Violated Honey Bear

Months ago when we discovered that our jungle mice will come into the house and eat just about anything, we started storing all fruits and vegetables in the refrigerator. Yes, even potatoes and bananas, things that you wouldn't ever think to put in the fridge, have to be sealed away from the stealthy rodents. We had continued to keep our garlic out on a shelf since we had never had any problems with the mice fancying a munch on that. Until this morning. We woke up to find that something had nibbled into a head of garlic. And then when I reached for the honey, I was horrified to find that our honey bear had been violated! I can only assume that the mouse had the manners to remove the bear's nose to spare it the misery of its pungent garlic breath as it then went at our poor bear's left ear.

Puffbirds and Pumas

On a walk up to Cerro Arbolito yesterday morning we heard a lot of racket in the canopy of the forest ahead of us. We recognized the noise as the alarm calls that monkeys make when they see a big cat; however, the odds that you'll ever lay eyes on a big cat are very low, so we didn't hurry ahead. The monkeys continued to scream and bark as we approached - there was an entire troop of spider monkeys and a few white-faced capuchins scattered around. When we were close enough to see where the monkeys were looking, we started to think that this cat must be relatively close. And then out stepped a puma, 5 meters directly in front of us, right out into the open trail. It paused with its right paw in mid-air. I paused, in awe. We locked eyes. And then the puma calmly turned back into the underbrush and disappeared. My camera was in my backpack, so of course I took it out and plunged into the forest to see if I could get that coveted shot, but it wasn't to be.

Instead, I got a shot of this white-necked puffbird. It stayed on this branch for ages, turning and posing. Not nearly as impressive as a large carnivore in your face, and telling somebody that you saw a puffbird somehow doesn't have the appeal that big cat sightings do. Oh well, maybe next time we're out we'll see a jaguar!

Collared Anteaters and Bamboo

We scared this guy up into the bamboo one morning a while back. Known as a Tamandua or Collared Anteater (Tamandua mexicana), these animals prefer a feast of termites rather than ants. Another thing that we learned from watching this individual's attempted escape is that they can't get a very firm grip on bamboo - it's slick surface isn't conducive to climbing. Perhaps this trait of bamboo, coupled with thick, leafy and often spiny foliage, is what draws the troops of Squirrel Monkeys (Saimiri oerstedii) in to settle many evenings.

Scarlet Macaws in the Yard

Even though there are loads of Scarlet Macaws on the Osa Peninsula (in fact, I recently read that we have the highest population in Central America), we rarely see them perching around Cerro Osa. They tend to spend a lot of time at lower elevations, especially around the beaches in the almond trees. This afternoon, however, I heard their distinctive screech and saw this couple eating some very green guavas. Of course when I grabbed the camera they flew higher to perch on the other side of the house and enjoy their fruit.

Watch Your Step

I saw this Fer-de-lance by the storage shed on my way home last night. Everybody around here says that you need to be most careful between about 5:30 - 6:30 pm when the sun is setting. It brings a lot of insects out, which brings a lot of frogs and lizards out, which brings a lot of snakes out, and down the line. And then there's the fact that we have a lot of bamboo leaves on the ground which tends to be a great place for snakes to slither around. 

I saw this before I was too close. But this morning, Roger, Juan's son who is about 3 years old, nearly stepped on this same snake which had made its way to the other side of the shed. I was about to say that he has already learned about the danger of snakes, but I remember reading somewhere that the fear of snakes is an innate phenomenon that is not taught nor learned. Show a snake to a baby monkey and see how it freaks out.

Hummer

It's not great, but I got a shot of this hummer (hummingbird in birder parlance) on the Cerro Osa trail this morning. We left at 7 am with Augustin to walk the middle access road through the teak plantations, up to the northern border of our property. This turned out to be another doozy of a hike - totalling 6 hours on the nose and covering a large portion of the north and west property borders. 

I was pretty wiped out after that as a morning activity, but had to prepare things for Tyler. Tyler's a student from Purdue University who will be living on Cerro Osa for the next few months conducting trials on the efficacy of biochar as a soil improvement amendment. Interesting stuff, huh?! All I can say is that if it makes the tomatoes bigger and juicier, and the eggplant come up at all, bienvenido!

