In hindsight, I don’t think anyone ever said taking a 6 month old on multiple plane rides was a great idea. That may have been because most people we talked to were more experienced parents than us…

Our journey to Costa Rica started weeks before we left, when we bought checked luggage. No more just carry-ons with Archer. We got to the Montrose airport 2 hours early, which turned out to be a little too early, but we were able to finagle a row to ourselves. Archer is already a pro at ~2 hour flights, and after a good inflight nap we arrived in Dallas without a hitch. After a brief fortification at the Centurion Lounge, we boarded our 4 hour flight to Costa Rica. I did my best at entertaining him prior to takeoff (this means not letting him eat until we start to take off so he can equalize his ears while eating). While playing SpaceX, Archer’s head may or may not have bounced off the ceiling of the plane, causing the flight attendant call light to come on, and eliciting an audible gasp from everyone around us. After getting over his dazing, he was ready to go again and decided to show me by wanting to “party” for the first 90 minutes of the flight. He eventually fell asleep, and we breezed into San Jose.

We landed at 9:54p and we were in a taxi with our astonishingly large amount of stuff at 10:26p. After a brief checkin we were whisked to our $113 Marriott suite, and Archer said that he was not tired and still wanted to party. After some milky he finally acquiesced to falling asleep in his Merlin Suit. He slept for 7+ hours. He hadn’t slept that long without interruption in over a month. Katy and I both checked on him in the middle of the night to make sure his not waking up was intentional. 

Our first morning in Costa Rica started without an explosion or pee in the Merlin Suit!!!! Archer and I took the stroller out for a stroll to explore while Katy got some extra sleep. We had a lovely free breakfast at the hotel where Archer was the main attraction for the waitstaff and then headed out for the day. 

We started with getting local SIM cards. Katy went in and purchased the Cadillac cell plan for both of us (Katy notes, “You can’t be sure what you’re getting when you only understand 60% of the conversation”). I think that we have enough cell phone data in Costa Rica for the rest of our lives!!!! Riding high on cell phone data, we headed off to coffee country. Now, I have to say that driving in Costa Rica is more like driving in Tonga than the US: you don’t get anywhere fast; people stop in the road for fun; lane markers are suggestions; and the largest vehicle has the right of way.

We had an uneventful trip to Hacienda Alsasia, Starbucks experimental coffee farm. Katy ended up ordering numerous coffees to taste and ended up with jitters so bad that she got a tummy ache. We sat on the terrace and enjoyed the coffee and generally relaxed. We thought we might go on a tour, but decided to leisurely enjoy our coffee instead.

On the way back to town we made a detour to Walmart and bought some diapers and sunscreen. Katy also stocked up on all varieties of snacks not available in the states. While she was doing that I was stocking up on overpriced subpar craft beer. We then headed back to the hotel and decided to grace the hotels outdoor terrace bar with Archer’s presence. The wind had kicked up and it was chilly enough that I put on long sleeves and Archer had a blankie. Archer wanted to play SpaceX again, and to Katy’s delight there was no a ceiling for me to hit his head into. Once even SpaceX failed to delight Archer, it was determined that it was his dinner and bedtime. While Katy put Archer to bed, I used Uber Eats to order papusas and cheese balls for dinner. We actually doubled our order just in case we wanted leftovers for our drive the next day. It really was nice to be able to have food in a hotel without paying hotel prices. We then did a little packing and headed off to bed.