This is a short post.  I just wanted to write and announce it, so you can’t say you didn’t know.  I’m going to Costa Rica.  It has been one of my goals for a long time to start couch surfing outside the USA.  Heck, I’ve had many offers in the UK, Scottland, Amsterdam, Australia, Japan, and more places… I love change. I love new places, new people, and cool stories.

Caleb Jennings has told me about Awesomeness Fest after he told me about his trip to the Malaysian rainforests.  When I was photographing David Wolfe’s Longevity Conference, I was hanging out with Caleb and I also met Fatemeh, who works for Vishen, who is the organizer.

I wanted to go.  It sounded like “TED” but on the beach.  There’s some smart people going, and I love smart people.  I love learning, and bouncing ideas.  The tickets are costly, and would require flight, and the hotel is costly.  But just as I decided it was out of my range…. Serendipity comes into play.

Fatemeh pointed me out to Vishen as a kick-ass photographer.  I worked out a deal with them.  Hotels were still close to $200 a night, plus flight.  Well, Brendan has been inviting me to go to Costa Rica for a while.  He says he’s there because of me.  So, I figure if I go to the Awesomeness Fest, I might as well stay a bit longer.

I still thought things were a bit out of my range- and then Billy shows up at my door.  Literally.  2 minutes after I say that looks like I’ll just do more speaking in December, as that would be fun and productive, Billy shows at my door.  Billy I met through Jason Moffatt.  He was going to teach me surfing, but I spent the time training for a race (Which I ended up not running).

The weird thing is that I met him this time around while living on the beach in La Jolla.  I went with Jason to Papa Lu Lu, and on the way Billy recognized me.  I was just visiting in town, and so was he.  Apparently, he lives in Costa Rica now.  Even weirder, turns out the place I was couch surfing at, is where Billy used to live.

He said he’d come visit at the house, and this was the time he showed.  We got talking, and he asked what I do, and I told him, and it just so happened he needed some of my video editing skills.  He had a 30 minute sales video he had done that exported wrong, and no body could tell him how to fix it.  Not the gurus, not the people at the apple store.  No one knew.  Except me.

So, he made me an offer, and I fixed his video, and then did some web work and helped him do his launch.  Voila.  2 minutes after I decide I can’t go, I get a visit with a project I could knock out that would cover my trip.

I was happy.  Now there was hotel.  Billy invited me to stay with him in Costa Rica, but that is an hour away from the hotel.

I saw Brendan on Skype, and we got talking… turns out he lives 3 miles from where I need to be.  So I got a place to stay.

I will be in Costa Rica from the end of November until January 7th.  I’ll celebrate my birthday there.  I’ll celebrate New Year’s there.  I’ll learn to surf.  I’ll work on my book.  I’ll zipline.  I think I’m taking a trip to Panama too.

Kathryn, who  has been traveling Latin America for nearly 1/2 a year now, had invited me to Costa Rica for my birthday, but I had said “yeah… sure… sounds great… ” but I didn’t know how I would do that.  Additionally, I had forgotten about it a bit, since time had passed.

Well, now that I was going, I was reminded “Great, so make sure you keep the 18th open for that surprise.”

So, all of a sudden, I got international couch surfing, at least 2 people to stay with, an opportunity to meet incredible people and exchange ideas.

So.. that’s it.  I want to write more about it.  I’m really excited.  For my couchsurfing, this is like getting my big-boy pants!  So… stay tuned, I’ll really have a lot of exciting stuff to share.  I just need to get a lot of stuff done before I go.