Hotel Alta and La Luz Restaurant

We like the Hotel Alta .
The Hotel Alta was recommended very highly by medicaltourismofcostarica.com  as one of the better hotels to recuperate from dental work. It's located in the Santa Ana area which is a suburb of San Jose.  Nestled in the mountain, the rooms are terraced, and each one has a gorgeous view of the valley below and surrounding mountains. 

Our room has 2 queen sized beds that are very, very comfortable. Even with having extensive dental work, I've been able to sleep very soundly. The pillows, sheets, are soft and high quality. There  is the little coffee pot, furnished with Britt coffee, creamer and sugar for our java fix before we go for breakfast. The Alta offers laundry service, so next time we come, I will not pack as many clothes. My blouses were pressed, and all items were cleaned and neatly folded.

The hotel was described as a restaurant with a hotel attached. The restaurant is La Luz and provides a nice variety of dishes served by professional waiters who all speak English as well as their native Spanish. They are quite accomodating to dental patients, even rustling up oatmeal for me when my mouth was too sore to chew anything. They make a fabulous fruit punch drink (kind of like a smoothie) with fresh fruit. I recommend you try it when you come here.

They do not charge extra for room service, and as a dental patient, I did use it more than a few times, as chewing and eating was not always good viewing for other restuarant patrons, nor comfortable for myself. Eating on the veranda offered the privacy I needed.


The owner, Michael, is very friendly and helpful. He makes a point of greeting people and asking about their stay. One evening my temporary fell out and he offered to drive us to the farmacia later in the evening, so I was able to get some fixadent until I could get back to the dentist. This reflects the genuine caring he has for his guests.

Spending two weeks in one hotel, could be boring, but I have not found that to be the case here at the Alta.  We have privacy, yet there is an openness that is inspiring and so easy on the spirit.  No one is intrusive at all, yet everyone is friendly and approachable.

I look forward to returning to the Alta.

Some Sight Seeing

Deb woke up Tuesday morning feeling a little better. She had kept taking pain meds during the night and that helped her sleep better. Once we were up and breakfasted, she felt ready to do something.
We decided to visit a wood worker who does artistic boxes from tropical woods. His work is beautiful.
Check out his site at: Biesanz Wood Working
And he has been working to re-forest Costa Rica. We looked up his address on the internet and went to the front desk to get a taxi.
Taking a taxi to a shop seems pretty simple. (Insert mocking laughter) Unless you are in San Jose. It seems that streets are unmarked, buildings don't have numbers displayed, and even taxi drivers call for directions. According to legend many directions refer to landmarks that have disappeared over the years, but all of the locals know where they used to be.
We got three different addresses for this place, all of them ended with something like, 'then drive 500 meters past the old church...' The distance ranged from 300 to 800 meters, and the actual church sat at a five way intersection.
But we got there.
The place has a nice front room filled with displays of beautiful wood working. I wanted to touch everything because it was so beautiful. Then we were offered a tour of the back lot, which had been an old dump. They have reforested it with tropical and medicinal plants. Just out the back door, they have a slice of rainforest . They have specimens of a wide variety of plants including a spiny palm tree. Our guide explained that the fruit of this tree is only found in Costa Rica and he likes it very much. He was very concerned when I got close to it. I spotted a huge spider and wanted a picture. As I maneuvered around the tree, he was really worried that I might brush up against the spines. I believe that the spines have barbs on them, and I would have had a trip to the hospital to get them out. But no harm done. Then we got a tour of the work shop.
I have read about techniques of making boxes and green turned bowls. But they have raised this to a new level. They have a room filled with partially turned blanks that are curing, waiting to be turned into finished bowls. Some of these are more than ten years old. In addition, they make boxes and other things all out of tropical wood. They are careful to only use fallen wood, because so many species of hard wood have been depleted. They handed us a piece of ironwood so that we could feel the density of wood that doesn't float. The workshop is a place where production of wood objects occurs. It was dusty and filled with ugly powerful machines, and pieces of wood going from chunks to finished silky smooth items. I loved it.
We bought ourselves a couple of little items. They will be shipped for us, and we are anticipating getting them next week, at home.
Deb had another session at the dentist that afternoon.

