What is a Purple Country Girl?

It's not an alien from outer space.

It's the name of the orchid that's the national flower of Costa Rica.

It's one of the 1,400 species of orchids that grow wild in the rainforest.

Since there are so many species of orchids that grow here, you would expect to see a lot of variations in the way the orchids look--and you wouldn't be disappointed.

Below is a rare yellow hanging orchid growing in my neighbor's yard. It hangs down about four feet with hundreds of tiny blooms. It's not like any other orchid I've ever seen. I've seen orchids growing in the wild here, in Australia, and in other parts of the world, but I've never seen an orchid like this before. It's beautiful.

There are dozens of orchids growing right outside my door. It's easy to grow orchids here. You can tie them to a tree trunk with a string, and the roots soon attach to the tree, and then the string is no longer needed.

The picture above is one that was just "planted" recently. I can sit at my desk and watch it grow. I don't know how long it will be before it starts blooming. I need to do more research on orchids.

This is a picture of orchards growing on tree trunks in my yard. These orchards have been there for a year or two and have attached themselves to the tree trunks. A string is no longer needed. Some of them are blooming, and some are not right now.

On a recent university-sponsored expedition into the rainforest, they found 20 new species of orchids. So now, there are 1,420 known species of orchids here.

What does all of this have to do with RVing? Quite a lot. Keep reading, and I'll explain it in a minute.

It seems like everything in Costa Rica is colorful

The clothes people wear, the houses, the flowers, and the birds all look like they've been painted with bright, vivid colors.

When I was camped on the beach in Galveston, Texas, all the birds I saw were black or white--mostly white seagulls and black crows. I haven't seen a black or white bird in the two months I've been in Costa Rica.

There are 52 species of hummingbirds in Costa Rica. There are a lot of other colorful birds here, too, such as flocks of green parrots, big, colorful macaws, and toucans (that's the colorful bird with the big beak that's on the boxes of Fruit Loops).

Below are pictures of macaw and toucan birds. I often see the toucans on the rail around my balcony, but the macaws are not usually this high up in the mountains. I see them when I go down the mountain towards the beaches.

Can you imagine sitting at your kitchen table, drinking your morning coffee, and watching a toucan or a green parrot outside your window staring back at you?

One whole side of my apartment is glass, so I get to see a lot of birds.

Bottom line: What does all of this have to do with RVing?

It's an example of the freedom the RV lifestyle gives you. RVers are discovering that they have the option to store their RV for a few months, cancel the liability insurance, and travel to a foreign country. They can rent an apartment for a month or so in a foreign country for less than it would cost them to stay in a campground.