Wild Nutmeg

Yesterday morning we took a walk on the trails of Bosque del Cabo, an eco-lodge that is one of our neighbors here on the peninsula. It's common to find large tree seeds on the ground whenever you go for a walk through the forest. These are a species of wild nutmeg, known as fruta dorada, or golden fruit. I found some of the seeds where the fruit had already opened and the distinct red aril had been eaten, probably by large birds or maybe monkeys. From Tropical Plants of Costa Rica: "There are many species in the Amazon Basin. Resin from some species, especially V. theiodora, is famous for its use by Amazonian shamans in hallucinogenic snuff preparations and as an arrow poison. Various alkaloids in the resin cause a lack of muscular coordination, nasal discharge, visual distortion (seeing things larger than they are), nausea, and hallucinations. This family also includes true nutmeg (the seed) and mace (the aril), both from the same plant, Myristica fragrans, which originates in Indonesia."

So basically, you gotta go to the Amazon or Indonesia for the good stuff. What we have here is for the birds.

SHIT!

That's right.  I said it.  I have succumbed to cursing on my blog.  In our first month here we consistently found insect shit throughout the house, and then as we became more knowledgeable about the local fauna, discovered that the floor candy I had been eating was bat shit.  Recently we have seen much more mouse shit on our floors and counters, and finally had to remove the mosquito net from our bed after a mouse chewed a huge ass hole through the top of it.  I guess they like this kind of material, along with pillow case material (yup, another huge ass hole in a new Ikea pillow case from the guest room), to make their nests so that they can raise more shitting little mice.

Yesterday we had a cute warbler start to visit the house.  It was singing happily and flitting from door frame to window frame.  We watched it flit in and out, perch and sing its lovely song in hopes of attracting a young hottie from the jungle to make sweet bird love to on our porch.  And then it flew into the house and shat on my exercise ball.

Patience

Wow, it has been a long time since I last wrote. I am not yet accustomed to living here - I forgot how mundane tropical days can feel, while at the same time how they can just go by unnoticed. Always 12 hours of daylight, 12 hours of dark, and short, quick sunsets. You have to find another rhythm. I think growing up in Michigan, my mind and body are trained to thrive on changing seasons, day light, temperature. There's something dynamic and exciting about yearly cycles. Here you are never hoping for the day to last just a little longer, or the weather to get warmer or cooler. It won't. 

In a lot of ways, and for a lot of things, this consistency is comforting. Predictability brings stability I suppose. So I'm trying to just accept it. You can definitely find a plethora of interesting things here that you couldn't further north. The abundance of diverse plants and animals is overwhelming. On Cerro Osa, there are more than 700 different kinds of trees, for example. I could spend years studying and still never be able to identify many of them. 

And then there is the connection to the land. Everything is so close and personal here. Juan, one of the workers up here, brought us some bananas from close to his house yesterday. And Augustin, his brother, had already left us 5 mangoes earlier in the day. We have a starfruit tree just behind the house that is full of delicious fruit right now. And we've started our own garden. So far we've planted a lot of different kinds of tomatoes, two kinds of cucumbers, eggplant, pumpkin, watermelon, bottle gourds, and Tinda, a kind of Indian gourd. We really weren't sure how any of these would do, but I'm sure that the raised beds and improved soil is giving them a much better chance of survival than had we simply planted them in the ground. We're getting rain nearly every day now, so besides some weeding, they take very little work. The work here associated to gardening has everything to do with hauling organic materials for composting, and then hauling that soil to the raised beds. This week we'll be installing 8 more beds and getting some more seed in the ground to take advantage of the rains.