Session 4 - Back to the grind

After a couple of days off, they started in on Deb's other side of her mouth. We both hoped that this would be less traumatic, but again we were disappointed. Deb has had less work done on this side, but she felt worse after it was done. Once again, the dentist had a hard time numbing her up. And the teeth he was working on were in rough shape, possibly infected.
During the ride home, she was crying from the pain. We had given her some pain pills, but they take 30 minutes before they begin to work. During that time she was hurting.
I don't know if it was worse pain, or if she hadn't braced herself for it. But she was miserable.
We have some stronger pain meds, but they make her nauseous. Deb hates throwing up and so she won't take them. I've been trying to get her to take them with a full stomach but she is leery. She has to balance her pain with the side effects of the pain meds. All in all, Monday was not a happy day.

Two Days Off

After such a hard time with her front teeth, Deb had two days off. We spent the weekend quietly. We did make one trip to a local strip mall that has a nice art supply store called Art Depot. We picked up a couple of things. One of them was a plastic container for Deb's pastel colors. When we opened our luggage, we discovered pastel powder had spilled out and smeared some clotes. No harm done as it washed out, but we realized that we had to pack pastels in a better way. Deb loves her pastels and seeing them jumbled around was not a happy moment. Now they are neatly packed away in a plastic box with a clasp and batting to hold them in place.
We have our next appointment at 3:00 pm, Monday

Session Three.

One concern Deb had was that her lower front teeth have been bothering her. She talked with the dentist, and he pointed to the x-ray of her whole mouth. She had something going wrong with those teeth. He could pull them, but it would be difficult. It seems that those teeth are the most difficult to numb up, and the hardest to remove because they are close together.

But Deb was pretty sure that she would have to deal with them, sooner or later.

And so, we decided to proceed.

While I sat in the waiting room, I heard her yelling in pain. Eventually, I got to come in and check on her. She and the dentist were shaken by the process. Deb never got numbed up, even though the dentist worked hard to numb her. He was shaken at how much he had hurt her.

I got Deb home as quickly as I could and got her to bed.

A day off - sort of

Deb got over her nausea and got her temporary teeth. This had been scheduled as a day off. Nobody is a machine, the dentist said. But, Deb had been too sick to come in when she was scheduled. So we came in to have her temporary teeth fitted. The we went back to the hotel so that she could rest. She got the rest of the day off and took the time to recuperate.

Session Two

Deb was feeling better after a night to recuperate. she seemed to bounce right back. Of course, we had to go back to the dentist and he did it all over again. Deb is having the left side of her mouth worked on. The lower jaw was done first, and now the upper jaw is being worked on. Once again, Deb comes out of the session looking rocky but we are better prepared now. We have the prescription drugs ready.
Deb will come back at 3:00 pm when they will fit her with temporary teeth. Basically, she will have her left side finished. The next step will be taken 10 months later when full permanent crowns will be fitted to the pins in her jaw. This allows for complete healing before the permanent caps are put in place.
We had the driver take us back to the hotel. Deb took her pain meds and went to bed. Pretty soon she became nauseous and threw up.
Deb never throws up. She hates throwing up and takes extraordinary steps to avoid it. But she was sick. We eventually figured out that she had taken a pain killer she had from a previous dental problem and had a reaction to it. She does that. Her body doesn't get numb from novocaine. She gets nauseous from some pain killers. She admitted that she had taken two pills which aggravated things.
I called and canceled our 3:00 pm appointment. Deb was sick all afternoon and in to the night.

After Session One

When Deb came out of her first session of dental work, she was kind of shocky. By that, I mean that she knew that her mouth had been hurt even though she was still numb. Dr. Munoz works very quickly. He knows that he is damaging your mouth. It is for a good reason, but he is pulling teeth and screwing metal pins into your jawbone. And so he tries to get in, get out and be done with it. But, as Deb is a McLeod, her instinct is to rush around and do something when she is hurt. I imagine this was a survival positive instinct in the dim past. However, today it meant that she wanted to control the situation, through a mist of pain and shock.
First, I talked with Dr. Munoz to find out about pain killers and after care. Deb was trying to walk out of the office, but I knew she would wait until I joined her.
When I did join her, she wanted to walk to the pharmacy in order to get pain killers. I agreed, and stalled her until the car pulled up. She decided that we should just go directly to the hotel. I nodded, and told the driver to take us to the nearest pharmacy.
A drug store in Costa Rica is a stupid thing. They only sell drugs, and the pharmacist just takes care of that. They don't have huge displays of crap that you can buy while you wait for the pharmacist to do his job. You are not made to wait an artificial fifteen minutes because marketing people know you might buy over-priced junk out of boredom. Instead, now check out this dumb idea, you get service from a pharmacist. Of course, by dumb, I mean excellent. And by excellent, I mean that the pharmacist gave us clear instructions and did it right away.
We got the drugs, and gave her the first dose. The we took Deb back to the hotel, and I put her to bed. She was in real pain but that did finally settle down enough for her to get some sleep.
Her next session was at 9:00 am the next day.

