Day 25 Eating from a tropical garden

It’s pretty easy to eat well here when there is fresh fruit, vegetables and herbs for the picking but the grocery store is a drive away. At the tiny local grocery store, the staples costs more than you might expect and there is no such thing as pre-prepared food. All of this means that meals tend to be simple and close to their source. Almost everything is organic and local with free range eggs coming from Karen and Mike’s just down the road,

yogurt and cheese from Tad and Cook’s cows one town away, and the fish we have regularly enjoyed from the fishing village at Playa Bejuco, a nice walk down the hill.  I have bought tomatoes, garlic, and onions from the store but almost everything else has come from the land here. Marie grows pineapples, coconuts, starfruit,

Starfruit or Carambola as it is known locally

oranges, a few types of limes, bananas, mangos and mangas (yellow honey mangos in the States), papayas,

Papaya tree

and there is a community grapefruit tree next to Patty and Bill’s house that provides the neighborhood with sweet, fat grapefruits. In addition to all that fruit, she grows two types of tropical spinach, a cooking green called Chaya, two types of salad greens (one looks like a bush and one is a small tree) and all sorts of herbs from tropical cilantro, to spicy basil.
Hank and Marie’s worker, Mai has turned a small hill down near the quebrada into a bean patch. He is growing hundreds of bean plants that will provide his family with red beans for the entire year, once they are picked, shelled and dried. Here are some plants that he harvested so we could make gallo pinto (red beans and rice). Since the beans were fresh, they took only about twenty minutes to cook and yes, they were delicious.

Red beans in their shells

Day 24 Painting in Paradise

Painting in paradise sounds wonderful in theory but is difficult in practice; there are just so many distractions! Exotic birds call needing to be photographed and identified, the beautiful beach always beckons, and then there are friends like Wendy asking if I am maybe interested in hiking up to a new waterfall or looking for turtle hatchlings or something equally interesting.
Then back at home there are still daily chores: dishes and laundry which can hardly be considered work when you have the view that the kitchen sink commands:

And then it’s pretty fun to harvest something for breakfast, which means finding it first in the gardens that fall away in each direction from the house.

I have managed to work however, and have designed several large paintings and painted a large composition which is 36” wide and 12 feet long. Unfortunately, I lost most of my dyes on the flight down when they leaked at altitude from their little containers. Fortunately, I had triple wrapped them so none of that intense dye escaped into the interior of my suitcase, but I was left with precious little to actually apply to the silk. I did manage to finish these kois before the jars ran dry.

Day 23 The Estero at Camaronal

Signpost at Playa Camaronal

Wendy and Tom, checking out the surf

This morning, while Tom and Wendy surfed the world renowned break at Playa Camaronal, I went exploring in the Rio Oro. Exploring an estero by foot at daybreak is a wonderful thing. Everything is waking up and golden. Little blue herons and sandpipers patrolled the shallows and the fish slapped the water leaping for a breakfast bug. Little crabs popped into their burrows as I approached.

I followed a narrow fishing trail that wound through the trees following the curving river. Just as I was about to turn back, I saw a bit of pink on the river ahead: a roseate spoonbill, one of my favorite birds in Costa Rica! They are very shy so I snuck up on it as best I could while getting mired in the mud of the river bank. I got a few pictures from far off before it spotted me and flew off.

As I turned around to head back, I saw movement on the opposite shore which I recognized as an otter. Later access to a field guide identified it as a neotropical river otter which is endangered in Costa Rica and rarely seen. A lucky and appreciated sighting!
I returned to the beach and spotted two pairs of footprints in the sand which were the only ones there besides mine. Tom and Wendy had come to find me, turned back and surfed a second set. I rejoined them for a refreshing swim in the waves before heading back home for breakfast. It was only 8:00am.

Tom, post surf 

Day 22 Monteverde Cloud Forest

The most visited national park in Costa Rica is the Monteverde Cloud Forest Biological Reserve which is located in the north central part of the country and straddles the continental divide. Cloud forests are unique in that they exist at high elevations in tropical areas and are usually swathed in clouds so that the forest there is cool and almost constantly moist. Orchids wrap their roots around branches and trunks and bromeliads of every shape make the trees look like chandeliers. Vines and strangler figs create a primeval look so that if a dinosaur peered out from behind a giant buttressed trunk I don’t think I’d be too surprised.
Frogs, lizards and bugs of in all colors live here along with larger animals like monkeys, sloths and agoutis.  Tapirs and leopards and other exotic cats exist in the cloud forests but are rarely seen because of their rarity and secretive nature. The birds as you might imagine, also thrive there but are like the other animals hard to spot because of all of their foliage and the tendency for camouflage. We managed to see these tiny baby hummingbirds because a local guide pointed them out.