Ultimately we'll need to get a volunteer program up and running on Cerro Osa which will help provide income to support the protection of the land. This property alone is over 1500 acres and the Friends of the Osa land in total is more than 4,000 acres, and the goal is to absolutely conserve the primary forest, river and coastal ecosystems, and restore [or allow them to recover] any of the disturbed habitat. I had no idea of the complications surrounding land tenure when I showed up here. In order to conserve the biodiversity of your property, you have to first ensure that nobody steals your land. To do that, you have to constantly be walking your borders. I read that if a squatter is on your land for more than three months, the legal process to remove that person is much longer. So we'll be arranging walks with the main purpose of vigilance hopefully much more frequently than every 3 months to ever corner of the properties. The other thing to try to prevent on your land is illegal hunting. This is a little trickier as you are now talking about dealing with people who have guns - and aren't the most educated folks in the world. Therefore, preventing hunting takes much more coordination with the governmental body in charge of control and protection of protected lands, MINAET. But wouldn't it be nice if these walks were done as nature observation walks with students or educational experiences with other visitors interested in conservation? That seems like a sustainable model to me. That's the direction we're going in, but because we are also putting a conservation easement on the property, we'll need all involved parties to agree that this is a good model that will have a very low impact on the land and water. Done correctly, designed intelligently, I think we'll be able to make it work.

If You've Ever Dug a Grave...

... then you'll certainly appreciate the amount of work it takes to work with heavy clay soil bound together with a mass of roots. There were more than a few jokes that flew back and forth about being bored enough up here to dig your own grave, etc. Ha ha. But seriously:)

As part of our holistic approach to living on Cerro Osa, we're improving our compost pit - well, basically starting from scratch. We've leveled some ground behind the house to start a home garden and are toying with water catchment as well. The latter, however, we found out yesterday will require a huge amount of storage. 

We were exposed to our first torrential Tico downpour and learned that from only one of the four corners of the roof, we could fill a 50 gallon barrel in less than 5 minutes. It was astonishing! The rain came down so hard and the wind was blowing so violently that much of the water missed the barrel and it still filled as if by a fire hose.

Monkeys Around

This morning was packed full of wildlife! We decided that it had been too long since we had been out on the trails (I think Monday morning was our last time out, a hike up to Cerro Arbolito) so headed out after breakfast. We saw the Blue-crowned Motmot that we normally only hear close to the Rio Coyunda, as well as a black Tayra. I'm not sure if this is the same Tayra that I've seen before, but this sighting was better than the previous two. The first time I saw it, it was running across the clearing in front of the house, while the second time was along the entrance road to Cerro Osa. However, this morning was in the middle of the forest and when it saw us, it jumped onto a tree trunk and stared at us. When I pointed the camera, it jumped down, moved further into the forest and up another trunk. It did this once more before it was out of sight.

The howler monkeys were incredibly loud as we crossed the Rio Coyunda. We knew that they had to be close, but we couldn't quite get a fix on them. We kept moving to the southern border of the Cerro Osa property where we spotted the white-faced capuchin monkeys. These things are like the devil incarnate. I don't really know what it is about them, but when you see them in the wild, and look into their eyes, you feel pure evil permeate the air. 

On the same trail we were able to catch a lek of Red-capped Manakins giving a show to a prospective mate. They make a curious clicking sound with their wings and you wouldn't believe that wings could make such a sound until you see it. We stood staring straight up at their mating display until our necks hurt.

As we returned to the Rio Coyunda we found the elusive howlers loitering along the edge of the path. They were quite quiet until we stopped to observe them and sneak a couple of photos. Once they were onto us they released their distinct bellowing wails.

I've uploaded some videos of the Manakins and Howlers here: http://www.youtube.com/user/OsaConservation

Amphibians in Our Lives

We don't yet have a name for our house gecko, but we like it to be around to gobble up unwanted insects.

The second photo is of a poison dart frog (Dendrobates auratus) that we spotted on a hike this morning.  This was actually the first of two that we saw in only a few hours.  This displays the colorations of the Pacific variation while those from the Caribbean side are greener with black markings.

Fer-de-lance

We're still trying to figure out what is going on with our power here in the house and haven't heard back from any technicians.  So we wait.

Adrian arrived yesterday and we've been going over some of the major ideas that need to be implemented in the coming months regarding the operation of Cerro Osa, the Osa Biodiversity Center, and Friends of the Osa in general.  He definitely keeps things balanced though, making sure to take time to relax and breathe while discussing work.

We walked down the Terciopelo trail [Terciopelo means Fer-de-Lance in English] to check out a possible site for constructing a new turtle station for volunteers.  Manuel Ramirez was in front, Adrian second, I was third and Saima was in back.  I saw something scuttle in the leaf litter and immediately stopped.  Adrian turned around and confirmed that it was a Fer-de-Lance.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bothrops_asper

Aptly named trail! 

