(Re)Creation of the OIHS Culture Travel Club

Published 1:30 am Friday, June 12, 2026

By Leela Griesemer

OIHS 10th grade student

For the first time, post-pandemic Orcas Island High School students formed the Culture Travel Club.

And a group of 11 dedicated students and two parent/faculty traveled to Costa Rica, and I was part of that wonderful experience.

The idea of forming a travel club was a little bit out there because this was the first time. We had no experience and no money saved up. To help guide us, we partnered with this program called Arcos Learning Abroad/Journeys Abroad, which is an immersive study and cultural program based in Costa Rica. Centered in the small town of Atenas, the program paired experiential learning with Spanish immersion and home-stays with Costa Rican families. For our fundraisers, we did bake sales, a Costa Rica food dinner fundraiser and designed T-shirts and sweatshirts to sell to the community. We also received generous donations from community members, Island Market, the OIHS Associated Student Body and the Orcas Island Community Foundation through its GiveOrcas campaign. This made the trip way less expensive, and without such financial support, many students wouldn’t have been able to afford the trip. The Orcas Island School District and the Orcas Island Education Foundation were also important logistical supporters of the travel club, and its ambitious goal of traveling abroad the first year of its creation.

One of my favorite fundraisers that we did was the Costa Rica dinner because we made gallo pinto, which is rice and beans mixed with cilantro, onions, red peppers and Lizano sauce, with eggs or plantains. Gallo pinto is a very popular dish in Costa Rica. I also loved it so much because we all worked together. It was so cool seeing everyone cook collectively. Another reason it was my favorite fundraiser was that the community here on Orcas really helped the club out and was supportive of our fundraiser. A lot of people showed up to the dinner. To the Orcas Island community and parents, I want to say thank you so much for all the support and love that you all have shown to our Culture and Travel Club. It really means a lot to each one of us.

The big adventure begins

The trip began in mid-April with a drive to Seattle, and then from there we all met up and checked our bags and flew to Houston at midnight. After staying at the airport for a couple hours, we flew to Costa Rica. When we arrived in Costa Rica, the first thing I noticed when I stepped out of the plane was how hot it was and how tired I was too. We went to immigration, and luckily, the immigration process went smoothly. After that, we met the guide Catalina from the Acros program. From the airport, she took us on a bus to this little town in Costa Rica called Atenas. Atenas was amazing. Just by driving through the town, I could see a rich wildlife with gorgeous birds and different animals in the forest. Catalina and the van driver dropped us off at all of their housestays. My housestay was with a woman named Aida and her daughter Loriana, who goes to college in Costa Rica. My roommate was one of my good friends named Wren, and together we had a wonderful time there. The food that our home stay mama would make was incredible, and we had a mango tree in the backyard, so every morning we would have fresh mango. Our homestay mama didn’t know a lot of English, so Wren and I would have to speak Spanish to her. For Wren and me, it was hard, but I feel like at the end of the trip our Spanish was much better.

The activities/Costa Rica/departure

One of the amazing program activities was ziplining, which was very, very fun. We were in a beautiful cloud forest with a lot of animals, and it was so breathtaking to be in. When we ziplined, it felt like we were flying through the sky. It was sooo amazing. One time, we went on a big, huge swing and swung through the wild like Tarzan.

On another excursion, we went to an organic coffee farm called El Toledo in the outskirts of Atenas. There we learned how coffee is grown on a permaculture farm, and we got to taste all the different coffees they made for us. We learned a lot about the challenges of trying to run a business in an environmentally sustainable way.

Another activity was a cooking class with a farming family that maintains a traditional Costa Rican home for visitors. It is the same home that a grandma lived in when she was a child. It was a rough-shod wooden building with dirt floors, a large kitchen, a small bedroom and a large covered outdoor patio space for meals and socializing. Grandma learned how to make traditional Costa Rican food like homemade tortillas and gallo pinto. It was very cool because we had made gallo pinto before at our dinner fundraiser. This time, we cooked over a wood stove and hand-ground the corn for the tortillas. For our fundraiser, we were just going off a recipe from the internet, but when we were in Costa Rica, we actually had a grandma helping us and teaching us how to cook this wonderful food.

A few other activities that we did in Costa Rica were surfing, dancing, painting, visiting a wildlife refuge and hiking. One of my favorite activities was surfing because it was really fun, and even though my friends and I had gotten a really bad sunburn, it was worth it cause the water was as clear as the sky, and it was hot and sunny. The waves were big, but perfect for surfing, and everything was just like heaven to me. I also really loved it because when I was little, I used to live in Kauai, Hawaii, and it reminded me of that so much.

The trip back to Seattle was very tiring and sad because at the end of the trip, I think I can for sure say that we all didn’t want to leave, and personally, it was sad for me because I didn’t want to leave my host family. I miss dinners we would have and the amazing conversations in Spanish that made my speaking skills skyrocket. This trip made an impact on me because it showed me respect, responsibility, kindness, love. I feel like everyone should be in a travel club because you live to do new things, and you only live once, so you might as well see the world. It’s an incredible experience to go to these beautiful places, practice Spanish and experience the culture.