Tapantí National Park - Costa Rica

We went to Tapanti a few months ago. Some friends and I decided to take one day trip to a national park, somebody recommended us Tapanti, so we went there. It's closed to San Jose, like an hour or so.

We wanted to have some breakfast to we went to a hotel that is in Orosi, almost arriving to Tapanti, it was terrible because they didn't have Gallo Pinto, everyone was so disappointed, but any how we at least had some bread, eggs and coffee of course.

Tapanti National Park is just a great place if you want to be close to nature, there you can walk through the forest, there is this beautiful river and waterfalls, it is just amazing.

On the way back we had lunch in a restaurant in Orosi, it was very good, specially because everyone was so hungry and tired of the trip.

Tambor - Costa Rica

We went to Tambor in July, 2006. We spent 4 days and 3 nights in Tambor Beach Hotel, it was great because we really needed this vacation and this hotel is special if you want to relax. They have this "all inclusive" plan where you can eat and drink as much as you can, so dedicated ourselves just to relax.

The only problem we had was getting there, it's very easy to get to Puntarenas, but then you have to wait long lines to take the Ferry and then after you finally get to Paquera, you find that horrible road, where you and your car suffer as much as you can imagine. It took us 1.5 hours to go 20 kilometers, would you imagine? That's insane!

So here is my advice, if want to go to Tambor or anywhere near, take a 4x4 car, it's the only way and if you don't want to drive at all, take the Tambor bus, it's a lot better!

Photography

	The picture above was taken on my sister's garden and I modified it in Picasa to give it the effect you are seeing right now!
From Flowers

In this space I want to share with you some experiences I had related to photography and some useful information I found that it might help you too.

Tips and help

I found this site that sends you videos with tutorials on how to use Photoshop which are very helpful if you mostly work with digital photos. The name of the site is Photo Secrets. Come on, take a look!!

Here at O'relly there are several good tips that can help you understand some basic concepts.

If you want to see reviews of cameras, go to this site DpReview.com. They have excellent reviews of every single camera you might want to know about.

Cool links!

A friend of mine send me this site TrekEarth. Here you can upload your pictures so others can learn about the world through photography. It's a really interesting concept.

A photography site I really like, it's the Ansel Adam's site. Here you can find the best black and white pictures ever taken.

A friend of mine has a site where he has some pictures he changed to make them look like paintings, so if you want to take a look at them, go to Karoly's pictures

Sites to share your pictures

• Shutterfly


• Flickr


• PicasaWeb


• Kodak Easy Share

My favorites are PicasaWeb and Shutterfly, specially Picasa, because it's really easy to upload pictures and you can embed some of them in your blogs or sites.

More coming later...

Traveling to Europe - More tips

	The picture on the left is from some typical houses in Amsterdam! Here are some tips if you want to travel to Europe.
From Holanda

The Tips...

• In hostelworld.com, select the private rooms, because if you select the dorms, you would have to share your room with people you don't even know, dorms are cheaper though. If you select a Private one, you have to double check that the bathroom is also private, sometimes they have private rooms but you have to use a shared bathroom.


• If you are looking for hostels that are not so bad, check the Budget Hotel category in hostelworld.com. These are generally cleaner and more comfortable and in a better location.


• Traveling by train is kind of expensive, sometimes it's even better to take a plane, because you get to your destiny faster and the price is almost the same.


• In most of the European countries, they have metro, which is a way to move fast in the cities. Generally, they have special tickets for tourist that last for several days.


• In several cities, like Barcelona, there are touristic buses that take you all over the city. You can pay for one day or two. They are very useful because they go to the most important places in the city and you can get in or get off whenever you want.


• Something to take into account is that there are guides for every city in the world that have itineraries where you can find information about all the places where you should go, how much are the entrance tickets and how much time you should spend in every place, so this allow you to organize your trip.


• If you are going to Rome, look for hostel Euro, it's cheap, clean and it's very close to the main train station where you can take the train, metro and buses


• If you go to Rome or Florence, there are tours that you can pay in advance that would take to most visited places so you don't have to wait in lines or risk that you cannot enter the museums or galleries. In the case of Florence, there are some galleries, like Uffizi, that it's a lot better to reserve the ticket through Internet, because this gallery is one of the most visited in Florence, so you can spend hours in line.


• If you go to Venice, you would need around 2 days to see it all, it's actually a small city unlike Florence where there is so many things to see. In Venice try to stay out of the island because it's very expensive. Also, to move around Venice, buy the ferry ticket that is for 24 hours and allows you to go everywhere.


• If you go to London, just remember, this city is extremely expensive, so just be careful with your finances!


• If you go to Amsterdam, rent a bike, it's the best way to move around the city and it's cheap!


• If you go to Portugal don't forget to go to Sintra, this is a beautiful town and it's around one hour and a half in train from Lisbon.

I hope this information is helpful for you! ;)