Costa Rica

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Monday



Bright sunny morning. We could see the ocean in the distance from our balcony. Breakfast is included at our hotel...big fruit plate, toast, and home-grown, organic coffee. Delicious! Just perfect for us.



Today we were off to the Monteverde Biological Reserve. This is a cloud forest, and has been labeled the most famous cloud forest in the world. It contains over 100 species of mammals, over 400 species of birds, over 3000 plant species, and the largest orchid diversity in the world. Only 3% of the reserve is open for visitation.



We caught the bus to Monteverde at 730am, just up the hill from our hotel, in front of the drugstore. The reserve lets in only 160 people at a time, so it is best to get an early start. The road inclined quickly, and was very, very rocky. As we went along, we realized this bus doubled as a school bus. Cute little kids with backpacks got on along the way. The school stop was before the reserve. The children didn't wear uniforms at this school, which seemed unusual here. We were dropped off right at the reserve and got our tickets ($20/person). There are numerous trails here, but the two longest ones were closed due to downed trees and reconstruction activities.



As soon as we got on the path, we saw a coati run across. We spent about four hours hiking in the reserve, moving rather slowly as we looked for birds. There was lots of climbing and many, many steps. We got to an observation overlook, but it was prertty clouded in. The forest itself was beautiful...hanging vines, moss covered trees, ferns, wild flowers, and some huge old knarled trees which looked like Hobbit houses. We had our raincoats on most of the time. The area gets a lot of mist from the clouds, and this drips down from the trees. There also were occasional bursts of rain.



We were rather disappointed with the number of birds we saw, only about half a dozen. Where were the other 394 species hiding? We originally planned to take the 11:30 bus back, but found that it left at 11:00. We stopped for a cup of coffee, then went back into the reserve to take another trail. This one led to a 100 meter suspension bridge.



We still had some time before the next bus (2:00) so we walked up to a small cafe with about 20 hummingbird feeders strung around. It was really fun to watch them, so many varieties. We were talking to the guy who fills the feeders. He uses a ratio of 4.5 to 1 (water to sugar), fills them 3 or 4 times per day, and goes through 4.5 pounds of sugar per day. The birds were very tame; you could stand very close.



Later in the evening you could see some dark clouds rolling in, and there were some fierce winds but no more rain. Walked up the hill for dinner at a Soda and didn't get wet!

Today was a fun day, lots of adventures.

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