South Beach

No Shopping Challenge Week 8

/ Rae / Leave a comment

Costa Rica!

Although I’ve relaxed my budget for food while I’m travelling, I’m still trying to stick to the ‘no buying stuff’ aspect of my challenge. So far the only things I’ve spent money on in Costa Rica have been food, accommodation and transport, and I’m going to try and keep it that way.

I’ve been here almost a week with my best friend from home, E, and it’s been fantastic. Although it’s less expensive than the US was, I’ve still spent a fair amount as we’ve been eating out for almost every meal and doing lots of fun stuff.

We began the week, having just arrived in Playa Chiquita near Puerto Viejo, Limón, heading to the nearest beach with the best reviews – Punta Uva. One of the staff at the lodge we were staying at persuaded one of his friends to drive us there when there were no taxis available. This turned out to be a fortunate turn of events for us as he was a font of information about Puerto Viejo. He recommended places with the best coffee, the best Asian food, the atm with the shortest queue and various other useful titbits. The journey from where we were staying to one of only three ATMs in Puerto Viejo, back past where we were staying to Punta Uva and Arrecife Beach (definitely the best beach in the area) cost 10,000 Colones or $17.50 between us. Not bad for a 30-odd minute journey with free advice.

We then spent some time at the most stunning beach with warm, clear water, which was just perfect.

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Since I wrote the first part of this post I’ve been busy doing holiday stuff, so I’m going to summarise my spending for the rest of this week. Otherwise it’s going to take a long, long time and I’ll just end up repeating what I’m writing on my post about my travels. If you’d like to find out more about what I did in Costa Rica, please have a look at my other blog posts here and here!

To summarise, all my money this week was spent on: taxis and tuktuks to and from the beach, restaurants and various places we explored; food and drink; cocktails; entry to the Jaguar Rescue Centre; horse riding along the beach and through the jungle with Caribe Horse Riding Club; transport from one side of Costa Rica to the other and back to the airport; accommodation; and tattoos.

I managed to resist the urge to buy things by telling myself they were all things I didn’t actually need, which is true, so almost all my spending was on food or transport apart from my various holiday activities.

Saturday we had half a day in Miami. Since we’d met up, we’d been talking about getting tattoos together (E’s idea!): as a memento of our trip, our friendship and a significant birthday this year for both of us. It would be E’s first tattoo and my 12th. After trying – and failing – to find somewhere to get the tattoos in Puerto Viejo where we were staying, I looked into tattoo artists in Miami. I found an article about the top ten artists in Miami and emailed a couple of places on the list who weren’t too far out of our way, to find out whether they’d be able to do what we wanted in the time we had available. Only one place came through, and it just so happened to be Love Hate Tattoo, where Miami Ink was filmed a few years ago! This made the tattoos even more special and everything went according to plan (even if that meant getting very little sleep. Stupid flight times). This, of course, has added a significant amount to my spending this week ($262.50/£190), however, I’m much happier spending that money on a beautiful tattoo with a beautiful person than on more stuff that I don’t really need.

My last stop this week was Bolinas, California, a lovely little town where my aunt and uncle live. My uncle picked me up from the airport on Saturday evening then treated me to entry to see a reggae band at the local community centre and a glass (well, tin cup) of wine.

Sunday was very chilled out. After breakfast I took a stroll into town taking a few photos on the way. I had lunch ($37) at the Coast Cafe – the only restaurant in town – bumped into my aunt by the People’s Store, met up with my uncle, bought a few food items (my uncle paid) and went back to the house for the evening.

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My total spending for the week was $579.62 (£415) plus $222 (£160 between us) on our accommodation for the week, plus the tattoos. Not too bad for a week full of fantastic food, awesome adventures and gorgeous scenery!

One Day in Miami

/ Rae / 4 Comments

Miami. Stunning expanses of beach, funky music blaring from bars and restaurants, gorgeous sunshine, enormous cocktails and delicious food. This is my summary of a few hours in Miami in between our (mine and my best friend E) flight from New Orleans and our flight to San Jose, Costa Rica.

After landing at Miami International Airport at 12.30pm, we got an Uber to South Beach – by far the quickest and easiest way to get there when time is limited: $22 (£15) for a 30 ish minute drive. I’d done a little research into finding places we could store our luggage while at the beach and found Luggage Locker. If you’re not looking for it, it could be tricky to spot as it’s inside a tour place and the sign on the window is quite small. We successfully left our luggage there for $10 each. One thing to be aware of is that they close at 6pm (which isn’t on their website) so luggage has to be collected before then or another $20 fee paid for the manager to come back to the store so you can pick it up at a time of your choosing.

We grabbed a slice of veggie pizza and a drink from the pizza place across the road and headed down to the beach. And what a beach it was! I’ve never seen such a vast expanse of white-gold sand. Edged in the brilliant blue of the Caribbean Sea, the beach went on for miles, dotted with blue beach umbrellas and loungers available for hire. We found our own spot of shade next to a small cabin-like structure and enjoyed our pizza on the beach.

I went for a quick paddle in the sea, which was colder than I was expecting, while E changed into her swim stuff. I decided I didn’t want to get burnt to a crisp on the beach and I wasn’t fussed about swimming just before a flight so we looked for a cafe where I could sit, chill and write while E went swimming. We walked along the sea front past several restaurants and bars, all of which were blasting out music. Eventually we found one that was a little quieter and decided to stop there. Of course a cocktail was in order by that point, especially as the lady who seated us said we could buy one, get one free. The South Beach Vice cocktail which appeared was huge! It was practically the size of my head. E tried a little, then left me to it and headed back to the beach for a swim. An hour and a half later when she returned I had just about finished it! We got the second free one, which we shared, and after we’d got the bill ($50 including tax and service charge) the waiter brought us over two large glasses of tequila with salt and lime wedges on the rim – completely free! Downing those set us off into fits of giggles. I’m not entirely sure how we managed to make it back to the luggage place to collect our suitcases on time, but somehow we did.

A short walk along the road with our suitcases took us to Plant Therapy, a vegan restaurant just inside The Whitelaw Hotel. It wasn’t cheap but the food and cocktails were delicious. I had the artichoke ‘burger’ which was fantastic. A lovely way to end our day in Miami.