Unfortunately we broke rule number one of the good photographer so words will have to suffice for today.

Our Solar System is in Trouble

 

The past few days have been challenging. About three days ago, just as we are quoting a small solar system for the house that we're supposed to be fixing up, we find that we don't have any electricity in the morning. At first it didn't really bother us. After a couple of hours the lights and internet kicked back on. But later that same day in the evening as we sat staring at the walls after dinner, all the power kicked off again. Hmmm... We talked to Juan and Augustin who came over and checked all the charges on the bank of eight batteries that power the house. Everything was right around 5.8 volts - not too bad for 6 volt batteries.

We asked them what they thought it could be and they both mentioned that the last owners who had internet here had the same problems. When there is no internet connected, no problems. Activate the satellite and they start to see the problems with the solar system. So at this point it seems obvious that we'll need to do something to expand the capabilities.

Yesterday we hiked the south border of the Cerro Osa property with Augustin. We had no clue how crazy this trek was when we started. The beginning is fairly normal trail through the forest. But about halfway in, we found ourselves on a pronounced ridge that fell off to each side steeper with every step. We made our way, sliding for some of it, down to the base of a waterfall. Augustin looked back, half apologetic, half amused, saying that we had to go up.

Go up? All we could see was a waterfall. He pointed and showed us a rope that ran about 50 meters up the cliff. After some slipping through the splashing water, we got to the rope and hauled ourselves to solid ground. The next quarter mile, however, was a very steep climb, where the only good way to keep yourself from sliding backward down into the river was by searching for and grasping onto tree roots that stuck out from the soil.

Covered in mud, with a couple of bruises and a few cuts, we came out on top to complete another hour and half hike back to the house. When all was said and done, it was a great hike. But probably one that we won't do again. It was important to learn the trail though.

This morning I had the laptop set up out on the porch to work [after the electricity came on of course] and saw three Fiery-billed Aracaris zip by into the Cicropias behind the house.  I had seen some before fly across the clearing, smaller than the Chestnut-mandibled Toucans, with a different flight pattern and the distinct bill allowing them to be discerned from a distance.  I was able to get a few good shots.

I took the memory card out of the camera to download the photos, and looked up from the screen to see a Tayra skulking across the clearing.  I fumbled to get the memory card back into the camera, but by the time I did, it was gone.

Morning Walk

Saima and I walked down the Cerro Osa trail this morning to the Osa Biodiversity Center. When you walk the trails frequently, you learn where animals tend to be. We saw a pair of Great Curasows at the Rio Coyunda crossing in the same place I had seen them a month ago. We always here the Blue-crowned Motmot calling in the same place. Augustin taught us to call to the motmot. It always answers back to let you know it's there.

This is a photo of a young Heliconia and a diurnal moth that we spotted on the way down.

Learning to Ride

This is kind of how Saima looked this morning when she was learning to drive the quad. My first time was only a week ago, after a 2 minute lesson in front of the Friends of the Osa office before we lashed down our shopping and hit the dusty road to return to Cerro Osa. We agreed that it was a good idea for both of us to be able to get around in case of an emergency up here.

Sai got a photo of this pizote at Adrian's house this morning. We went down to show Luz how to make soap from scratch. We made a 50/50 mix of coconut/palm oil soap and it looked like it was setting well when we left.
We also got a shot of two agoutis while drinking our coffee and tea on the porch this morning.

Saima's First Big Snake

This morning I took the quad with Augustin down to visit Jackie and Olly, neighbors with some questions about planting trees around their new home site.  When I got back to Cerro Osa, Saima was excited to show me the photos she got of a rather impressive snake.

After a few photos and measurements, Juan took this big guy into the forest and released it.  It as 2.3 meters long.  How many inches is that?

