This house is branded

The ranch house had these brands burned into the wood on the side of the house. I don't know if it is a tradition for ranchers in Costa Rica to brand their houses similar to the way ranchers brand cattle.

The branding is not used like house numbers or street addresses because these brands were not visible from the street. Costa Rica does not have street addresses, so people would not be used to labeling or numbering their houses. To tell people where something is located, people just say where it is near, using a landmark that everyone will know, such as a restaurant, store or hotel.

Tomorrow will be the final installment in this series of our visit to the ranch. The post may be a little controversial.

Today is Sunday, so we have new photos on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site. This week we are showing a few more photos from our trip last Thanksgiving to the Atacama desert in Northern Chile. It was in the news a lot last year due to the Chilean miners who miraculously survived an unimaginable ordeal. It is an amazing, colorful, barren landscape.