Saturday, December 19, 2009
Costa Rica
Patricia and I just came back from a great trip to Costa Rica for a destination wedding of two of my friends from the Peace Corps (pictures are posted at picasaweb). I thought about taking my oil paints along, but they just don't lend themselves to that kind of a trip. So I did pen & ink sketches instead, adding some watercolor for interest.
So here's some of the outcome from that: all are 5.5" x7.5" on 140# coldpress paper.
Nuevo Aranal is off the tourist track (menu in Spanish), and Mincho runs
a great streetside breakfast bar there, full of local color.
This couple had a little restaurant in Bagaces, and they served us excellent soup and salad.
Ocotal was advertised as one of the nicer beaches. And it was, except for the black sand beach
(volcanic lava). Nothing wrong with that, really, but black foam just isn't very esthetically pleasing.
Coco was a sleepy, picturesque little town full of souvenir shops.
Lake Aranal was really large and beautiful. We would have gone kayaking here, except that
both days we were there it doing a good imitation of the monsoon season.
Volcan Aranal is impressive, and is a main tourist attraction because it has been continually active for years, so that you can see glowing lava flows at night, and maybe even some explosions and flames. However, it went dormant last month, so no more nighttime fireworks shows, at least for now. We did not even see the top of the volcano while we were there (the monsoon, again), but I kind of like this view anyway.
So here's some of the outcome from that: all are 5.5" x7.5" on 140# coldpress paper.
a great streetside breakfast bar there, full of local color.
(volcanic lava). Nothing wrong with that, really, but black foam just isn't very esthetically pleasing.
Volcan Aranal is impressive, and is a main tourist attraction because it has been continually active for years, so that you can see glowing lava flows at night, and maybe even some explosions and flames. However, it went dormant last month, so no more nighttime fireworks shows, at least for now. We did not even see the top of the volcano while we were there (the monsoon, again), but I kind of like this view anyway.