From Costa Rica…

Had a very pleasant day yesterday – lunch out at the Hotel Bougainvillea (gorgeous place, and excellent food), then did a bit of shopping with Mom after we dropped Dad off at bridge, then came home, made arrangements to start getting DSL Internet at home (as opposed to the dial-up that I have now), and then when we picked Dad up we went out to dinner at a Princess Marina (a small chain of restaurants, kind of like a St. Hubert’s at home). That dinner was okay, but nothing special (and the noise when we first got there was awful – whole bunch of families there with their little kids, and the acoustics of the place were dreadful).

Well, Mom & I went shoe shopping after lunch yesterday – I wanted some sandals, and not only is it winter back home, but because I take (U.S.) size 11 or 12 (about European size 42), I have a very hard time finding shoes that fit.

Well, I picked up two pairs of sandals, and one pair of runners, all size 12 (and Mom picked up an identical pair of runners). At the store (Payless Shoe Source) we went to, they even had a bit of a selection of size 13!

Anyway, the point is, one of my sandals was approximately 7600 colones, the other pair was about 9400 colones, and the running shoes were discounted to 10,900 colones (from about 12,545 colones). Seems like a lot? Well, there’s 500 colones to the U.S. dollar; about 420 colones to the Canadian dollar. So I got sandals (in my very difficult to find size) for about $15 U.S. and $19 U.S. respectively, and running shoes for about $21 U.S. You can not find that kind of bargain back home in Canada. Hell, even last year, I bought a pair of black shoes that I (still) use for work, and a pair of beach shoes, for a total of about maybe $18-$24 Cdn.

And a bit later today, it’s off to lunch with Pilar and possibly her daughter Rocio. I’m definitely looking forward to that!

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