Here is a photo of Juan and his nephew, Alex, showing off their find:

We headed down to the OBC to meet the Dintersmiths, a family of four that is doing a round-the-world trip.  While they didn't have too much time, we were still able to take them on a short tour of one of the station's trails.  Although we didn't see a lot with them, Saima and I headed up the Rio Piro after the family had moved on.  Off the top of my head, we saw a Green Kingfisher, Belted Kingfisher, Black-throated Trogon, Piratic Flycatcher, Bare-throated Tiger Heron, Red-legged Honeycreeper, White-crested Coquette, Prothonotary Warbler, and Cherrie's Tanager.  There were troops of spider and squirrel monkeys foraging along the river's edge as well, making for an exciting afternoon walk.  This place is amazing!

Visitors in the House

While we almost feel that we're settled in to the house here on Cerro Osa, we're also acutely aware that we need to start figuring out a budget to fix up the smaller house further down the hill.  We're getting pretty good at this routine, though; moving from one place to the next, getting somewhat settled in, but not too much.  Kind of ironic that it has happened again.

The houses are designed so that they can be completely opened up here which is ideal for the tropical heat and humidity.  However, you need to understand that when your house is wide open, you may get some unexpected guests.  In the last couple of days we have hosted a bat, a gecko (that we would love to have permanently), and a pizote that came in to eat a mango off the counter. This afternoon, after a long hike to get to know some of the borders of our properties, I was getting ready to settle into something else - work.  I had just sat down to dig into some enticing work plans, and review some documents that might be helpful in understanding the history of land use on Cerro Osa, when a truck load of unexpected visitors showed up.  

It turns out that the rogue leader was Manuel Ramirez who sits on the Friends of the Osa board of directors, so we were obligated to invite them in!  He had brought some friends and family up to sit on the porch of the house and watch the sunset.  We made up some lemonade to keep them away from the mangos on the counter.

Using Your Turn Signals

Things have been crazy since the last time I wrote.  I think I had just returned to Hyattsville after being down in the Osa for nearly a month.  I managed to slip in a blog post before the reality of moving out of the country struck me.

Saima had already done so much to get our apartment packed up, giving some things to charity and boxing clothes that we knew we would have no use for in the tropics [think thick jeans and wool sweaters].  Even so, the big task that we had was finding somebody to take over our lease so that we wouldn't be hit with the two month penalty.  We had the place advertised on Craigslist and were waiting until I got back to the States to begin showing it.  With so many people interested and so many people who came to see it, I thought it would be a piece of cake.  Well, after the entire week, we were able to wrap it up the day before we left the country.  Needless to say, there were a lot of emotions involved with packing up to leave, from a place where we weren't even sure we wanted to be but had started to like, after reconnecting with friends only to be on our way out again.  And on top of all of that, Saima had just received her permanent resident card, which nullified the need for the travel document that we had waited so long to receive.  Now we'll see if we can somehow maintain her status while living abroad - we both kind of doubt it.

We showed up at Reagan National airport and were greeted by a friendly Continental agent who began helping us to check in.  It wasn't too long before he told us that we had a problem with our tickets - they were only one-way and we couldn't enter Costa Rica unless we had a flight out.  Fortunately, he was much more helpful than many airline employees we've dealt with in the past, and after some phone calls, we had two refundable tickets to Tegucigulpa and were on our way to security.  That whole scene though had us a bit on edge and I have to say that I didn't believe we'd get our $600 back.

Getting to Houston was no problem and after some sub-mediocre airport food, we boarded the flight to San Jose.  We sat a little longer than normal and the pilot announced that they were "looking into a problem."  Just what you want to hear before you hurl yourself 6 miles into the air.  I guess that one of the baggage handlers had crashed into the cargo door and dented it.  Can you imagine - those baggage guys treat everything with such care, I can't picture one being so irresponsible.  Apparently they had to get some technicians to the scene to inspect the damage and ensure that the plane was flight-worthy.  No complaints about that, but it meant that by the time we had reached San Jose, we had missed the internal connection.

Well, not actually missed.  We arrived at 3:10 for our 3:30 flight with Sansa, could see the plane sitting on the ramp outside the door, but nevertheless, were told that it had left.  We made the mistake of making a logical argument; this never works in Latin America and I admit that we knew better.  We asked how it was that they had two passengers with reservations on that flight, it was 20 minutes before the scheduled departure, yet they decided to start the engine and head out.  Muy raro.

