance prepared this chart:

Here are a few pictures taken around our house:

Blocking the back door to keep water out - sort of works!

Flooding at the front.

Lance reading the rain gauge.

Mud, mud, mud.

I also made a short video on Saturday showing the drainage ditches outside our property. You can see why they are built so deep. That is our Cat snooping around.

Life’s Little Challenges .... Stupid Parrot

Today Lance saw a small bird fall down into our yard from somewhere and our cat did also. The cat started stalking the bird. Lance said, “it’s a parrot.” This is unusual ... flocks of small green parrots fly over our house all the time but they never stop in our yard and they don’t have blue colours on them.

Grabbed Cat and put him in the house. The pretty green/blue parrot was okay, busily running up and down bushes eating whatever parrots eat on bushes. I think his wings may have been clipped because he could fly very short distances but not gain any altitude. This made us think he was someone’s pet. Plus, he wasn’t very nervous and was not with a flock.

The bird ended up across our fence on our neighbour’s property. We went next door to see if we could help the little parrot but he was nowhere to be seen. 

Walking back to our house .... with all the rain we have had recently, our short laneway was very slippery. Wearing flip flops, I did a flip flop and took a fall. Net result: one bloody knee, one pair of pants with hole and a muddy shirt ... both going in the garbage. 

One Aleve tablet .... I should be fine!

Mexican Fiesta in Costa Rica, September 15, 2017

The Atenas Mens Club organized a Mexican fiesta outing on Friday, September 15, 2017. This is also the day that Costa Rica celebrates Independence Day. We boarded our Blue Bird bus in Atenas for the drive to the fiesta. Does anyone remember taking a Blue Bird bus to school? 

The fiesta was held at Rancho Montecito, a 260 acre working cattle ranch not too far away from our town of Atenas. The fiesta had another purpose - to celebrate Debbie's birthday, the owner of this ranch.

Somebody should interview Debbie and write an article about her, because she is amazing. She bought the huge property with nothing on it and not knowing anything about farming, ranching, cattle, fruit trees, etc., and has turned all this land into a sustainable enterprise. It's not flat land, it's mountainous. Her cattle are a cross between the Nelore breed (I hope I have that right) and Brahmas. Before arriving at the ranch house, Debbie jumped on the bus with us and explained what we were seeing as we drove along.

Tables were set up under a tent, just outside the rancho (open air dining hall) where the food was being prepared. Before long, three pairs of young dancers performed for us. This was followed by trick ropers and a mariachi band.

During this entertainment, we enjoyed excellent Mexican food served at our tables. Dessert was a tasty custard, plus the birthday cake. I also tried a Mexican tamale, which was completely different from the Costa Rican tamales. The Mexican ones are wrapped in corn husks while ours are wrapped in banana leaves and the fillings are totally different.

We had a wonderful time. Debbie is a fantastic organizer. She’s also a patron of my art work and one of my cattle paintings hangs on a wall in her ranch house.

If you are thinking of a vacation in Costa Rica, I would highly recommend Rancho Montecito. It’s beautiful.

Landing at Juan Santamaria International Airport, Alajuela, Costa Rica

On Monday, August 7, 2017 we returned to Costa Rica from Houston. We were in a holding pattern for a while waiting for clearance to land at Juan Santamaria International Airport, Alajuela.

Here we are lazily circling over land and the Pacific Ocean:

From the Pacific Ocean looking towards Puntarenas province and I believe that is the Tarcoles River on the right:

Video I made of our actual landing, United Airlines flight 1096, arrived 11:35 am:

Note: If you find that full screen is unavailable, then try the YouTube link. 

Storage Locker - Part 3

On Monday, July 31, 2017, we left our hotel in Abbotsford to drive to U-Pak Storage on Annacis Island, Delta. It would be the first time our locker had been opened in six years. As U-Pak promised, the locker had been moved from indoors to a covered place outside where we could unload our stuff. Here's what it looked like after unlocking the door. A few things had shifted around.