The highlight for me in this natural wonderland was a sighting of the Resplendent Quetzal which was among other things, the sacred bird of the Aztecs and kind of a holy grail to modern birders around the world. This bird is so spectacular that even while you are looking at it, it is hard to believe it’s real. You can see this boy’s green metallic helmet and wing coverlets laid over a bright scarlet cape but less evident are his 18 inch long twin tail feathers.

Once I saw the quetzal, I could have gone home—it’s that great of an occasion. Of course, we didn’t leave and continued to hike through the tangled jungle in the clouds.

Day 21 Riding the Bus

Tom arrived today!
In order to meet him in San Jose, pick up our rental car and drive back to San Miguel together, I took the public bus to San Jose. The crazy thing is, is that I feel like I am living on the edge of nowhere, yet there is a bus that runs past the bottom of the driveway—way out here---that will take me all the way to the capital six hours away. All I have to do is wait by the road (hopefully not in vain like for the produce truck) at 2:00am and flag the bus down with a flashlight.
Waiting for the bus at the side of the road at 2:00am is interesting. I got to watch tiny lighting beetles that crawled around in the roadside ditch, their little behinds glowing and dimming rather than blinking. I had time to enjoy the stars and discover a few new constellations, there being no street lights or any lights at all to block out the starlight. I also got to appreciate the night noises of various types of crickets (all have a different song), cicadas, and even the soft hoot of a nearby owl.
The bus finally chugged up the steep hill at 2:30am and stopped beside my suitcase. When the driver affirmed that this was the bus to San Jose (as if there was another bus at 2:30 out here going somewhere else!), I dragged my suitcase up the steps and plunked down on the front seat of a bus that might have looked modern back in the eighties in some large American city.
This old bus handled the rocks, potholes and hills better than I could have imagined and in two short hours we were in Jicarel after having picked up twenty or so passengers all waiting for this vital rumbling vehicle of transportation to pick them up. We all transferred to another bus in the metal shed that was the bus station, this bus being much newer and plusher with reclining seats.
Sometime on this leg, a woman boarded and rode the bus for a few miles, selling baked goods out of a basket to the passengers. I bought a small plastic bag with six cheese biscuit like crackers each with a bit with sweet filling which are a bit of an acquired taste but they looked familiar from a previous trip here so she had me as soon as she said “queso.”
Later a man boarded selling CD’s which he described in great detail, not that I understood all of what he was saying since I was still trying to sleep. But his voice carried well past the end of the bus, and I learned that his selections were wide ranging and ranged from rap and hip hop to marenge and tropicale, to the music of “Frozen.”
We passed through small towns that got larger as we got closer to San Jose dropping off and picking up passengers at will. After two hours we stopped for a bathroom and breakfast break at a small restaurant alongside the Pan American highway that we were on by now. Everyone got off with most of the women heading to the bathrooms and most of the men ordering a breakfast of eggs rice and beans and coffee which they quickly downed. I didn’t know how long we would stay there so I ordered a sandwich to go and some coffee “para llevar” also. I piled back on the bus with my food and coffee which turned out to be so hot it was halfway to San Jose before I could take even a sip.
At 8:30am, the bus drove up to the airport, dropped me and my suitcase at the curb and an quick shuttle ride took me to the rental car office across the highway where our car was waiting. Easy peasy!

Day 17-21 Things with Wings

Living in an outdoor house in Costa Rica is very exciting and constantly interesting especially if you like insects. This big boy visited the kitchen counter one of my first night’s here:

Rhinocerous Beetle

Katydids, grasshoppers, moths and beetles are constant visitors and can get annoying if they become inadvertent seasonings in the skillet as you are cooking dinner.

Katydid

Praying Mantis

Positively gigantic moth and teapot

This giant grasshopper would have terrified me if I hadn’t seen one in the jungle earlier. It was a full eight inches long and Itsy was pretty interested in it. Just as I was shooing her away from it (since it seemed to be a significant portion of her body weight), Nikita (the other dog) trotted by, snapped it up and swallowed it.

Butterflies stay pretty much in the garden and I would love to get a great picture of a blue morpho the most magical of them all with iridescent turquoise wings that light up the landscape wherever they are.

Not a blue morpho

There are other animals besides insects (and birds) that fly right through the house. I couldn’t figure out what was nibbling on the bananas ripening on the counter until I was up late one night and saw the world’s largest moth flapping through and pausing in the kitchen. The moth turned out to be a fruit eating bat that was doing laps over the bananas taking a bite with every pass.

