TJCanuck

We are part-timers near San Juanillo during northern snowy months and love the ruggedness and the differences from big-city Canada, where we spend the summer months with the kids and friends and family. Shopping in the area is not an issue as the market right in San Juanillo is very well stocked and the little hardware store is amazing for tools and supplies and most of those things needed when you have to maintain a residence near the coast. Larger shopping trips are less than an hour away in either Tamarindo or Santa Cruz and the roads are WAY better over the last 10 years. Lots of construction in Nosara has resulted in a newer and quite large home improvement store. Lots of nice places to eat when you don't want to cook. Overall, with a burgeoning expat community all over Costa Rica even in these formerly out-of-the way areas, services and shopping have followed. It's not the quaint Costa Rica of years past, but it is much simpler to transition now than for those that trailblazed in years past. I guess best advice is to know what lifestyle you're looking for - beach, mountain, city - and, with eyes wide open and good legal advice, take the plunge. And yeah, 35% exchange on the Canadian dollar right now hurts.

If you really need a fix of TV from Canada or USA and assuming you have stable and relatively fast internet in CR, and access to a cable or satellite box "back home" (...at your "other house" or at your kid's house or perhaps by paying for a friend or family member to have an additional dedicated cable box installed at their house) then Slingbox completely solves the problem. Any web-connected devise you have anywhere in the world (computer, cellphone, iPad, etc) mirrors what's on the cable box back home and you can even control the PVR. You can watch anywhere you have internet (live hockey on your cellphone on the beach is cool...if the beach bar has wifi!) or if you want to watch on your TV, the easiest way is to use an iPhone or iPad and AirPlay the feed to an AppleTV devise hooked to the TV. Netflix and iTunes are great for lots of things, but live TV through the internet (translation for the men....sports!) is brutal. We spend time in CR during the snowy months and RV in Canada a fair bit in the summer, and carry an iPad and an AppleTV with us wherever we go. Always connected - when we want be. About $150 to buy the Slingbox plus your cable bill from North America. No proxy server or VPN required. The Slingbox is just a mirror that translates the cable feed to streaming, and it only goes to your account, so the "internet" doesn't know where it's originating from.