Please to meet you, Now, open wide.

We met the dentist.
So we meet the dentist, Dr. Munoz. He tries to tease and joke with us. English is his second language which makes him braver than me. I wouldn't try to kid someone in Spanish. His son is his partner in this practice, and we met him briefly. His english is excellent. Dr. Munoz is obviously very competent, and comfortable with his competence. Deb is nervous about her dental work. I am concerned about her. He examined Deb's x-ray and pointed out the work that would be required. After some discussion, we had a plan. Deb was given a 3:00 pm appointment.
We had a couple of hours to kill. So we walked up a couple of blocks and found a place with an open air terrace. They serve Columbian style food. And I ordered off of the top of the menu which resulted in a plate of meat. By a plate of meat, I mean: chorizo, fried pork, blood sausage, carne molito (?), a fried egg, and and some rice. Deb had a plate of rice with a pounded thin breast of chicken. Her chicken was the best, although I liked my chorizo.
As we sat there, young men pulled up in in very flashy cars. A motorcycle rider parked his bike and took a table, watching us. Another young man came out and drove off on the motorcycle. Deb noticed all the young men parking very nice cars with expensive rims.
I asked Deb if she remembered that Korean restaurant we found in Chicago. She did, and she remembered that we backed out because we both felt like it was a Korean mob joint.
I expected her to get the hint but she didn't. I asked her what kind of food we were having, she said chicken.
I said, "No, what style of cooking is this?"
"Columbian" she said. And then after a classic pause. "Oh, you don't think.."
We finished our meal and walked back to the dental office. I don't know anything for sure, but we both felt like we had just eaten at a Columbian drug operation, masquerading as a restaurant. We had our little adventure and managed to avoid thinking about why we were here.
When we got back to the dentists office, we had a while to wait, but then Deb was taken to a chair, and the dentist began to work.

Our 'Five-in-One' Tour

Poor Man's Umbrella. One leaf could keep you dry.

We decided that Monday should be spent doing the tourist thing, because we expect that Deb's dental work was going to keep us both close to the room.
Sunday, we talked with the quiet young man at the desk and he suggested the 'Five-in-One' tour. This promised five beautiful attractions in one day. We discussed it for 10 seconds, and said, "What the hey, we wanted to see Costa Rica and this should do it." So we signed up. Now we would be picked up at 7:00 am, and off we would go.
We were both excited because we don't do these sort of guided tours. And yet, here we were indulging in completely touristy, pay your money and go along for the ride kind of sight seeing. We each laid out our morning plans, and Deb packed my knapsack with water, and other survival gear.
Of course, we were shocked when the room phone rang at 6:15 am. The driver was here, would we be ready in 15 minutes?
"No problem," I said. Follwed by scramble, stuff, grab, "Got everything?" "I think so...what about..."
After a mad dash, we got out the door. And met the driver.
After introductions, we started to chat. It seems that he had gotten back to the garage late, and fallen asleep. So when he woke up this morning, he had gotten a head start. Lucky for us!
He drifted through San Jose, pointing out different sights in town. It seems that they have a growing problem with illegal immigrants from Nicarauga and Columbia. They are very violent, bringing crime and domestic violence to Costa Rica. They take jobs from Costa Ricans. Deb and I nodded and said that we understood, while internally staring at this Costa Rican with his American concerns.
One of his gripes were the pretty young Nicaraugan girls who worked to catch the eye of a Costa Rican man so that he would marry them and give them a visa. Seems a buddy of his had married one of these girls, very much younger than he was, and now he was looking to introduce our driver to an eighteen year old girl! That is the other problem with those Nicaraugans. Once one of them shows up, all of their very big extended family shows up and expects help.
We finally got to the real tour bus, where we took our seats and said good by to our pick up driver. Then the real guide came on and we began picking up passengers from various downtown hotels.

The sights that are close to San Jose, are up in the hills. This is a nice way of saying that we would drive to the edge of nowhere and then begin walking. We drove up increasingly narrow bumpy roads until we reached a national park, and then walked up to the edge of Poas, a local volcano which grandly parted the mists to show a steaming lake of sulfuric acid.

Poas Volcano has an acidic, steaming lake of water that traps the worst of the fumes.

