COSTA RICA ADVENTURES
The Scarlet and Sage Casita
The Legacy of Jan Hart
My stories about discovering, adventuring in, and falling in love with Costa Rica would be woefully incomplete without mentioning Jan Hart, artist, watercolor instructor, author, and friend for nearly 20 years.
I first met Jan in 2003, when I was working under contract to the Bechtel Corporation in San Francisco. Newly divorced, I had accepted an invitation from an old friend to join him on a large, two-year systems engineering project. I packed my bags, and within a week found myself ascending from a Bart Station near the Embarcadero.
This project was typical of government contracts: behind schedule, over budget, and micromanaged to near extinction. Days were long, weeks even longer — I frequently logged 70+ hours. No problem. It was fun work, a fantastic team of seasoned engineers to banter with, and the most fabulous city in the world to play in on weekends.
And they let me take vacations! That first year, having dabbled in watercolor painting for several years, I decided to get serious about learning this medium. An online search found a two-week painterly retreat at Ghost Ranch, New Mexico, the former home of Georgia O’Keeffe, led by Jan Hart herself.
At the time, Jan lived in Española, NM, on a middle-of-nowhere ranchito, where she kept carrier pigeons and a gray parrot named Sage. Jan was a well-known artist and teacher, especially famous for her colorful desert landscapes. I was excited to meet her and, having no skills or training, more than a little intimidated.
Her workshop changed my life, in more ways than one. Under Jan’s tutelage I began to “see” for the first time in my life. Forests were no longer green — they became a kaleidoscope of quinacridone yellow, cobalt green, phthalo green, sap green, ultramarine turquoise, and dozens more.
I became a painter. An artist. A devotee. All I wanted to do was paint things. That workshop and that teacher changed my DNA forever. And I’m still happy about it.
The following year I returned for another two weeks of blissful learning, visiting fascinating formations all around the northern part of the state, painting and sketching. And seeing.
By the following year, my gig at Bechtel had completed and I had moved to Washington state, still hooked on watercolors. This time, Jan had set up a two-week touring, painting, and sketching escapade to Costa Rica, where none of us had previously set foot. I corraled three of my besties and the Costa Rica Chicas packed our paints and launched on this new adventure.
We rode horses on the beach, zip-lined over jungles, ate termites (well, some of us did!), drank margaritas, consumed dorados down to the skeleton, drank pipa right out of the coconut. But most of all, we painted, sketched, laughed, lounged, and ate and drank ourselves into nirvana.
Except for the bus rides. Our driver had no worries about flying around hairpin curves, two wheels suspended over ravines, defying gravity and all other laws of physics, while the rest of us had to change our underwear every few minutes.
Jan falls in love with Tico houses
No one would ever accuse Ticos of being afraid of color. As we zoomed past villages in our levitating vehicle, a rainbow of colored Tico houses blurred past our vision, every house a different color, and many houses being painted two bright colors! Like rectangular flowers they dotted the hillsides.
I remember Jan remarking how she would love to have such a colorful home.
Not long after that memorable tropical adventure, back in NM Jan became very ill and wracked with pain, soon requiring major surgery, which she could not afford, nor did she have health insurance. Eventually, it became clear that she was going to lose the ranchito and no longer have a home.
With a lot of financial help from her sons and her students, she made it through to full recovery… and to a life-changing decision to move to Costa Rica. Not only was she enamored with the country, it was affordable for fixed-income seniors.
The Scarlet and Sage House
Atop a steep rutted mountain road perched a dilapidated skeleton of a Tico house, painted red and green. These colors meant something to Jan at the spiritual level, which she explains in her book, A Woman Awakens: Life, After Life.
Once ensconced in her little casita, Jan set to work creating an interior studio and an outdoor workshop deck with a trillion-dollar view overlooking San Isidro. And in order to conduct workshops, she needed places for her students to stay. But without funds, this was a challenge.
One day, I opened an email from Jan where she laid out her ingenious scheme to build her artists’ retreat. Her plan was to build the workshop space, with an outdoor kitchen, shower and baño, and two rustic cabinas above, clinging to the steep hill, with a stone stairway ascending. And she was going to fund it with advances from future workshop participants. Pay now, we’ll build it, and later you can come to the workshop for free!
It was a brilliant idea, and it worked. I came for workshops nearly every year, staying in the cabins, or down the hill at La Princesa, or in Jan’s late husband Frank’s house after he passed. Every year was unique, rewarding, refreshing, and inspiring. I dreamed of having my own retreat in Costa Rica someday.
The last time I saw Jan was in November 2019, just before the pandemic stopped the world from turning. I had come to stay in the apartment at La Princesa, just down the hill, and spend a month visiting with Jan and other friends, writing, and maybe a few trips to the beach.
The previous year, I had stayed in Frank’s cottage, next to Jan’s house. Jan wasn’t home when I got there, and I had to collect the key from her caretaker. She was still in the hospital, looking forward to my arrival so that she would have someone to take care of her and help her with errands and doctor visits. Jan had been ill, was weak and having difficulty walking, but was recovering. So she said.
This time when I arrived, Jan was still weak, but using her “Johnny walker” to get around. Even though still optimistic about the future, the Jan I had known all those years no longer existed. This new Jan was cruel, selfish, and entitled, taking advantage of her friends and then publicly dissing them afterwards. I blamed this behavior change on her meds — her kitchen table was topped with an array of little bottles containing an artist’s palette of colorful pills. Turns out she was also microdosing ‘shrooms.
Within a week, Jan was in the hospital, barely conscious, and delirious when awake. A few days later, she was gone, her last words shouted, arms upraised joyfully, I LOVE COSTA RICA!
Jan created a little slice of paradise in her dozen years here, and her impact was wide and deep. For me, she instilled a love for watercolor and for this technicolor Central American country that I would never have known otherwise.
It’s sometimes hard to be here without Jan, but on the other hand, I wouldn’t be here at all if not for her.
Wherever you are, Jan, I wish you eternal Pura Vida. ❤️