blogabroadCompared to the deluxe Los Lagos Resort my Mom found for us to stay at by Arenal Volcano, Don Taco was a bit more humble. We stayed in wooden cabins on stilts with quaint balconies. Mike and my parents weren’t too hot on the idea of a cold shower. Mike cracked me up because he kept pointing out how everything including the mirror bounced when he walked across the floor. So there wasn’t a wet bar serving piña coladas in pineapples, but there was a yummy Tican breakfast (rice, beans, eggs, fruit, cheese, coffee), wonderful staff, and a cute dog all for $20 a night per person. The desk staffers were fantastic; Jessica arranged all our tours and had a friend go pick up my Dad’s belly bag from across the lake at Los Lagos.
This parrot gnawed on fruit outside of a small restaurant. Poor thing had his wings clipped so he couldn’t fly anywhere. He and my Dad played a game where he flipped his food dish, my Dad picked it back up, and the cycle repeated.
We went on two tours; on Monday afternoon we went on a canopy tour at Santa Elena and the next morning we went for a walking tour in Monteverde National Park. I chose for us to stay in Santa Elena because it is less touristy than the famous Monteverde—and as a result, less expensive. But there is still plenty to do like horseback riding to waterfalls, canopy zip lines, tours of cheese making factories, and tours of sugar cane farms. Monday night I had fresh, hot sugarcane juice with my dinner at Morphos restaurant. Very tasty. Although, my meal was a strange combo--I ordered a veggie burger and ended up with a fried egg on a roll with avocado slices, lettuce, tomato, and onion. I think it’s better to just stick with good ole gallo pinto (rice and beans). It makes me laugh how many Italian restaurants there are in Costa Rica. You don’t come here for Italian food; You come here for fresh pineapple, papaya, and other exotic fruits, as well as fried plantains, tortillas, gallo pinto, cafecito (literally little coffee), ceviche, and lisano sauce (like barbecue sauce). Before coming here I never really appreciated rice, beans, and tortillas but there are so many delicious ways to season and prepare them! Mmmmm....yum!
Before dinner we went on a “Sky Walk” canopy tour in Santa Elena. The company also offered “Sky Trek” zip lines. Though zip lining down through the canopy would be a terrific rush, we opted for the bridge walk because it allowed us to take our time and see more. Plus, my Mom is not a fan of heights; even walking up the spiral staircase to the net bridges she was not very happy. The first of our six bridges was 49 feet high and 98 feet long. My favorite was the last one which took us 150 feet above the ground for a length of 900 feet. From that bridged we saw male and female Orange-bellied Trogons, which are in the same family as the Resplendent Quetzel. At the end of the bridge a Violet Saberwing, the largest Hummingbird in Costa Rica, hovered right in front of us for a few moments.
On the right side you see blue sky. Mike and I enjoyed slowly walking along the bridges looking for birds and exciting epiphytes. Unfortunately we didn’t see any monkeys!
The next morning we got up early and trekked out to Monte Verde National Park right at opening time, 7 AM, because they only admit a limited number of visitors per day and we were told that that would give us the greatest chance of seeing Resplendent Quetzels. Gerardo, my professor who is always 100% serious (*cough*cough*), told me that I was very likely to go the whole semester and never see one. So I suppose it’s good that I went with low hopes. After we bought tickets for our tour I saw a ranger making the Quetzel call and listening to the woods. I followed him and he spotted 2 females and a male in a parking lot tree snacking on fruits resembling small avocados. In my excitement, I didn’t know whether to use binoculars or my camera! Decisions, decisions! A paparazzi like group of tourists descended on the bottom of the tree rapidly snapping pictures with large flashes and telephoto lenses that made me green with envy. My mom shouted for me to come or I’d miss the tour and I told her, “Wait a minute, come here first!” The birds flew from their tree to another across the parking lot and everyone ran after them. I fumbled and got the picture below before they flew away from all the noise and the chaos of the gawking humans. I apologize that my shot doesn’t do the bird justice.
My photo’s not great but it must be included because it is a male Resplendent Quetzel! There are less than a thousand of these magnificent birds left in the world. Our Monteverde Tour guide solemnly predicted that they will be extinct within 30 years.
I was happy because I had seen my Quetzel. Mike and Dad joked that now we had to go search for a Resplendent Pretzel with mustard for Mom because she had missed it. Our next wildlife encounter was with a curious Coati Mundi who had adapted to the tourists in the park. Like a raccoon in the states he scavenged around the picnic tables and trash cans for food. It is interesting and sad how even in National Parks exposure to humans can fundamentally change a wild animal’s behavior so that it no longer needs to practice its adapted hunting and scavenging techniques. Animals such as pigeons, deer, and raccoons, which are able to best coexist with human society, are labeled pests. But they wouldn’t be as prevalent if we hadn’t altered the environment in the first place. Each and every one of our actions has such a great effect on the world around us.
The Coati Mundi struts his stuff as he trots through a group of tourists.
Something smells interesting!
Dad was a trooper and insisted on hiking all the way to the continental divide while in Monteverde Tropical Cloud Forest.
Our guided tour through Monte Verde was delightful, although we did not witness much animal wildlife. Our guide joked that we could not find many of the melodious birds because there was an inverse correlation between musical talent and physical beauty; the beautiful birds don’t have to work hard to earn a mate as a LBB (little brown bird) or a LYB (little yellow bird). We heard the calls of many species including the Quetzels and hawks. However we could not find the forest dwellers because of the abundance of plant life; dew dripping epiphytes, mosses, vines, bromeliads, and multicolored orchids carpeted the giant fichus, palms, and other species of trees. At one point our guide told us a hollow strangler fig was filled with a colony of butterflies. I stared for a minute inside the heart of the tree and saw nothing--that is until our guide blew inside and a mass of black wings scattered and flew away.
An old growth tree covered in epiphytes, bromeliads, mosses, ferns, and hundreds of other species. In the tropics you cannot measure rings to determine age because there are not distinct hot and cold seasons. Instead age is estimated by the number of species living on a tree.
As a defensive mechanism millipedes like this spray cyanide to fend off predators. You can tell centipedes and millipedes apart because millipedes have two legs on each segment while centipedes have only one.
I think that this is a Saturniid moth (Rothschilidia lebeau). The one on the cover of Daniel Janzen’s Costa Rican Natural History had slightly rounder triangles. You can tell a moth from a butterfly because moths rest with their wings spread.
The view of Puntarenas and the Bay of Nicoya from the continental divide. We couldn’t make out the Caribbean on the other side because it was a little two cloudy – makes sense since it’s called a Tropical Cloud Forest.
The Tree House Café in downtown Santa Elena was one of our two favorite places to eat because it featured a giant fichus tree in the center of the restaurant.
This is Mike’s photo of the fichus trunk. We ate chocolate fondue by the upper branches. Dad liked dipping tortilla chips, Mike liked pineapple best, I think Mom liked bananas and I enjoyed eating straight chocolate sauce. Chocolate fondue with tropical fruit = straight bliss!
As always thank you for reading. Mucho gusto,
Tammy J