The worst part about all of that was that they charged us to change the tickets to the following morning and we had to pay for a hotel.

By the time we arrived in Puerto Jimenez, we were both fried, exhausted, fed up and ready to get up to Cerro Osa.  But we were just in time to catch all the staff and then of course got caught up in introductions, and inevitably work-related items.  I even went and met with somebody from the local ministry of the environment office to ask about an issue with part of our land.  

We did finally make it up to the house on Cerro Osa that afternoon, after doing what we considered to be a big shop for food and some things that we would need to get moved in.  It turns out that the place needs much more cleaning than I had anticipated, having been unlived in for too many months.  Books were being eaten on the shelves, accompanied by insect excrement. Dust and droppings abound and walls are stained.  Railings need to be replaced, wood sanded and refinished, a pillar replaced.  

And then there's work.  But I won't get into that.  My head has been spinning and I finally realized today that all of this won't get done in a day, or even a week, and there are some things that won't get done this year.  But we'll keep working at everything and progress will be made.  

On my way to the OBC this morning, I saw a great curasow crossing the road and remembered the running joke while the birding group was here in March - I had told them that I saw three in one day, Adrian said, "Sure, those things are a dime a dozen.  I once saw 23 walk through my back yard."  Yet the group didn't see one during their five days on the Osa Peninsula.  It made me laugh.  And then I used my turn signal to turn into the drive that leads by the schoolhouse to the OBC, and remembered somebody commenting in the past about what a funny practice it was to use your turn signal in such a remote place.  Some things are like that though.  It might be taking time to read for pleasure, exercise, yoga or photography.  These are the good things, that you need to keep no matter where you are or what's going on in your life.  

So this afternoon I made sure that Saima and I went for a walk for a couple of hours before the sun set.  She's practicing with the camera and has captured some good shots already.  We were happy to see a troop of spider monkeys; we stood there and watched them eat, jump and flirt with us for 20 minutes before we turned to come home. 

Philosophizing About the Line

After an illogical flight from San Jose to Panama "on my way" back to the States, I touched down at Dulles just before 1 am.  As we had started our descent, the captain's voice came over the loudspeaker to give that standard announcement of estimated time of arrival and local weather conditions.  Of course this was in Spanish and when I first heard the words "dos grados bajo cero [two degrees below zero]" I panicked for a split second until I realized that this was Celsius so it wasn't as bad as it sounded.  But wait a sec, that was still really cold compared to the hot and humid weather I was coming from, and then came the voice again, "Current temperature is 28 degrees."

28 degrees?  Are you kidding me?  I guess this was to be expected, but expecting something and then stepping into it are quite different things.

So it was back to reality in the States, starting with an announcement that I hadn't heard before, that the use of cell phones was prohibited until clearing immigration and customs.  Is this a new law that was enacted in the last month?  Apparently this has been in place for quite a long time, but weird that this was the first time I'd ever heard about it.

Then there was the line to get through immigration, another display of how human constructions, often with good intent, so easily go awry.  I'm referring to everything from the creation of the Department of Homeland Security [what a waste], to the older idea of immigration, to the yet older idea of the Line and philosophies on how to make it function most efficiently.  The basic and most fundamental rule of the Line is that the first person in the line is the next person to be served.  When a new person arrives to the line, there is no question about where that person's place is, after the last person.  By using only these two rules, one will find that there is no confusion and the system functions smoothly.

Humans, however, seem to have this penchant to "improve" simple systems that need no improvement, and "develop" places that would be better left alone.  I found myself directed to wait at the number 24 box while 10 people who had been behind me in line proceeded through numbers 21, 22 and 23.  There you go, the Line, another natural system ruined by human intervention.

Back to Hyattsville.  I realize that I made a disparaging remark about Hyattsville in one of my earlier blog posts so I thought I would give it a chance to redeem itself.  After all, they are developing.

Trash Abounds

Migrant turkey vulture

Chestnut-mandibled toucan

Baird's Trogon [female]

Since these birds are so common on Cerro Osa and at the Osa Biodiversity Center, I've heard them referred to as "trash birds." Granted, it's often in jest [I think?].  Nonetheless, I think they're worth saving.

If I've improperly identified any of these pieces of trash, please comment with supporting evidence and I will re-label appropriately.

