Monday, April 29, 2013

Costa Rica Day 6: March 29


Friday was our free day. We didn’t have any tours scheduled. I had briefly contemplated taking a zip line tour through the canopy, but my thighs, while not as painful as the day before, were still far too sunburned to think about sitting on straps.
It was delightful to lounge in bed listening to the birds’ dawn chorus. After what seemed like a long time, I got up to see if I could spot what was singing. I’m not a good birder. I looked and looked through the binoculars and saw only a leaf move in the underbrush in the general vicinity of the sound.
I had typico with scrambled eggs for breakfast again. Unlike the other days this week, I had time for two leisurely cups of tea while looking over the ocean. I hadn't worn my watch all week because it was too hot. I had no idea what time it was. I thought it must be getting late. Terry, who had his watch, told me it was 7:45. I took more pictures of the flowers blooming around the La Paloma grounds.
Bromeliads blooming near the lodge
We returned to the ranchero and sat on the deck watching birds. We walked down to the beach at low tide. I took some pictures of the tide pools for my lectures. Everything seemed miniaturized. I don’t know why that would be. Tiny snails, tiny anemones, tiny barnacles. Not like the Pacific Northwest. I barely saw a well-camouflaged crab. That will be a good photo for Ch. 46.  
The beach

Camouflaged crab (center)

I got soaked to the waist when I tried walking around the rocks instead of over them. The water was much deeper than I thought it would be.
I took my first shower of the day when we got back up the hill. Shortly after that, there was a brief rain. 
The view from the deck during a brief rain shower

The rain really seemed to bring out the birds. Diane pointed out the birds as I tried to get pictures. The best picture I got was of a golden hooded tanager.
Golden hooded tanager

In the afternoon high tide, Diane and I went kayaking again. When we got to the launch, we saw a large crocodile swimming in the middle of the river. I got in my kayak thinking that the croc would head to the other side to make way for a motor boat that was coming up river. To my surprise, the croc headed straight for me! I paddled frantically to get out of its path.
Crocodile coming for me

We watched the sunset down by the pool for the last time. 
The last sunset
On our way to dinner, I saw a toxic cane toad on the sidewalk. I needed a picture of one of those too, and was very excited to see it. The cane toads are native to Costa Rica but not to Australia. They were intentionally introduced to Australia to control the unintentionally introduced cane beetle that came along with the sugar cane that was really the only thing the Australians wanted to start growing. The toads are out of control in Australia now.
Toxic cane toads can get to be 2.5 kg (5 lbs)

I was ready for bed at 8:00. What had we been thinking when we signed up for a night hike with the Bug Lady? We met at the lodge. The Bug Lady, Tracy, passed out headlamps to all of us and instructed us on the on/off switch and the white light/red light switch.
We saw many interesting things, such as a net-casting spider. While most spiders are passive predators that weave webs and wait for something to get caught. The net-casting spider weaves a net that it holds in its feet and actively throws the net over passing prey. During the day or when provoked, it folds itself up and looks exactly like a dead leaf of grass.
Net-casting spider with net at the ready
The trapdoor spider digs a hole in the side of an embankment, lines the hole with silk and weaves a little door of silk that is covered with the same stuff as the rest of the bank. It take experience to spot them.
Trapdoor spider
The find of the evening, though, was an ocelot. They are very rare, and we were very lucky to see it. My photo of the ocelot is now on La Paloma’s Facebook page. Or so they tell me. I don’t Facebook.
A rare ocelot siting

Sunday, April 28, 2013

Costa Rica Day 5: March 28


Howler monkeys woke us up at 5:00 with their deep, guttural woofing. When we saw them eating the previous day, they had been quiet. I was thrilled that we got to hear the calls. Check that off the list. At 5:45, the troop of capuchins moved through, dropping pods all over the place.
We were up at the Lodge promptly at 6:00 for breakfast. Tebs told us that the hot breakfast choices included huervos rancheros with “mashy beans,” a phrase that struck me as being quintessentially British. Nigella Lawson says stuff like that all the time. I also recognized it as a life-changing moment. I may never refer to refried beans again.
We met our guide for the day, Randall, at 6:30. Diane and Tom knew Randall from previous trips, and knew that he was very good. We boarded the boat and took off for the mangrove forest. We hadn’t gotten far before Randall pointed out some bird activity in the distance and directed our captain, Edwardo, to take the boat to it. It was a school of sardines. Sandwich terns, royal terns, brown boobies, and brown pelicans were busy picking them off by diving in the water while frigate birds swooped overhead, stealing fish from the other birds. When we were above the school of sardines, we could see skipjack tuna cruising through the smaller fish. I could only infer that the sardines weren’t having a good day.
Brown pelican, left, and brown boobies fishing for sardines

