Rancho de Español is in la Guácima, a small (a few thousand people) village a bit less than an hour west of San Jose. It's a mix of suburban and rural, but a bit more on the rural side. There are cow pastures on most sides of the Rancho. The Rancho itself is a small ranch on maybe 5 acres of land and contains the school itself (a few rooms plus 6 or so outdoor cabañas -- wonderful little screened rooms for a teacher and a couple students), the home of the owners, a swimming pool, and grazing for a couple horses.

Photos of our visit are available at:

	Summer 2003 Costa Rica -- Part 1, Part 2, Part 3
	Summer 2004 Costa Rica

After a few days, our son was taking solo walking trips a few blocks to the corner grocery store. But this deserves some explanation... like most all of Latin America, Costa Rica and La Guácima is not as "tidy" as the USA... i.e. you find litter strewn most everywhere, no sidewalks, narrow streets, semi-wild chickens and mangy (but friendly) dogs. But as you settle into the country you find the people unbelievably warm and trustworthy... and therefore a genuine feeling of safety and well-being grows on you quickly.

To emphasize, the Rancho is a very small (yea!) school. While we were there, there were never more than 10 students. The best part of this is the personal nature of the teaching... we had a student/teacher ratio ranging from 3:1 to 1:1.

Because we were 3 in our family, we found it best to stay in one of the Rancho apartments... they have I believe 3 such apartments (2 efficiencies and 1 multi-room apartment) plus 5 dormitory rooms for singles/couples. The apartments are not fancy at all, but clean and they provide maid service and laundry.

I know the website says "campus"... but that's a bit of a stretch. This is a small ranch with the school, the owner's home, and the little apartments all interconnected. Again, the benefit here is that your apartment is at most 50 feet from the classrooms (cabañas).

We stayed on the ranch in one of the efficiencies and had 2 meals a day with a local family that was only a couple blocks away. I'd suggest requesting a "meal family" or "homestay family" that is within easy walking distance (as I know the Rancho also has some eat/stay with families all the way on the other side of town, say 2 miles away).

Meals are simple and a real taste (pardon the pun) of the country... and delicious!

We took classes in 2003 for 4 weeks (my wife and son for 4 hours/day and I for 5.5 hours/day) and my son and I took 3 weeks of classes in 2004. We all began as pure beginners and progressed quite well to what might be called "conversant". When we returned home after the first trip, we had our son tested (written, oral) at the local high school and he tested into 10th grade Spanish (he was then actually a 5th grader!) and through the first two semesters carried a solid A (we're proud of him).

For the past 9 months, I've also been using the Rancho's Internet classes (on-line, real-time audio with an instructor), and I find these invaluable in keeping reasonably refreshed in the language.

We plan to return to the Rancho every year or two for on-going language development.

There are a lot of things to do in Costa Rica... but to be honest, after studying hard all week we were content half the weekends to remain in the village a relax a bit. We did spend 2 weekends out on the country (mostly touristy stuff) and this was all arranged (rental car or bus, hotel) by the Rancho. Verònica, the school operations manager, is great at these arrangements.