The Things You See

Today we took the colectivo from the Osa Biodiversity Center to Matapalo beach.  You have to understand that in most Latin countries, colectivos are usually a mini-bus.  Here, however, due to the road conditions between Puerto Jimenez and Carate, the famous blue colectivo is a truck with a canvas-covered rear bed, lined on both sides with benches.  I was with Liliana, Friends of the Osa's program manager based in Washington, DC, and Sonia, who has been volunteering with us for a couple of weeks now.  

Since Liliana hadn't taken the colectivo before, Sonia and I were trying to explain the experience to her while we waited.  That's probably a good point to make first - you have to walk to the road and wait for the colectivo.  It has a fixed schedule, leaving from Puerto Jimenez to Carate twice a day and returning twice a day, so you usually have a pretty good idea of when it will pass your stop, in our case the Escuela Rio Piro.  But this isn't like waiting at a bus stop in any American city.  During this time of year, the truck is surprisingly consistent as the road is dry and has been well-maintained.  However, I understand that during the rainy season when conditions worsen, it can be a crap shoot as to when the colectivo passes.

Another thing that is different, yet somehow similar to bus stops in the States, is that there is always something to watch while you wait.  Back home you might people watch, or watch drivers talk on their cell phones, text friends, sip coffee out of disposable containers or even read books [yes, drivers] as they speed by the bus stop.  Here, you often hear racket in the trees above the road and look up to see curious white-faced capuchin monkeys, scan the forest to locate the singing bird that sounds so close, or ponder the salient color of a passion fruit vine that dangles from a tree along the road.  And then the roar of the big blue truck breaks your meditation.

The driver stops, and you tell him where you're going.  If you're a guy, you climb up the rear gate, swinging your leg over and tumbling into the mass of passengers.  However, if you're a woman, or traveling with women as I was today, the driver gets out and opens the gate, helping you up, and makes sure that you're situated before climbing into the cabin and roaring off.

The ride is noisy, dusty [at least at this time of the year], and quite bumpy, at times jolting you into the air off your seat.  Your options are to grab the wooden gate behind you, clasp the bench tightly [which only works if there aren't too many people inside], or lean forward with your elbows on you knees which seems to work fairly well and I'm sure is funny for the locals as it looks like you're praying.

I've been impressed so far with the handful of colectivo trips that I've made, that the driver always remembers the stops that people have indicated.  Although I guess it isn't very complicated being that his route is the only road on this side of the peninsula and there's only places that anyone would want to stop every few kilometers.  So I take that back, it really isn't very impressive at all.  The deboarding process respects the same rules as boarding: guys fend for themselves and you hope you don't snag anything on a bolt and fall face first into the dirt, while women enjoy the attentiveness of the driver.  I suppose you still experience similar behavior in other parts of the world, but I tend to think of this as part of being in Latin America.

Here are a couple of other things that have reminded me that as idyllic as it can seem down here much of the time, that I'm still in Latin America:

Playa Cativo

We stopped by Playa Cativo as part of our boat trip with the ABC group.  Saima and I were invited to stay for a weekend.  Ummm, twist my arm!

Amigos del Bamboo

Yesterday we visited Friends of the Osa's bamboo project, cunningly called Amigos del Bamboo.  The site is located in La Palma, where we had been to the school the day before to talk about involving students in water quality monitoring projects.

The idea behind promoting the use of bamboo as a viable construction material is to save hardwood species that take much longer to grow.  So even though wood might be called renewable in the sense that it regrows, if a tree takes 100 years to reach a size that could be used in construction, without disciplined management and long-term planning, chances are that those trees begin to disappear from the forests.  That has happened with many species of beautiful wood, like purple heart, cristobal, and manu, here in the Osa Peninsula.

On the other hand, bamboo is harvestable in 5 years from the time it is planted.  When cured correctly, it is strong, pest-resistent and great for construction.  The only trick is that since the pieces used are round, the workers need to be trained in a few specific techniques.  Once they have that down, they're off to the races building with a local and truly renewable resource, thus saving old growth forest.

This photo shows the system used to flush the natural sap out of the wood, thus making it resistent to pests.  A salt solution is slowly pushed through each piece of wood under 20 psi of pressure.

