Sicily Here We Come

Hi all, following on from our previous post about applying for jobs Teaching English in Europe, we have finally had some good news! We got a job offer from a school in Ankara, Turkey, but turned it down, pinning our hopes instead on a preliminary chat we'd had online with a school in Sicily who seemed interested in employing us. Small town/island life would be our ideal rather than a big city like Ankara despite the fact that the pay was better in Turkey!

It's not all about money though and after waiting a few weeks for a skype interview with the school in Sicily on Sunday, we got offered jobs! We don't start until October 1st but plan to go a month early so that I can immerse myself in Italian....wine, food and the language of course, and get to know the island a bit. Rene doesn't need to work on the language so will just work on the food and wine bit!! We will be living and working in a town called Giarre, it's looks very quant and historic on the internet and we've already checked out the eateries there online!

Now we just have to find some work teaching English at a summer school, and this week I have applied to about 10 different places in Spain and Italy and now we are just waiting to see what comes back. So we have three more weeks here in CR and our very good friend Susan is flying out today to join us for the remainder of our time here. We have retired from our voluntary positions at the animal rescue centre as we have done a hard 5 months slog there and it's back breaking work. We will be visiting over the next few weeks as tourists though and taking lots of pictures of our friends there, both human an animal.

Recently we had a gig at a local restaurant - we called ourselves Fused Blues and mostly did blues and soul covers. Our good friends Jana and Tom came with their new puppy who danced the night away and video filmed most of it! All our friends from the rescue centre turned up too and we had a great night. My hands were bleeding at the end of the night, I'm not quite as hardy a musician as Rene. He sang and played his heart out as usual and was brilliant!

On a philasophical note, giving up everything, changing our life like we did, was the scariest thing we have ever done, and of course at the time there are always nagging doubts in your mind wondering if it's the right thing. Now though we can honestly say that it worth all the worry and the fear because we've realised that the possibilites are endless and our journey is full of new and wonderful experiences, places, people and excitement that we would never have found had we not had the confidence to close old doors. Off to the beach now, it's too hot not to swim!

Lucky Puppy

Unfortunately this country is over run with unwanted dogs. They stroll the streets and beaches day and night looking for food and obviously are left un-neutered and have unwanted puppies. It's really sad to see them all so hungry. Just two days ago, our neighbours and good friends Jana and Tom heard some crying just outside their house. When they went to see what it was, they found a tiny puppy, probably no more than 6 weeks old, hungry and lost.

Fortunately for this puppy (named Lucky we think!), she was found by good, dog loving people who have given her a home and also an older brother and sister in the form of their other dogs which are beautiful huskies! The huskies are not so sure what to make of the puppy, but the puppy seems happy to make friends with them. I'm sure they will all be good friends by the end of the week!

So the last two days have been puppy-tastic, we took her to the beach and she's attented two of our parties and been quite happy to snooze on us whilst we are singing and playing the guitar! We are all so smitten and can't take our eyes off her!

Renegade Set To Rock Again!

So, some decisions have been made over the last week or so. Since I am 40 this June (oh no), I thought that I would rather be at home to share it with family and friends so we will be arriving back in England on 27th May for a few weeks. We are having a 40th party jointly with Genny at her house in Prestwood, Bucks on 11th June and what better band to dance the night away with?! Renegade of course! The band have all kindly agreed to reform briefly for our two week visit back to England and will also include a gig at The Lord Nelson on Poole Quay on 8th June as a warm up! Hope to see you there. Following that we are looking to fly back out mid June to start work as TEFL teachers, teaching English...but where? Well, we have yet to find that out ourselves! We have lots of applications out there and some skype interviews lined up, so hope to have a clearer idea soon! Italy is on the top of our list right now as a work/live destination for obvious reasons! Costa Rica has been great to us, but the time has come for another change and to put our careers back on track, or rather start a new career! So we have about 5 more weeks to soak up the sun, continue working with the animal rescue project and spend time with good friends that we have made here.

Back From a Tour

We just arrived back from a tour to a few other places in CR. We went to Arenal initially where we visited an active volcano set on the side of the beautiful lake Arenal and we stayed in a town just outside called La Fortuna.

During our trip we went on a tour of suspension bridges that criss crossed rivers and rainforest to the side of the volcano revealing some spectacular nature finds and view points along the way. We took a guide who was amazing at finding poisonous frogs, snakes and spiders and birds on route. The walk took about two hours or so and after that we had a visit to a hot springs spa lined up to sooth our aching feet. The spa consisted of 16 thermal pools all set at different temperatures. It was amazing, and thrown in for the price of £25 dollars each was a 3 course buffet. Okay so the beers were $6 each but there you go. Definately worth a trip.

Four of our friends that we studied the TEFL with have taken teaching jobs in one of the countries big cities - Heredia, so we headed there next to visit them and to see what city life is like. As far as cities go, it wasn't bad, but the climate was considerably cooler than we are used to on the coast and we hear that crime is on the up. Great to see them though and hear their stories about teaching.

We are back now in our Caribbean town and enjoying a relaxing Sunday with a trip to meet friends in our favourite carib eaterie this evening.