Day 16 More Turtleness

I really wanted Andrea to be able to see turtles laying or hatching while she was here and following a tip from one of the gals at the ARA Parrot project we decided to stop by Corazalito Beach on the way home. Great decision! We hadn’t even gotten to the beach proper from the truck before we saw in the light of our flashlight, the bulk of a female Olive Ridley turtle lumbering up towards us in search of a spot of beach to lay her eggs. We sat down next to her and watched as she used her hind flippers to excavate a really deep hole in the warm sand. This process takes much longer than you might expect and as we were patiently observing in the dark (so as not to disturb her) I briefly turned on my flashlight to check the process only to see another turtle heading straight for Andrea and only a few inches from her!
She jumped up to get out of the way and with a sweep of the light saw that we were surrounded by turtles: coming up the beach, digging in the sand, laying eggs and heading back. There were turtles everywhere! In fact we discovered that there were so many turtles laying on the same stretch of sand that other turtles had utilized on previous nights that as this night’s turtles dug their nesting holes, they were digging up previous nests of turtle eggs. Ping pong ball-like turtle eggs were flying along with the sand and again I couldn’t help wanting to interfere with nature by returning some of these eggs to a nest where they might survive. We tucked as many eggs into the new nesting holes as we could before deciding that our ideas of what should or shouldn’t happen to those eggs was not our choice to make.
We had the honor of seeing our original mother lay her eggs and then watched in amazement as she filled it in with her flippers and then rocked her shell back and forth, slamming it on to the sand to tamp it down. The hard thumps resonated through the sand and into us and if you listened you could hear the same sounds all the way down the beach.
As she headed back down to the water’s edge, we carefully moved around the beach avoiding dozens of nesting turtles and soon came upon hatchlings too. There were mother turtles coming out of the sea, tiny hatchlings heading for it and spent turtles following in a moving turtle carousel on the night beach.

The only picture I took since we were trying really hard not to disturb the nesting turtles with cameras or lights.

Day 15 Rainbows in the Sky

After the cabalgata, Andrea and I made the trek back over the mountains and after a sidetrip over two rivers and an increasingly tenuous road were turned back by a locked gate at the Monte Alto Reserve which we had hoped to visit. The residents near the entrance to the park cheerfully waved at us for the second time as we went back down the hill again.
Our next destination was the ARA project in Punta Islita, north up the coast from Playa San Miguel. Named after the genus name for macaw parrots, this group is breeding the two macaws endemic to Costa Rica: the Scarlet Macaw and the Great Green Macaw and releasing them on the Caribbean coast (greens) and on the Nicoya Peninsula (scarlets) to bolster the dwindling wild populations.

What a visual treat greeted us as we came through the gates! Seventy five or so wild scarlet macaws, all released from the facility, had reconvened on the grounds for an afternoon snack courtesy of the project. They festooned the trees and were scattered around on the ground creating photo ops everywhere we looked.

Especially magical was seeing them fly, something I realized we don't usually experience when viewing macaws in small cages or confined to perches back home. All of their colors seem to swirl together as they flew past a background of bright green, creating rainbows in the sky wherever they went.

Day 14 Cabalgata!

Andrea and I had the pleasure of attending a cabalgata today. What in the heck is a cabalgata, you ask?  It is basically a party with horses. In this region of Costa Rica, the Guanacaste, cattle ranching is a big part of the landscape and of the culture. Not everyone is involved of course, but the cowboy culture is alive and well and many people ride horses for work and for pleasure. A cabalgata is a chance to get together and socialize---and show off your horses.
Friend Wendy had been invited to attend and was loaned a horse, she in turn suggested we might come to see a slice of local life, Costa Rican style. We made the drive over the mountains and arrived in the village of San Pablo as the first trailers full of horses were unloading. Soon the field was full of horses and the big shed was full of Ticos in boots and hats, many wearing matching western style shirts with embroidered club names on their back.

Wendy and Perlita

Beer flowed freely and we were all served meat soup and rice at big tables. As the only gringos in attendance (in addition to Wendy and another neighbor Mike) at the table of one of the most prominent ranching families, it was suggested we speak only in Spanish out of respect to our hosts. This we did, although for me that means I was pretty much limited to saying that yes, I have horses at my house in the United States and, I like your hat! I really regretted not brushing up on Spanish more before I came down.