Then back to the bus and off to La Paz Waterfall. This had a drive up roads more narrow and treacherous, we began to laugh as the bus kept turning a corner one way, only to switch around so we were looking across a steep gully at the road we just came on.
Then the road became steeper, narrower, and in worse repair. Deb pointed out that no guard rails were anywhere. But we started seeing a yellow warning tape tied to sticks in the ground stretched along the side of the road which started us giggling. That wouldn't help a bus stay on the road, and the steep drop to a green hell was obviously dangerous.
La Paz Waterfall is a beautiful sight. We found an excellent lodge and carefully maintained paths that led down. First to a beautiful nature preserve with an aviary, a butterfly garden. Deb had a toucan land on her arm. We saw ocelot, margay, and jaguar. We saw capuchin and spider monkeys and they served us a nice buffet lunch. Then we began to walk down stairs and down steps, and even further down into the rain forest.
The waterfall itself is spectacular. But that walk was a lot of exercise. If you want to train for a vacation in C.R. I'd recommend finding a tall building and walking the stairs up and down all day. Because that is what we did.
The bus ride home was pretty quiet. Everyone was tired. We went to bed early. Tomorrow Deb has her first dental appointment. By spending the whole day on our tour, she didn't think about that until the bus stopped in San Jose.

Travel Day

We left Alden Il, at 9:00 am, via a taxi driven by "PK" an Indian from Punjab. He suggested "PK" as an acceptable way to refer to him, apparently his given name was too much for Americans to pronounce. He was a little fuzzy on our area, but once we got him to route 47, he knew what he was doing. We had a little time to talk, and Deb drew out that he had been in the States for 11 years. He was married and had two sons. He grew up on a farm in India, which was still a working farm, and he found that Woodstock suited him because of its farming orientation. He has been to Brooklyn, NY, and down town Chicago and he very much did not like it. We got down to Midway Airport in plenty of time to wait for our plane.
We got checked in by a busy man who kept getting calls for Delta Cargo. Since he was not a Delta Cargo clerk, and he was very busy, and the caller kept calling back as quickly as they could hit re-dial, he was getting kind of short with the caller. I can't blame him. But he did get us all checked in and we were off to security. Note: Delta doesn't have a Cargo area in Midway.
I have to say that the TSA, seems to be more of a full employment scheme than a real terrorist prevention squad. But we went through the whole drama. I wear suspenders, so I had to be wanded. The fellow who did was joking with me that I was lucky because this station was normally handled by a "BIG black girl. Real BIG. " I came back with "but she's sweet." and he laughed.
We finally got through, and after tucking our clothes in and putting on our shoes we ambled off to check it out.
Midway Airport is a nice little airport, on the south side of Chicago. Brick bungalows line the streets right across from the airport. Once, an airliner skidded past the end of the runway and collided with a car. It's that close to the neighborhood.
We ate lunch in Midway at a place that made hot sandwiches, and we both liked them. I noticed that several stewardesses, and pilots were eating there, so I think it was the best. I only mention this because in Atlanta we ate supper and were not happy. The joints in Atlanta all had expensive and not very tasty food. Deb had sweet and sour chicken, and I had a b.l.t. wrap. We both got stringy pieces of meat stuck between our teeth. Eating and waiting are pretty much what you do on a travel day. And that is what we did.
I avoid the airline free pop and coffee, because: a) I don't like using the bathroom while bouncing around. b) I don't like wearing coffee or pop. If I do get a drink, I try to chug it down, so that it can't spill.
Deb had a rum and coke and had a little trouble with it. She got half way through her drink, and started to feel the alcohol, so she didn't want to chug the rest. She is a real light weight drinker, by the way. When the plane hit a bump in the air, she got rum and coke all over herself, her book and her paper work.
Arrival in San Jose was at 9:05 pm which is one hour later than our local time which would be 10:05 PM. So after 13 hours of travel, we were both tired. We wanted to get our luggage and clear customs/ immigration. The Costa Rican government has the system set up very nicely. So, we did get all of our luggage, and cleared the official part of the trip without any adventures.
We grabbed a luggage cart at the baggage claim which helped immensely with our mountain of bags. But when we got to the exit, we had to give it up to a helpful young man who transferred our bags to another cart managed by "his partner." both of us were a little alarmed, thinking that this was the last we'd see of our luggage, but it was not a bad thing. Not a bad thing at all, it turned out, because we were met by a driver from the hotel and this guy trucked our stuff out to the taxi. Deb had told me to change some money for colones and then told me to tip him, so I tipped him 20,000 colones. Too much? Too little? By that time I didn't care.
We did get to our room by 11:30 PM. Deb stayed up for a while with a drippy nose. I layed down, shut my eyes and took a deep breath.
Then it was morning.