I been a bizzy girl, which is why you haven..t seen me online much these days...
Funny how life can be so relaxed one minute, and so hectic the next. About 3 months ago, I bought a little abandoned coffee finca, (Around 6 acres, with a stream, a mini waterfall, and about a third under secondary forest) after dinking around and not making a decision for three years, and finally recognizing that prices here are rapidly escalating beyond my reach, and if I didn't do something, I wasn't going to be able to.
I started a drawing for a house which is basically an open porch with a couple of rooms and a bathroom. I turned it over to an engineer, who is working it up into something the municipality can approve. Since it is a completely new construction (I am not building on the same site as the old house, which is near the road) I have to go through a complicated bunch of bureaucratic hoop jumping and pay for approvals in every office I go into. It is frustrating when you are used to the relative efficiency of this process in the US, but then, on the other hand, Costa Rica has a government with such a bloated and inefficient bureaucracy precisely BECAUSE it is not a war based economy. I am choosing my poison, and trying to maintain good humor and patience about the whole thing...
So meanwhile, semi-legally, we have begun the construction process. My contractor lead, Bienbenido, is really knowledgeable, although sometimes a little flaky on the details. With my reminding him of things, I think we will be OK. He found a good deal on a backhoe guy, who managed to do all of the work needed in one day!
This included flattening out the building site, (destroying a lot of aged and beyond hope coffee trees in the process) and making the 500 foot long driveway up to the house site. (This spoiled gringa wanted to have the awesome view!) It also including digging the canal for the cantarillas (drainage pipe) at the end of the driveway. Everything was processing beautifully until he punctured the water main in the street. 3 times! Fortunately, the aqueductos guys are quite prepared for this (between earthquakes and other construction activities, the 3 inch plastic pipes break frequently) and they had my neighbor's water back online within two hours.
There is water up to the building site, and the electric lines and meter box went in the second week. (The electric service request happened the previous week, they are pretty quick to start billing.) The guys have built a little bodega re-using the roofing and wood from the cabin, up near the building site, where the crew will stay during the week and the equipment and materials can be safely housed. Later, I can re-use this structure for viveros (nurseries).
Meanwhile, before we started construction full on, when I need to be there almost every day, I took a few days to go to Orosi and met up with friend Lynn from Philadelphia, visited some folks there, and went to the Basilica for the biggest party in the country, the festival of La Negrita, the Black Virgin, the national religious pilgrimage holiday that happens every August 2nd in Cartago. One of my neighbors in La Pintada, Hormidas, started the walk to Cartago last week, where he joined up with thousands of others along the way making the pilgrimage on foot. Fortunately, the Cerro de la Muerte was open, allowing the thousands of pilgrims to access Cartago from the south by bus or by foot.
My family in Orosi is always wonderful – my dear friend Trina is due with a baby boy any day now, and the gang was in full flair partying – the parrot still wouldn't let me film him singing Ave Maria, but we had fun nevertheless!
Cerro (the highway connecting San Jose with San Isidro) closed once again, a week later, after some heavy rains washed out a few sections of the road. Whast this means for bus travellers is an extra two hours of bus ride, as the route goes down to Quepos and Dominical and up through Platanillo.
Lynn stayed for two weeks, while we had lots of visitors (John, Jeffrey and Desiree) did some side trips to the Wilson Botanic Garden, and she had lots of fun hanging out with my neighbors Mari, Rolando and their kids (Valentina pictured). Her last night was lots of fun, the community had a party, in the salon, with a DJ, and we were both out there dancing! I promised her I wouldn't u-tube her.
Because of the road closing, she decided to go back by plane, leaving from the mini airport in Palmar Sur. (Single engine, seats 12.)
Its really pretty amazing how much work it is to build a house from the ground up completely in Spanish! I am exhausted all the time now! I am in charge of buying stuff, making sure it gets delivered, paying people, and making sure my workers are doing what I want them to be doing...This week my lead, Bienbenido, went to San Isidro to the Bamboo factory, to learn about construction techniques of bamboo and earth based plaster. The house is going to be a hybrid of sorts – partially green, or as green as I can make it and still be safe from weather, earthquakes and theft...
We are also planting a lot of trees on the property. Jeffrey, one of my neighbors, is helping me clear and prepare areas for gardens, and for hardwood trees. I just bought my first hundred of the slow growers, the ones I won't live long enough to see in their full glory – caoba, cocobola, cenicero, ron-ron, laurel, and amarillon. (My plan is to eventually have the finca become protected private reserve.) I am also putting in some faster growers, such as cedro amargo (bitter cedar, used here as a soft lumber)as a neighbor just gifted me with a lot of young ones from his coffee finca. I will also be putting in fruit trees as I can locate them. So far, we have some pineapples and strawberries ready to go in. There are already mature mangos, limes, bananas, oranges, avocado, mamon chines, and pejibaye on the property, but not producing for lack of care. I am researching how this climate will be to grow vanilla orchids and mushrooms as crops for income. As long as my seemingly placid neighbors (the Brahma cattle) don't get in and eat my plants, all will be well.
I am having trouble getting the fotos up online, the internet connection down here is abysmally slow. I have already made the file size pretty small, but will try to find some other way of doing this