"" Writer's Wanderings: Costa Rica Pickleball Play And Tour

Thursday, June 14, 2018

Costa Rica Pickleball Play And Tour

It has started to spread around the world and now so is the opportunity to gather with others addicted to play and tour other places in the world where it's being played. I'm talking of course about Pickleball. If you haven't a clue about what Picklebsall is, check out my blog post about it. Combine travel with our favorite sport activity and we were eager to join the group that was heading to Costa Rica to play and tour.

We went a day early and flew into San Jose. The Hampton Inn near the airport was very nice and certainly up to the company standards. We had not been able to get the local money, colones, at the airport. Either we didn't recognize an ATM machine or there just wasn't one in the arrival area. The receptionist at the Hampton (who by the way was very sweet and helpful and spoke excellent English) suggested we go to the casino across the street next to a Denny's where there was an ATM inside.

On our way, we saw a restaurant sign, "authentic Costa Rica food" and decided we were hungry. The place was called Rostipollo. I knew pollo meant chicken. I don't know what the rosti might have stood for. It is a fast food type chain but table service. I had what looked like a taco salad but was called something else. It was delicious! The refried black beans in the bottom were a little sweet. Different than anything else I've had.

After our authentic lunch, we went over to the casino and found the ATM just inside the door. It took us a while to figure out how much to take out. Bob wanted the equivalent of $50 USD. We figured that the colon was about 550 to one US dollar. An attendant came over to try to help us since we'd been standing there so long. Somehow in the translation between us we ended up withdrawing 5,000 colones which got us a 5 MIL bill. Seems like a lot doesn't it? Turned out it was only about $8.

We were about to go back to the hotel and try to figure the whole thing out (I forgot I had a converter app on my phone) and it began to pour rain. We looked at the 5 MIL bill in our hand and decided to play some slots while we waited for the rain to stop. Bob went to the cashier to get the 5 MIL changed into something smaller. She looked strangely at us but gave us 5 1,000 colones bills (worth just under $2 each). By the time we had played several machines, we finally figured out how much to withdraw from the ATM to get around $50. The afternoon passed pleasantly in the casino as we waited for the rain to stop. Cost of entertainment was only $8 and we got free coffee.

Welcome to Costa RIca.


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