Another unconventional Thanksgiving in the books. Six years ago, we visited my South Africa family in Johannesburg Thanksgiving week. Two years ago, we visited my in-laws in Trinidad. This year, I flipped the script totally and took the family on a week-long Thanksgiving trip to Costa Rica. We visited two cities (La Fortuna and Monteverde) after landing in San Jose from Miami and did a couple of the must-see things in the country. We visited the Hanging Bridges, saw the Arenal Volcano, soaked in hot springs, drove around Lake Arenal, drove to the Fortuna waterfall (but it was closed), hung out in the blue Rio Celeste, visited the St. Elena Cloud Forest, and at least one of us … went ziplining in the forest. Ultimately, I put 2,170 km on the brand new Hyundai Tucson that I rented for the week.

In total, we took three airlines (Frontier, Avianca, and Copa), “visited” two countries (Costa Rica and a Panama layover), and stayed in six hotels during the week. They ranged from luxury (Hilton Miami Blue Lagoon) to business (AC Hotel San Jose Escazu) to mid-level (Hyatt House San Jose) to convenient (Miami Airport Hotel) to cabin (Arenal Xilopalo) to rustic (Monteverde Rustic Lodge). I enjoyed being able to experience the various types of accommodations available to us during this trip.

To be sure, Costa Rica is a BEAUTIFUL country. Known for its natural beauty and biodiversity, we just barely scratched its surface. We stayed in the Central Valley region of the country. We didn’t have time to make it to either the Pacific coast (known for its surfing and little beach towns) or the Caribbean coast (known for calmer waters) where the black Costa Ricans live. Seems as though another visit to Costa Rica is definitely in order.