Lovely La Fortuna

Do you know what I love most about life in La Fortuna? The fact that it's a small town, about 5 times bigger than the one I've from, but a charming size nonetheless. It's small enough to walk around and navigate easily, but with all the ammenities you could really want or need (which is definitely more than you can say for my humble beginnings!)

What this means is whenever I walk around, I'm bound to see a friendly face - someone I know, if only in passing. Almost every day when I'm walking home from school, or around Parque Central to get ice cream with L, the other volunteer who was working at the school (she went home yesterday - yes, sadface), or shopping at the supermercado, or talking to my parents on the public payphones, I will see a kid from one of my classes at school - or they'll see me first, and shout "¡hola teacher!" and wave furiously. When I went running on Wednesday (a feat from which I am still recovering!) I ran a little ways up the road to the waterfall, and passed one of the kids from my third grade class riding his bike on his front lawn (I waved feebly as I passed by, gasping for breath).

My Lonely Planet told me La Fortuna had a population of 10,000 people, so I was prepared for something approximately the size of Parkes, or maybe Deniliquin. My Lonely Planet was lying (yes K, it appears to be on a factually inaccurate trend!! Haha), which I quickly realised once I got here. It's possible LP is including all the small towns in the area, about 10min away from LF - that's really the only explanation, you can't mistaken this for a 10K town. But I'm glad it's not - because that would mean it would have more than one fast food chain (as it is, it has a Burger King - and yes, it's as random as it sounds!) and probably traffic lights (I've only seen them at one intersection, near the school - not sure to what extent they are actually observed.) 



Yes, La Fortuna is the touristiest town around (and yes, I'm aware I just coined another word - put in the bitch dictionary y'all!) with the streets literally with offices and offers, but still manages to keep a small town charm about it. It helps that it still feels very rural - that you walk just one or two blocks away from Parque Central and stumble upon paddocks and cattle grazing. And with the beautiful (if ominous) volcano looming large overhead, to grace the landscape with a different pose everyday, silhouetted by the frequent storms, the stunning sunsets, the constant clouds creating new and picturesque views, how can this town do anything but stay true to its natural roots? 


So yes, it's fair to say I heart La Fortuna. 

x
JAG