We rode the surf up the Sierpe River into a 30,000 acre mangrove reserve, the largest in Costa Rica. We saw many wondrous things. Randall had an amazing ability to see wildlife. “There! In the top of that tree! There is a pair of sloths. They just mated.”
Mangroves

Female sloth with algae-covered fur

How did he know that? He went on to explain that the males and females are only seen together at mating time. The female finds the male through vocalization and pheromones. I wonder what a sloth call sounds like. Randall correctly predicted that the male would stay in the top of the tree while the female moved off to find her own territory. Paradoxically, she moved very slowly, but I found it impossible to get a video. The algae growing on her fur made it nearly impossible to find her on the video screen. I had better success through the still picture function.
So many birds! The snowy egret has yellow feet and black tarsus. It stands in the mud and wriggles its toes. Fish can’t see the black legs and think that the toes are worms.
Snowy egret. Note yellow feet and darker legs. This is a juvenile whose legs are not as dark as they will be as an adult

We had seen juvenile Jesus Christ lizards everywhere along streams in the rainforest. We saw our first mature pair in the mangroves. The male had a characteristic crest on his head.
Jesus Christ male with head crest
Just before lunch, we stopped at the tiny town of Sierpe for a bathroom break. Despite its size, it is the closest town to a road in these parts. All of the supplies--gas, food, beverages, everything--for the ecotourist resorts, including La Paloma, come into this town and are moved by boat to the resorts.
"Downtown" Sierpe, the terminus of the nearest road to Drake Bay. Yes, it does say "Las Vegas" on the sign.


I think perhaps the best thing would be to just go with pictures and captions for the rest of our tour.
Little green heron

Purple galino

Scarlet macaw pair

Tiger heron

Scarlet macaw eating fruit



Great egret

Caimen

Squirrel monkey

Julie and Andy, a very nice couple from the D.C. area, had been with us on our tours. They invited us over to their ranchero at 5:00 to see the toucans that seemed to be there every day. Indeed, one showed up right on schedule.
Toucan

Sunday, April 21, 2013

Costa Rica Day 4: March 27


Wednesday was our day to snorkel on the coral reef near Caño Island. This tour was shorter than the rainforest tour, so we didn’t need to be ready to go until 7:00. The previous day, Jess had briefed us on the trip. She recommended wearing a shirt in the water to prevent sunburn. She expressed doubts about even water-proof sunscreen in the water. We happened to be in Costa Rica during the spring tide—the highest high tide, which also comes with the neap tide---the lowest low tide. Because of the extreme tide levels, the water was going to be murky.
Our guide was Daniel (pronounced Danielle) or Danny, an ex-pat from Spain. Walter came along too. Danny was slim and handsome, and sported long dreadlocks. I didn’t bother taking my camera. Sorry. I was concerned about two things. First, I have trouble breathing with my face underwater. It’s a hard-wired adaptive response we all have, of course, but I hold my breath when I watch Jacques Cousteau films on TV. Secondly, I couldn't wear my glasses, and I’m really nearsighted. Neither turned out to be a problem.
Probably if a person had done a lot of snorkeling in crystal clear tropical waters before, it might have been disappointing. For a girl who grew up playing with a cheap mask and snorkel (which I never really got the hang of) in a kettle lake in Michigan, however, it was amazing and fascinating. I saw green and blue parrot fish, trigger fish, white tipped sharks, bright blue fish, yellow and blue fish, corals, and on and on. I’d never seen anything like it, even without my glasses. Actually, I saw more than I thought I would. Even though the shark was out of focus, there was no mistaking the form. The only disappointment was that we didn't see a turtle.
We snorkeled for an hour and 20 minutes. The park on Caño Island had closed because the human impact was getting to be too much for the fragile island ecosystem. We climbed in the boat and headed to a park on the mainland. On the way, dolphins played in the wake of the boat. We snorkeled again a little bit before lunch. The water near the shore was almost hot on the top layer yet cold a little farther out. The water here was murky also, and there wasn’t much to see except a mixed school of tiny blue and gold fish with vertical stripes and blue fish with horizontal stripes.
There wasn’t a table  at the picnic spot today. Our boat crew brought a folding table along for the lunch service. We sat on a log while we ate. I began to think I should have worn pants while snorkeling or at least applied sunscreen. The backs of my legs were hot and painful, especially the tops of my thighs, even though my legs had been submerged. I didn't know it was possible to get a sunburn through water. Sitting was becoming uncomfortable. The boat ride back to La Paloma was even worse.
We were back fairly early in the afternoon. Danny and Walter said it would be a perfect time to kayak up the river because the moon would be full tonight, and the river would be as high as it ever got. Diane, Tom, and I dropped our things off in the ranchero and requested kayaks in the lodge. Terry was not feeling well and stayed near the bathroom. Before we went back down to the river, I saw a scarlet-rumped tanager from the deck and felt a certain kinship. I too was scarlet-rumped.
Male scarlet-rumped tanager displaying his scarlet rump

