Probably one of the best bathroom signs I have seen at Los Amigos. They sell t-shirts with this logo on it.
I had not been to Jaco in a while - with said, a while back I wrote about how wild Jaco is and how I predicted that the desire for tourist bucks will change it. Needless to say, I spend some time checking out the ‘new’ Jaco a few weeks ago.
Those that experienced Jaco years ago had warnings about the lawless of the town. Druggies, prostitution, pickpockets etc, pretty much ran it. I’m impress how Jaco has changed. The last time I was there, old men with their bellies protruding from Hawaiian shirts with hookers on their arms was a common occurrence. And high-rise cranes littered the sky in development. Not anymore.
However, Jaco still has it problems, last August the mayor was arrested for embezzlement, illicit enrichment, misrepresentation and fraud and there are still those undesirables that cruise the streets and beaches, harassing gringos to buy drugs and other illegal items. Jaco has also become sorta the “no-mans-zone” for drug traffickers. This has increased the on-foot police force – which is a good thing as it gives the tourist a sense of security. Read more... (951 words, 5 images, estimated 3:48 mins reading time)
Up until quite recently in Costa Rica, the proposition of saving both money and the Earth with photovoltaic solar systems has stood on some pretty shaky ground. But that is changing. Nowadays, more and more Costa Ricans and expats are installing stand-alone or autonomous photovoltaic systems in the country’s remotest regions and have made it possible for people to live well where ordinarily they could not. Also, although stand-alone solar systems are worth their investment versus a generator, with their large battery banks they do constitute a hefty initial outlay – but it is worth it? Yes it is!
Imagine investing in a product that builds the most home equity, requires no maintenance, comes with a factory warranty of 25 years, begins paying for itself the month after it’s installed and diminishes your home or business’ carbon footprint. A photovoltaic grid-tie system reduces or eliminates electricity bills through solar panels that generate energy for the grid, which is obliged to deduct the energy’s cost from the owner’s monthly bills. In other words, the electricity bill is either reduced substantially or eliminated. The system is essentially solar panels and an inverter. Read more... (742 words, 3 images, estimated 2:58 mins reading time)
In the last couple of weeks one of our accounts has been having a hard time logging into their server. So after they rebooted the router a few times and then cleaned the ends of the cables the problem still existed. For a while it was driving me a bit crazy why this was happening until suddenly that light bulb clicked on; I remembered the article I wrote back in April, 2010, Net Neutrality For Costa Rica – Throttling Bandwidth Usages and Charging For It.
A Free Trade Agreement signed with the US and Canada (a few years back) ensured that private companies are able to operate in the telecoms sector. State-owned ISP, Radiográfica Costarricense (RACSA) has already formed alliances with the main cable operators to allow them to provide broadband services and ICE has been working feverishly to upgrade their system. Since then, the competition has been going hog wild running fiber optic just about everywhere, which leads one to ask two big questions: Read more... (1073 words, 1 image, estimated 4:18 mins reading time)
- Are some of Costa Rica Internet Service Providers (ISP) starting to throttle bandwidth to save money?
- And could this be the first sign that these companies may start charging their customers for excessive and/or limit bandwidth as we wrote about back in April, 2010?
Guanacaste has posted some great numbers in 2011 however things still seem to be slow in talking with many hoteliers, restaurateurs and retailers. Our real estate friends in Guanacaste are positive and things seem to be picking up a bit, but our friends in Atenas are talking about a slump. Their situations were completely reversed a year ago. Many other factors on the table are very positive for Guanacaste and we are predicting big things here in the next ten years instead of the up and down market in the last few years.
One very notable positive is that Costa Rica has returned to the top ten places to invest in Real Estate in the world, this by the highly respected International Living Magazine after an eleven year hiatus. The reason given for being taken off the list originally were exorbitant real estate prices. This has changed, and is great news for those people that were careful or lucky with their finances and are looking to invest in a way of life that is often not affordable in the United States or Canada anymore. Read more... (882 words, 2 images, estimated 3:32 mins reading time)
Local products like these hand painted bowls, not only helps the community but are eco-friendly
Everyone comes to Costa Rica with a dream. The dream can be the lazy, sand swept beach life with a margarita in hand, or a jungle getaway, a pair of rockers on a balcony with views of the Central Valley. My dream was to have both, and truly enjoy this Costa Rica paradise and to discover what living in Costa Rica was all about. Having 16 years experience in residential Historic Restorations, the itch soon began to do something fresh and new. With a country as lush and green as Costa Rica, you cannot help but be enveloped and caught up in the idea of how to preserve such natural beauty and at the same time live in it and with it, leaving as little impact on it as possible. Eco Construction was my new passion! Read more... (1728 words, 4 images, estimated 6:55 mins reading time)
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