Below you can see that the solution has made its way to the end of the wood in the piece on the left, while the other pieces are still dry. This usually takes about 30 minutes for a standard 6 m [20 ft] length.

This last photo demonstrates the use of a hardwood pin in bamboo construction.

Relax

Today, Liliana and I tagged along with Guido and Pilar to three schools to see if we would be able to work with their students in our environmental education efforts.  We visited Puerto Escondido [which means Hidden Port, but we found it since we arrived by road], El Rincon [The Corner], and La Palma [Palm].  These schools are strategic since one of the educational programs deals with teaching about the importance of the mangroves surrounding the Golfo Dulce.   Another separate but related part of the program will be working with the students to teach them about biological indicators of water quality.  

We were lucky enough to catch a glimpse of this three-toed sloth at one of our stops.  Normally when you leave your camera in the back seat and somebody spots an amazing creature, you're left feeling remiss that you didn't follow the rules of always having your camera at hand.  So when Guido pointed into the tree to indicate that there was a sloth, my first reaction was, "Crap, I don't have my camera with me."

It's something about our culture, the way we're brought up to always have to be doing something, planning for the next step, achieving.  I'm not saying that these are bad qualities to have, but I look around and often think we could take a lesson from the sloth.  Did you know that sloths descend to the ground only about once a week, and then only to defecate and slowly claw their way back up?  

Quoting the parrot in Tom Robbins' Fierce Invalids Home From Hot Climates, "People of zee whurl, RELAX!"  I ambled over to the car, got a drink of water, reapplied my sunscreen per the manufacturer's instructions [ensuring that I'll need to buy more soon], tied my shoes, removed the camera from its case and sauntered back to where I had seen this lethargic beast.  He hadn't moved a toe.

If you ever have the chance to look a sloth in the face you'll notice that they are always smiling :)

...and we're back!

That's right.  I had a hunch that things would get really busy while the bird group was here and I wasn't mistaken.  There were a lot of early mornings - waking up at 4:30 to make sure that coffee was ready - since birders need to be out the door by 5:30 in order to catch the full show.  Then there is all the meal planning and running around making sure things are where they should be... but enough of that.  I didn't want to get into the details.

I did want to say, however, that the trip went incredibly well.  It was an easy-going group and we all had a great time.  For me it was a great experience,  learning a lot of bird names, calls [although these I don't remember at all], colors and habits.  I managed to get some pretty good shots by sticking to my own made-up rules of photography:

1. Always have your camera

2. Use it

  

I think it's a good time to point out my frustrations with the limited formatting options in Blogger.  It could be that I'm a tyro, but it doesn't seem too easy to me to position pictures. 

The first photo is a black throated trogon, followed by a juvenile blue heron, if I'm not mistaken.  The sequence above is of a brown boobie, related to the more famous blue footed boobie of the Galapagos islands.  This was a rare spotting as boobies are normally found in pairs.

This is a white crested coquette that has been hanging out around this same spot for at least two months now.  It shows up every afternoon around 3 to 4 o'clock.  It's hard to tell from this perspective, but this bird isn't much larger than a bumble bee!  Someday we'll need a bigger lens for the camera.

Boat billed heron that we saw in the mangroves.

Parrot eating guava

Tiger heron on the way from the OBC to Puerto Jimenez

If the birds don't do it for you, we had a little added excitement this afternoon when we felt the effects of a 5.9 earthquake.  It was enough to shake the buildings here at the Osa Biodiversity Center, leaving the solar panels trembling and Edwin, one of the young construction workers who happened to be on the roof, yelping for joy.  Like I said, some just need more stimulation than all of the natural beauty that surrounds us here on the Osa Peninsula.  

It was funny; we were in the middle of the meeting and when we felt the first tremor, everybody paused, looked at each other, and got up and moved out of the building into the clearing.  We felt another wave while standing there.  After waiting a few minutes, we moved back inside and proceeded with our meeting.  

The next shakes were stronger however, and as the others rushed outside, I noticed two bottles of red wine perched on top of the refrigerator making their way for the edge.  Considering all options and consequences, I went for the wine.  It went well with dinner.