I had never done much kayaking before. It was a hoot! I had to remember not to J-stroke, but other than that I got along pretty well. The forest along the river was beautiful. The water was clearer than the ocean had been. I saw juvenile Jesus Christ lizards on the banks, a damselfly on a plant above the water, and a big fish in the water. I got a pretty good look at a kingfisher when it rested between foraging flights
Self portrait of me kayaking

Costa Rican damselfly

Diane kayaking down the river
Kingfisher on its break

A flowering tabebuia tree with bromeliads near the boat landing

When we got back to the landing dock, La Paloma was receiving a shipment of supplies, including “agua tonique.” I could have a gin and tonic tonight if I wanted to.
I was just getting out of the shower and putting cortisone cream on my sunburn when Diane called downstairs that there were howler monkeys. Terry and I went upstairs to watch them forage leaves. We had a good view from up there.
Howler monkey eating leaves
I decided to have a mojito for happy hour even though tonic water was available. La Paloma makes mojitos with oranges rather than limes and uses more mint than I usually do. Theirs were better. We sat at the pool watching honeycreepers. Actually, they are tiny birds and were high up in the branches, so Diane watched them and I squinted in vain.
For dinner, we had a delicious pureed vegetable soup with cream cheese, a green salad with strawberries, walnuts, and balsamic vinaigrette, and filet mignon (beef! Must be delivery day…) with mashed potatoes, beets, and green beans. The plates for the main course were garnished with star fruit. I encouraged my companions to try it, but regretted the decision when it turned out the fruit wasn’t fully ripe. The beef was well-salted and marinated with thyme. Good thing, too, because the salt was never coming out of those shakers. Haven’t these people ever heard of putting rice in the salt to take out the moisture? Dessert was German chocolate cake. Yeah, baby! Chocolate!
Oh, what a beautiful night it was with the full moon over the ocean. 
Full moon

Friday, April 19, 2013

Meanwhile...

Back in Illinois, we had 5" of rain between Wednesday morning and Thursday afternoon. On Thursday, we awoke to lakefront property, complete with geese swimming in the hay field.
The flooded field
By the time I got home from work, however, the waters had gone back down over most of our land. The piece to the south is still underwater. Last summer, I said I'd never complain about the rain, but it would be okay with me if it stopped for a little while now. Still, I'm glad that last summer was not the beginning of a 10-year drought like the Dust Bowl.

Tuesday, April 16, 2013

Costa Rica Day 3, March 26


We were up early for breakfast and a 6:30 departure to Corcovado National Park and our tour of the rainforest. Both hot and cold breakfasts were available. The choices of hot breakfasts included French toast or typico (I have no idea how to spell it). Tebs, our host for the day, explained that typico was eggs any style with beans and rice and a tortilla. Additionally, one could just have eggs and toast. Over on the bar, there was yogurt; granola; bananas; a fruit plate of watermelon, outstandingly sweet and juicy pineapple, and papaya; coffee (no decaf), and an assortment of teas (no green). I ordered typico with scrambled eggs. The eggs were at the perfect point between snotty and dry. The corn tortilla was freshly made. The typico was a mix of rice and black beans. It needed hot sauce, which was on the table. I had black tea.
La Paloma is an ecotourist resort. They try to live lightly on the land. Thus, they have refillable water bottles on loan to guests. The first day, they even filled them for us.
Promptly at 6:30, we met our guide, a young man with that common Latino name, Walter. No kidding. Not Jose or Antonio or Julio. Walter. Walter wore knee-high rubber boots. I think of them as foot saunas. How long would it be until his feet dissolved in this heat? We walked down the hill and got in the boat.
A short time later, we landed at Corcovado, the largest rainforest reserve in Costa Rica. We were barely on the shore when Walter took off to the trees next to the picnic area where we’d waded ashore. It was a band of capuchin monkeys.