I had packed and wrapped the majority of our belongings in plastic storage bins, which had a number, and everything inside a bin was numbered also. This corresponded to our inventory list. We did not know at the time we acquired the locker if we would be shipping the entire thing down to Costa Rica so the inventory had to be done. That in itself was a major job but it did make things easier when asking family members what items they wanted. I just sent them the lists with descriptions.

From Monday until Friday, August 4, we drove every day from Abbotsford to Annacis Island and spent most of the day there, minus a few hours here and there for other appointments. Our plan of attack was to empty all the bins, unwrap boxed items, etc., and then refill the bins with those items being shipped to family. As each bin was filled, we took it to the UPS store in Surrey for shipping. The owner, our friend Raj, handled everything for us and the final price for shipping five bins to Ontario was quite reasonable.

We used ShredMasters in Abbotsford to dispose of paper and documents.

I had contacted Junk Squad, Inc.  prior to our trip to arrange for pickup and disposal of all items that we no longer wanted. This Canadian owned company will pick up your stuff and either donate it or trash it. They donate to over ten charities. We had quite a bit of good, useable furniture and small appliances so I imagine a lot of it will be reused. Since we had alloted just five days to get rid of everything, there was simply no time to try and sell things ourselves. After six years of not seeing any of our stuff, it wasn't hard to let most of them go. There were a few things we had hoped to bring back to Costa Rica but the four large suitcases and two carryons filled up fast so we left them behind.

What to do with all my paintings? Most were canvas on wooden stretchers, all different sizes - none of them would fit in our suitcases. The solution was to remove the canvases from the stretchers, a tedious job involving removing lots of staples, and rolling the canvases into mailing tubes. I needed four of those. Although the stretchers come apart, simply no room anywhere to carry them home. I brought back only one and am now looking for a source for stretchers here in Costa Rica - so far, no luck. I worried about how the paintings would fare being rolled but they are all in good shape. Coming home on two different airlines, the attendents graciously let me put the tubes in their closet. The overhead storage bins were not a good place for them. I had many, many tubes of high quality paint and art supplies - they came with us. 

No room for the authentic pith helmet or my desktop easel:

We finished on the fifth day, Friday, and that is the day Junk Squad arrived and the job was finally done. The next day, Saturday, we spent shopping for a few things to bring home: smoked salmon, Asian spices, clothing. We went to Canada with two large suitcases and ended up buying a third and U-Pak gave us another one left behind in an abandoned storage locker.

Comments on our trip - so happy to no longer have the burden of the locker and everything in it. The lower mainland: it quickly became boring driving back and forth from Abbotsford to Delta as, really, nothing much had changed in six years. Traffic is so heavy, especially on the freeways. Expensive: gas, food, hotels, restaurants, alcohol. Fifty Canadian dollars gave us only half a tank of gas. Depending on brand, alcohol in Costa Rica is about 50% to 60% cheaper then in British Columbia. I don't smoke, but I noticed that cigarettes are from 55% to 65% less expensive than in B.C.

Airports: mind numbing and exhausting. Do it all yourself: from shlepping six heavy bags onto conveyor belts and then off; checking ourselves partially through immigration with those crazy machines that take your picture and standing in the long, snaking lines to do so; being ordered here and there (and make it quick, please) by uniformed employees - bah! And, get this, in the Houston George Bush airport baggage carts are $5.00 USD each! And we needed two! They are free at Vancouver International. The next time I fly, it will be with nothing more then a carry on.

Airlines: All our flights were fine but - for the amount of money we paid for tickets - all we got was a packet of biscuits and water/juice/pop. We ended up buying a couple of meals on board. Six years ago, from Dallas to Costa Rica American Airlines served hot meals.

It was wonderful returning home to Costa Rica. Huge difference at the airport: all the luggage had been removed from the carousal and neatly lined up. I went to grab a couple of baggage carts. A Costa Rican porter said "no" and off he went only to return with a large wagon type carrier. He loaded all our luggage and we didn't have to lift a finger. He found a taxi for us and loaded all our baggage into it. At our house, the taxi driver unloaded everything - we lifted nothing.  It was the difference between night and day. Clearance through immigration was quick - we now get to use the Costa Rican citizens' lineup (also for people like us with residency). No rubbing shoulders with the touristas.

And this concludes my storage locker epistle.