Don Antonio flanked by two friends

We were under the impression that the horse riding activities were going to start in the morning but we soon came to understand that the party would continue until it started to cool off in the late afternoon. Unfortunately, since we had planned to visit a nearby nature preserve that day as well and we didn’t want to drive back in the dark, we reluctantly left before the horse activities started. We did get to enjoy looking at them, the different tack they wore, and heard from Wendy later all about what the riders did. What we reluctantly missed were games on horseback, herding water buffalo, and a demonstration of horse dancing in which horses under saddle prance in place on a small wooden platform in order to demonstrate their training and even cadence. The day ended with a trail ride through the lush countryside.

I will certainly look forward to attending another cabalgata perhaps even having a horse to ride there!

Day 13 Kayaking the Estero

Mangrove estuaries are mysterious and fascinating places, home to complex ecosystems of diverse plants and animals. Unfortunately, because they grow in valuable shoreline areas, they are often drained and filled for development. Mangroves are protected in Costa Rica and there are three large esteros in the San Miguel area.
Andrea and I rented kayaks to explore the largest one that drains the Jabillo River near Punta Coyote a few miles south of here. We felt like explorers in the Amazon but with a lot less gear. The main river has many side channels that twist and turn until they get too shallow to follow. Tall trees completely fill the sky but the most arresting feature are the roots of the mangroves which branch and arch above the water so that the trees looks like they have legs.

These roots criss cross and overlap each other into an impenetrable tangle that are highways for several types of crabs, and home to encrusting oysters, barnacles and certainly many other creatures unnoticed by me. They also make excellent perches for the many birds that live here like herons and egrets, wandering tattlers (great name!), and this jaunty green kingfisher among others.

Deep into one channel we smidged over a big fallen tree that was barely submerged and then had to navigate a much larger obstacle on the way back after the tide had receded appreciably.

We ended our explorations by heading out to the mouth of the river, where it met the breakers at the beach. This is a tiny fishing port that we passed:

Just as we pulled the kayaks out of the water and back up into the shed, the darkening skies opened up and chased us back up the hill, out of the mangroves and into the hotel.

Day 12 Community equals sharing

It has been a wonderful to meet the “gringo” residents of this area and begin to understand the community that binds them. I have met neighbors from France, Germany, Switzerland, Holland, Canada, and all parts of the United States. There are all sorts of people of all ages who are living here for different reasons, but all love their adopted country passionately.
What is especially interesting about this community is the amount of sharing and helping that goes on. Without a store or gas station nearby, anytime anyone goes into “town” (over an hour away) they offer to bring back anything that others might need.
Within two days of my arriving, new friend Patty brought me back diesel for the truck when she went to Carmona. When I went to pick up my friend Andrea at Liberia last week, I brought back lettuce, sweet potatoes, chocolate chips, bleach and four containers of gas or diesel for residents here. Wendy borrowed a cookie sheet, I borrowed a battery charger for the truck from Bill. Patty needed a double boiler. When the truck wouldn’t start, Wendy called the mechanic Calin and arranged for him to come here and fix it (a two hour repair that cost $10.00).  I traded lemon grass for fresh eggs.
All of this sharing and caring, loaning and trading seems very natural and easy and happens nearly every day.
The best part of this kind of generosity is that no one has to own everything.

Generous neighbors Wendy and Patty and her dogs enjoying a tidepool soak at Playa Bejuco

Day 11 How to start a day with birds

This morning I set my alarm for 5:30 to make sure I was out on the street by 6am. The fruit and vegetable truck comes through this area between 6:00 and 7:00 and if you flag Marvin down you can buy from the back of his truck. When I heard that he might have fresh passionfruit and hearts of palm, I wanted to make sure I did not miss him, though the refrigerator here is far from bare.
I went down the driveway with my book and a cup of coffee along with a bird guide and camera just in case, not knowing how long I might wait. Before I even got comfortable in a chair I dragged out from the bodega and positioned next to the road, I saw a pair of one of my favorite birds, the White-throated Magpie Jay, land in a tree nearby. Delighted since I had only seen one so far on this trip, I managed to get a decent picture of one before they continued on their way.

I then noticed movement behind me and discovered a squirrel cuckoo in the hibiscus, These long tailed birds hop along branches much like a squirrel, hence their name.

Next a pair of noisy orange-chinned parakeets started feeding on blossoms on a tree across the road. They stayed there long enough for me to get a few good photos and positively id them in Marie’s comprehensive bird guide.

The parakeets were replaced by a large parrot I had not seen before which turned out to be a white-fronted parrot. I watched it tear the flowers apart as it ate them with apparent relish.

