What happens when North American empty-nesters decide to pull up roots and move to Costa Rica to start a reforestation project?

The owner of the Yahoo group Costa Rica Living, who also owns a coffee cooperative¹, suggested that I (Fred) write a series on life in the campo, or country living in Costa Rica. The stories relate the experiences of my wife and I on our visits to set up the business and our early experiences of living here. Finca Leola's business is returning pastureland to perpetual forest, with a plantation as the first stage. People also can own trees with us an investment, and in this way we can afford to secure more land that, after the plantation trees are gone, will forever be forest.

These stories are mostly set in the area near our tree plantations, located near La Fortuna, San Carlos, in Alajuela Province (Monterrey is the nearest town of any significant size; if you want to be exact, finca #1 is down the road from San Miguel). We have also included in this section some amusing stories by the North American wife of our tico (Costa Rican) former partner about her own adaptation to the culture. When we visited Costa Rica prior to moving here, we used to stay at their casa (house). It was a better-than-average 3-bedroom tico home, concrete, no hot water (not even a suicide shower²). The rent was $120 US dollars per month in 2003; utilities less than $20.00 a month, including phone, and Internet access was $15.00 per month.

The stories will probably never stop coming, because we'll never stop learning from the quirky situations we get into. And we hope we'll never stop finding the unexpected in Costa Rica.