Alli's Ag Ed Adventures: Aqui en Costa Rica (Here in Costa Rica)

It's been over two weeks already?!?

Crazy.

I can tell this summer won't pass by slowly.

Welcome friends (and maybe strangers) to my blog. This season's focus: EARTH University, Costa Rica. But before we get there, let's review my first two weeks in county.

Arrival: Saturday, April 27. I spent a week with a lovely little host family right outside the campus of EARTH, near Guacimo, Limon, Costa Rica. In addition to getting acquainted with the cozy campus (and the intense tropical weather), I was taking some refresher Spanish classes to be ready for a 12-credit semester (taught in Spanish of course). Already within this first week (of not intentionally interacting with EARTH students), God started answering prayers by bringing forth some exciting friendships! I am so excited to see what He has in store for this summer, regardless of what trials may arise.

So after a good first week in Costa Rica (no sicknesses, thank the Lord!) I traveled via bus/taxi/bus (a new feat for me in a Spanish-speaking country) back to the airport to pick up mis padres as they arrived for a week of vacation along the Pacific!

We thankfully avoided the most touristy areas and hit up some pretty lovely areas. I didn't have to work too hard to get dad to go zip-lining with me in a rain forest canopy the first morning they were in the country. And we had some great views of agricultural diversity in our travels (palm plantations, pineapple, coffee, sugar cane, etc). Let's not forget the 60-some birds my mother recorded during her time her (yep, she's a birder).

Of all the travel, I would have to say my favorite place so far in Costa Rica is the third place we stopped at: la Península de Osa, in a hotel called Drake Bay Wilderness Resort (if you can't tell, I like maps). Our cabin sat 30 meters from the Pacific ocean and the view was so gorgeous that it looked good even on my camera phone! Dad and I took out the hotel's kayaks on our first afternoon and kayaked up the river (that opens into Drake Bay) then out to the ocean. We had two day-long tours: the first included snorkeling in the Pacific, canoeing up a river, and swimming in waterfall pools. The second was a tour of Corcovado National Park, one of the many gorgeous parks in the country. We saw these (large rodent things), these (wild pig things), and these (probably related to Zoboomafoo) along with three of the four monkeys found in Costa Rica (Spider, Howler, White-faced Capuchin). This place was just fantastic, definitely a recommendation for a getaway (like a real getaway - we had to leave our car somewhere and take a 1 hour boat).

So coming back to the central part of the country, we spent a few days in my Costa Rican hometown of Turrialba - I spent 6 weeks with a family there last summer: 4 weeks with a PSU Ag Science immersion program and 2 weeks through a grant to do research in local high schools for my undergrad thesis. I got to meet up with some friends, have dinner with my host family, walk around downtown Turri, and take my parents to the incredible historic Guayabo National Monument. It was a lovely close to our vacation, topped off by a lunch with the NEW Penn State crew in Turrialba. See their running blog here!

Yesterday we made our way to EARTH, a trip complete with one more Panadería (bakery) stop and a mountain-top view of the Caribbean. So what is EARTH you may wonder?

EARTH stands for Escuela de Agricultura en la Región Tropical Húmeda (School of Agriculture in the Region of the Humid Tropics). It is a private, international institution funded by USAID, the Costa Rican government, and W. K. Kellogg foundation. The university has a strategic focus on sustainability, development, and practical agricultural instruction - leaving its students with a prestigious (4 year) degree in "Agronomic Engineering" almost equivalent to a combined undergraduate and master's degree in the states. There are 400 students here from 29 countries (Latin America, the Caribbean, and Africa). They live alongside the diverse and prestigious faculty on the closed 8,300 acre campus that is also home to a banana plantation, dairy farm, integrated hog farm, periurban garden, forest reserve, organic crop garden, and more. In my explorations here I will not get around to everything... but I certainly will try!

So what am I doing during these four months in Costa Rica? I am studying here for the entire trimester (students have three 15-week trimesters per year) - my flight leaves on August 24 (2 days before fall PSU classes start!)

Classes started today - I had my tropical animal production class all day and am excited for more new information and Spanish challenges. But don't worry about that now, I am sure you will be learning a lot about what is going on in the coming weeks!!

Thanks for following along on this semi-long introductory blog post. But lucky for you that endured, you get to see some photos from our vacation!