Capuchin
We started our tour by walking along a beach studded with rocks that provided a testament to Costa Rica’s volcanic past.
The beach

One characteristic of rainforests is epiphytes, a word that literally means “on top of a plant.” The plants spend their whole life growing on another plant, never having roots in the soil. The first epiphyte we saw was an orchid called lady of the night.
Lady of the night

Walter pointed out some very tall trees than might be a hundred years old and 40 m high. That would be the height of a 12 story building. Very tall indeed.
Tall trees

Coconuts are water dispersed. The fruit is adapted to float in sea water without the salt harming the embryo. Coconuts have naturally spread all around the tropics. It was amazing for me to see even one sprouted coconut, and they were everywhere.
Coconut sprouts. These were about knee high

We were visiting the forest during the dry season. There were a few deciduous trees standing bare, but most trees were evergreen. The big trees had buttresses as an adaptation to growing in very wet soils. It helps keep them from tipping over. It is hard to believe when surrounded by so much plant growth, but the soils here are quite poor. All of the nutrients are tied up in biomass. When a leaf drops, especially in the wet season, it rots almost immediately, and the nutrients are sucked up by another plant. I quickly discovered that a consequence of this was that you had to watch your feet. There were roots all over the place. As much as I wanted to be looking up at the trees, lianas (vines), and epiphytes, I learned to walk, stop, and then look up.
Buttresses

And then there’s strangler figs. Walter explained that even though they killed their host trees, they were important in the forest because they are in fruit year-round, providing a constant source of food. Also, when the host tree dies, it will eventually fall down and open a light gap, allowing light-tolerant plants to grow. This process adds diversity to the forest. The strangler figs are dispersed by birds. They germinate in the canopy and grow down to the soil. Weird.
Strangler figs wrapped around the trunks of the larger trees, most clearly visible on the left. Diane is taking the picture. Walter is at the right

The awesome experiences I had on this tour is practically without number. I saw, in person, many things I studied in graduate school. One of the biggest thrills was the leaf-cutter ants. There they were, tiny little things carrying big (relatively) chunks of leaves in a parade down a tree and across the forest floor. It was just like National Geographic. Words cannot describe how I felt.
Leaf cutter ants

Shortly after that, we passed a swarm of army ants. “Watch your step,” Walter said.
Army ants swarming the stick

The trail led back to the beach. We saw a coati (co-ah-tee), a relative of the raccoon, nosing around where the forest met the sand.
Coati

We went back into the forest to complete the loop back to the picnic area. The boat crew and Walter set out quite a spread of bread, cheese, not-very-cold cuts (they had been in a cooler), pasta salad, tuna salad, glass bottles of soft drinks (mostly Coke), watermelon, and pineapple. I ate too much. Again.
We had some down time during lunch. You can imagine that it took some time to set up and take down the lunch food. We walked down to the nearby creek where we were lucky enough to see a tiger heron hunting.
Tiger heron
Near the restrooms (which flushed, by the way), there was a cashew tree. Just one more thing I was seeing for the first time.
Cashew

While eating lunch, I noticed a tree nearby that was absolutely covered with bromeliads, another kind of epiphyte.
Branch covered with bromeliads

Just before our afternoon hike, Walter called our attention to an anteater climbing up a tree. I was noticing that I was getting quite a lot of pictures of animal butts as they walked away from me.
Anteater

In the afternoon, we walked along the creek to a scenic waterfall.
By the waterfall

Perhaps the best moment of the day was swimming in the cool water by a smaller waterfall. After another sweaty day, it was wonderfully refreshing. The feeling didn’t last long, though.
Terry swimming by a smaller waterfall

We had a rough boat ride back. I took a shower and put on fresh clothes for dinner. Terry and I sat on the deck and watched a sloth in an acacia tree. It moved its head slowly from one side to the other. The pictures didn’t turn out. The light was wrong.
For supper, we had lentil soup followed by a green salad. It seemed like there was a chicken option and a fish option every night. We made our choice in the morning for that evening. Today I opted for the chicken breast with olives, capers, and fig. It was served with braised cucumbers (better than I expected) and sautéed plantains (which I liked a lot). Dessert was banana cream pie.
I was ready for bed at 8:30. My brain was full of all I’d seen and learned. My body was exhausted.