of rice and beans (or "the magical fruit of central america")

since coming to central america three weeks ago, i've been eating a lot of gallo pinto. gallo pinto is rice and beans mixed together with seasoning, and it's a vegetarian's dream food.

fantastically yummy gallo pinto with an omelet and toast in little corn, nicaragua

the gorgeous presentation prize goes to cafe liberia, in libera, costa rica

the best gallo pinto i've had yet has to be this one pictured above, from a restaurant in the tiny coastal village of cahuita, in costa rica. a pile of rice, beans, tortillas and salsa topped off with fresh guacamole? well, if you insist...

a bit part of traveling is trying local foods, and now that we're in panama i'm already longing for costa rican gallo pinto. of course we're still eating rice and beans, but they aren't quite as ubiqutous as they were across the border. i've heard that the rice and beans trend continues in a variety of forms throughout south america too, and i certainly hope i can keep eating this delicious food.

have you tried costa rican gallo pinto?

share your thoughts on the rice and beans below in a comment, or on Twitter @expatkerri

What did you do on Monday?

Just strolled in a national park watching monkeys in the trees.

Cahuita, Costa Rica

swimming with sharks

Jake's Place, Little Corn Island, Nicaragua

"you're probably wondering who jake is..."

this is how the dive briefing began for my second day of diving in little corn island.

"...jake is a friendly nurse shark."

a friendly shark? friendly and shark are two words not usually used in the same sentence, at least outside of the diving community.

this dive was actually my second time seeing sharks underwater, so i had a small idea of what to expect since we had seen a few nurse sharks on our dives the day before.

the first time i saw a shark while diving, it was sitting still under a coral shelf. lying on the ocean floor, it looked calm, resting and waiting for night to come.

i expected to see jake in the same way.

as i handed my fins and weights onto the boat, i casually asked my dive master how big jake was.

"about 7 feet."

when our boat arrived out in the middle of the choppy waters, i wondered if jake would be resting under his chosen coral shelf. securing my mask and air, i rolled back off the boat and into jake's place.

as soon as we got down to the coral, our dive master turned to us and gave the shark signal (a hand gesturing a shark fin on your forehead). within moments, just feet below my fins, jake swam through.

we stayed still to watch him, and he had no interest in our group. he swam out of sight and we kept going along the coral. after a few minutes, other divers signaled the shark hand gesture. jake swam by again in the other direction, close to the coral. he kept on appearing and disappearing throughout our dive.

i was not scared, but more amazed to see this creature moving peacefully through the water below us. the shark appeared perfectly in balance with all of the other fish and life we were seeing under the sea, and accordingly didn't feel threatening. there were even two foot-length blue fish following the shark around, as little ones might follow around their older siblings.

the underwater social hierarchy in balance, right before our eyes.

upon surfacing, everyone commented how good the dive was. how lucky we were to see a shark.

and i feel lucky too.

how special to witness a moment of life for a creature so misunderstood, to the tune of my own breath. i felt no fear, but rather peacefulness and a longing for the underwater dream never to end.

but like sleeping dreams, all dives have to come to an end.

even dives with sharks.

big in granada

big skies

big avocados

big trees

big colours

big friendships

Just two days into Granada, Nicaragua with my beautiful travel partner Brenna, I can't help but feel we're at the beginning of something amazing, something life altering, something unforgettable, something big.

This morning over breakfast, we discussed an idea I've wondered about before. Whether you travel for a week or a month or a year, after the travels are over you feel a specific range of feelings when reviewing your photos.

It's easy to think of the pictures from early on in the trip as being less informed and lacking the worldly wisdom of later pictures - your clothes tidy and clean, your skin unworn and not yet blazed by the sun.

Around the middle of the trip, the photos are happy and care-free: the mark of a traveler truly amid the journey, thinking neither of the beginning or the end of the travels. For me, this is where I usually find my favourite travel photos.

When it comes to the final pictures of the trip, they seem to hold the knowledge, sadness, and already nostalgic feeling of a trip coming to an end. Sometimes you even stop taking pictures for days at a time.

Every trip has a beginning, a middle, and an end. And though this trip through central and south America together begins now for us, it's hardly the beginning of our journey as travelers together: we've traveled Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey, Japan, Thailand, Burma, and South Korea together.

And it's certainly not the end.