This went on and on, I photographed a Hoffmann’s woodpecker, some sort of orange and yellow oriole, and any number of hummingbirds. I finished my coffee, waved at the neighbors as they drove past and id’d more birds. I looked at my watch: 7:30, hmmmm.
Then I looked up higher in the sky to see a wood stork soar past and at a lower level a single black hawk circled. A mourning dove cooed over and over again from the telephone line stretched along the road. Another hummingbird, a new type to me and impossible to identify, buzzed past.
It was now 7:55. I decided to give Marvin five more minutes. At 8:00, I headed up the driveway, coffee cup empty, unopened book under my arm. I had no vegetables but I did have a camera full of great photos and the memory of an exquisite day that unfolded in front of me in the form of the lives
of the birds that live here.
I’ll wait for that vegetable truck anyday!

Day 10: Cow Day

Today seemed like the day of cattle.                                                                                                       They were wandering loose along the road on the way to the beach:

Then they were peeking out of bushes:

and then in a surprising sight, a this herd was wandering around the beach in the middle of the day. Then they were running along the shore—I don’t know why.

I take a lot of pictures of the cattle that live here because I think they are so interesting to look at. These cattle are brahmas or brahma crosses which are a breed originally from India bred to do well in high temperatures and humidity. Their long ears and thin skin help dissipate heat. All colors occur but white is most common which is a good strategy in a hot, sunny climate. They are all pretty cute,
but the little ones with huge bat-wing ears are my favorite.

Day 9 This is the real deal

I am staying in a very rural part of Guanacaste on the Nicoya Peninsula, two thirds of the way down towards the tip of this huge land mass hanging off of the west coast. Although the scenery is stunning and the beaches spectacularly beautiful, modern development has not reached this area partly due to the remoteness from any major towns and because of the primitive state of the mostly single lane roads. Also, while the surf is good here, it is not compared to some famous spots north and south of us, which draws huge numbers of surfers and has driven development there.
As a result the Ticos (Costa Ricans) live a very traditional lifestyle, little influenced by outside forces. pretty much as they have for generations. Life is centered around family and home in small villages that often occur at crossroads. Those who work usually do so locally and commute by walking, by motorcycle or car or even horseback! Gas is expensive and carefully consumed. Each village has a small grocery store or two and a “soda” which is a simple restaurant and bar and there is often a small mechanic shop as well. If you are low on gas out here (a bad idea) you ask around and get directed to someone’s house. You will pay a premium and say a prayer as whoever is home fills up your tank from recycled gallon jugs filled with gas and stored in a shed nearby. A funnel helps smooth the operation.
Here is a woman who was moving cattle through Pueblo Nuevo (the nearest town) last week, along with another herder on a motorcycle:

Sunday is specifically devoted to rest and many people take in a local futbol game or perhaps pay respects to ancestors at the local cemetery. My friend Wendy likes to place flowers on the graves in the tiny cemetery at Playa Bejuco and so she took me there last Sunday and we did just that, adding beach peas to the lonely graves without arrangements.

Tico homes in the area are pretty simple and always seem to have the front doors open. There are almost always flowers in the yard, a dog or two for protection and a flock of free range chickens. You cannot drive through a village of more than a few homes without seeing people gathered outside on the porch just visiting at at least one of them. Ticos seem to take time (or make it) for each other.

Of course, life is not perfect even though my outside superficial view sees these peaceful scenes. The middle class is shrinking, divorce is not uncommon, and corruption is dismayingly prevalent in government here. The price of food is high and many people subsist on rice and beans much of the time, not by choice. There are not enough jobs in the rural areas, which has only gotten worse here with the closing of several small restaurants and hotels along Playa San Miguel in the last few years.

On the other hand, universal health care is available and functions well, the democratic government and currency are stable and education is well funded.  Several polls have rated Costa Ricans as the happiest people on earth (you can read about it online including an interesting NY Times article from 2010) and I am a daily witnes as to why.

Day 8 Excitement in the Bedroom

Day 8  Excitement in the Bedroom

Remember, I am staying here alone...but that doesn't mean that I am the only body in my bedroom-the one with the view of the ocean blue and the sounds of the surf all night long... I went to brush my teeth last night and their was a crab in my sink! It was a baby Halloween crab, named for its colors.

Once I am ready for bed, I am joined by the three pets who live here, previously mentioned. Here is little Itsy, already under the covers. She is hoping I won't kick her out.

And in case you think I am living in some rustic lean-to or something, here are two views of the beautiful home that I am so priveleged to be enjoying.

patio outside the bedroom

Dining area with pool behind left, kitchen behind right

and finally, here is the view that I wake up to outside my window--with all three furry companions, of course: