Motorhome News from North America 37

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Motorhome News from North America 37 1st March - 12th March 2007
Looking for birds in Costa Rica

There’s a peaceful little country in Central America sandwiched between Nicaragua and Panama, swept by the blue and enchanting Caribbean Sea off its eastern shores and the mighty Pacific Ocean out to the west. Come, join us in Costa Rica, a mere 10 degrees north of the equator, clothed in green from its volcanic peaks and mountain- top rainforests to the mangrove swamps and sandy beaches where it meets the sea. This is the dry season in Costa Rica. The other is wet.

Shimmering heat rose from the runway as we landed at San Jose in the early afternoon, welcomed by blue skies and cloud-shrouded mountains on the horizon. We had not seen a hill much bigger than a speed bump for many weeks on our journey through southeast Texas. A short drive away, through busy streets bustling with traffic, past happy lads selling fruit, sunglasses and lottery tickets to motorists at every street corner, we reached the aptly named Bougainvillea Hotel, its picture-book gardens a haven for wildlife. That’s what we came to Costa Rica for. The next eleven days would be shared with seven mad-keen birders from across the United States - and our Costa Rican guide Rafael, tiny eyes sharp as a physician’s scalpel, greying beard bristly as an angry porcupine, his set-back chin reflecting his vibant character; determined and resolute.

This tiny Spanish-speaking republic has enjoyed prosperity and democratic political stability for many years, watching its strife-ridden neighbours with smiling eyes. Despite an evident ‘second world’ exterior, Ticos, as Costa Ricans like to be known, enjoy a good healthcare system, a high level of literacy, education and life expectancy, unsurpassed in Central America. The army was abolished back in 1948, offering trust to the people in return for improved living standards. They’re still working towards a brighter future. San Jose’s houses and shops are barred and gated, with razor-wire coils deterring would-be thieves, an early indication that there is still some way to go to provide the last soul with a living above the poverty line. We were asked to keep our valuables in the hotel safe. For birders, that means binoculars, telescopes and cameras before even passports or wallets (birders don’t generally have pockets, necks, ears or fingers loaded with jewels). There is a strong police presence we’re told, though there was little evidence as we passed through town.

Costa Rica seems to have cornered the market on corrugated iron. Tiny town houses and open fronted shops with rusty corrugated roofs line dusty streets. Roadside stalls with corrugated roofs add local colour, fruit and veg, wood-ware and trinkets, waving hands and happy faces as we pass them by. This might be a Catholic country, but life goes on, seven days a week, hand-in-hand with work for many. Work finished for the day, families retire to the porch to mardle the night away, lazily watching the golden sun slip over the distant horizon. There’s a soccer pitch on every street corner, steel goal posts beyond the reach of health and safety, Sunday teams in all the latest gear, football pictures on newspaper front pages - and plastic-enhanced ladies on the rear. That’s life! They’re mad keen on soccer here. A grinning Rafael held up the daily paper and called to me from the front of the bus, “Liverpool 1 Manchester United 0!” Two teams on everyone’s lips.

A ridge of mountains runs northwest - southeast, a lofty spine across the country like the back of a lizard, a handful of volcanoes still mildly active. A hundred tree-clad hills line the skyline at every turn, rising high to rainforest peaks swathed in rolling mist. We’re not strictly here as ‘sightseeing’ tourists, but the smouldering Poas Volcano seen on our first day set a dramatic tropical scene for us, yellow sulphurous plumes rising from the bland grey crater above a sheet of rolling cloud casting its shady net across the valley. The vista before us: forests, hills and fertile lands, prized for their Costa Rican coffee, fields of pineapples, bananas, papaya, strawberries, melons, tobacco for fine cigars, sugar cane and mangoes.

Cocooned in our 20-seater mini-bus, we had room to relax, spreading our rucksacks and hiking gear on spare seats whist travelling the highway. But highways are somewhat scarce in Costa Rica, its un-surfaced roads more the norm, potholed and rough, loosely gravelled and dusty. Great clouds of billowing white dust chased us along winding mountain tracks up hill and down dale to Selva Verde (green rainforest) Lodge on the Caribbean slopes for the first of our many rainforest walks, surrounded by palms and hanging vines, bromeliads flowering on lofty branches and flights of vultures wending their way north on spring migration.

It’s not really dangerous in the rainforests of Costa Rica. Jaguars are rarely seen, scorpions and zebra tarantulas are mostly active at night and only a handful of the snakes are really deadly! We were advised to wear strong walking boots for our early morning and early evening hikes and soon learned it’s not essential to bring your own machete with you on such outings. Well-maintained tracks took us walking where many thousands of birders and botanists had walked before, through dense verdant undergrowth of ferns and palm, plants we tend with loving care in many an English conservatory, paths bedecked in confetti of orange and yellow flowers.
Giant trees cast deep shadows from the canopy 150ft above us, strangler figs leaching life from ancient growth, leaving hollow skeletons where witches live out their days eating leg of frog and eye of lizard over a steaming cauldron - whilst a broody owl looks on with sleepy eyes. The sweet pungent smell of fermenting leaves pervades the air on a rising thermometer. Forest cicadas awake, joining together in a symphony of a thousand sleigh-bells, ringing, ringing, inside our heads. A family of spider-monkeys crossed our path, way up high in the treetops defying death as they leapt from tree-to-tree, crashing noisily on leafy branches and clinging precariously to flimsy twigs. Sound advice came from Rafael on this subject. “If you must look up to watch the monkeys, be sure to keep your mouth shut. It might look like guacamole, but it sure doesn’t taste like it,” he said. And he should know, he was born in these parts a long time ago. Outside our room iguanas scampered across the lawn as scarlet parakeets screeched off to roost and giant toads crept out at night to play moonlight roulette with nocturnal bats and prowling owls.

As a wee lad, I would spend many a happy day on my own at London’s Regents Park Zoo, wandering the paths, through the aquarium, the aviary, the insect house and the outside pens, without a thought that I might ever get to see some of those animals in the wild. How could I ever imagine I would see a sleepy Two-toed Sloth taking a nap, a Coati, a Central American Agouti, or a Wooly Opossum in the wild, come face-to-face with a 3 metre boa constrictor, a poison dart tree frog, see Scarlet Macaws in the treetops or watch the amazing Chestnut-billed Toucan (signature bird of that delicious black and creamy stuff the Irish call Guinness) flying overhead, squawking its head off?


Contrary to popular belief, it’s not essential to know a Tawny-throated Leaftosser from a White-whiskered Puffbird or a Fiery-billed Aracari until you see the first one - but the chase is demanding and rewarding when you’re with a group of dedicated birders looking for something special. Up before daybreak, most days before five, we tip-toed, booted, along forest tracks in single file seeking out new feathered friends, peering into the dark undergrowth and up in the canopy, binoculars at the ready, bright eyes alert, ears twitching, stopping only for lunch and dinner before crashing into bed at 9pm for a few hours of welcome sleep.
Peering heavenwards for long periods is tough on the neck. It’s known to birders as ‘warbler’s neck’- that aching feeling no end of exercise can cure. There is a cure though, usually taken in the early evening from a long glass. It’s called pina-colada. We all tried it - a number of times!
Aching neck or no aching neck, there’s no stopping the fanatical birder. There is always one person who can’t seem to see the elusive bird the others are all gaping at. But help is close by.

“Look. It’s just there, just beyond that tree. See it?”
“Which tree?”
“That one, there - the one with the sun on it.”
“That one?”
“Yes, that one. Look. There, above the branch to the left. No. Not that one. Come over here. There - it moved! Did you see it move? No? Can you see that patch of green leaves up there? No? OK, let’s start again. See that post there?”
“Yes.”
“Good. Now, follow the wire to the left for three metres, go up the trunk of the tree to the first branch on the right. Go along that at five o’clock to the next - Oh! It’s flown again. There - there, in the grass! Did you see it? No? Sorry.”
“That’s OK. Thanks for trying.”

You know what? He’ll be miserable all day - or at least until the next bird shows up.


High temperatures and humidity levels continued throughout the week. By 10am most days we were overheating on our early morning walks despite ample liquid. We soldiered on with tired feet and perspiring brows - it would be cooler at the coast. But it didn’t get cooler - or less humid. Our objectives were clear enough - to sample the gift of nature in differing habitats across Costa Rica. We could never see it all and would certainly not venture as far as the beach resorts, the hotels and condos where North American investment builds tomorrows concrete jungle, whilst providing welcome economic growth and work.
Two days on, a short drive took us further north into the Gulf of Nicoya, to the dry savannah landscape of lowland ranching, broad shallow trees, arms spread wide to welcome the winter sun and summer rains, to the simple cabins of our hotel, hot, paper thin walls, frogs in the toilet keeping cool, scorpions under beds keeping watch, siesta time listening to the hum, hum, hum of the ceiling fan, dreaming of air conditioning, - and always the crow of the cockerel. Fun eh? There we saw a family group of howler monkeys, settled overnight, calling in the family, an awful din. It’s said the male’s call can be particularly ear-piercing when his nuts are caught in the fork of a tree. I can well believe that.
Dinner that night was rice and beans with something.


Brahmin cattle laze on tiny knolls of browning meadows, dreamy eyes searching the clouds, strawberry cream in the early sun, thinking of summer rains and sweet green grass. On wooded hillsides, tiny hamlets of little houses, wrought from discarded planks and a mouthful of three-inch nails, ramshackle houses with basic amenities, corrugated roofs terra cotta or rusted, porches swept and squeaky clean, tidy yards strung with washing, mostly jeans and kids’ bright tee-shirts. A stark exposure of how little we need in life, but how much we demand. Beside the road a small Catholic Church, a silk-flower decked cemetery, showing signs of neglect.

There remain a few hard-learned traditions in the remote regions of Costa Rica. An elderly gentleman spoke gently to his two white oxen as he led them across the beach, stick in hand, drawing behind an empty traditional painted cart, his chariot - not for him the guzzling motor or traumas of modern life.
In the dry forest, giant trees open their branches as umbrellas on the canopy and tarzanic vines anchor themselves to the forest floor. Leafcutter ants relentlessly march, armies of automatons, like legionnaires shouldering their burdens aloft, little legs forging discernable tracks beneath our feet. Army ants secure the boundaries and deter the enemy, big and strong, infantrymen to the last. Their ferocity is such that there is a Costa Rican dance named after them. Stand in the wrong place for more than a few seconds and they climb to the top of your boots, long columns of programmed ants the size of your fingernail, primed to bite. There starts the foot stamping - left, left, right, right, both together, turn around, left, left, right, right, both together, turn around, chassis left, all together, left, left ….. Between the dancing to shake off the ants and the harmonic ring of cicadas, white-faced capuchin monkeys passed us by in caravan foraging in the trees, oblivious of our presence. Such wild moments are rare indeed, succulent as a classic wine, to be savoured and absorbed. Ten uplifted faces beamed with delight - mouths closed of course. It’s what we came for, but boy, it demands some stamina!
For lunch and dinner, rice and beans - with meat of your choice.

Our final few days took us to the cool reserves of Monte Verde, a 20 mile drive on a treacherous unsurfaced road winding like a serpent 5,000ft up to the central range of high altitude cloud-forest, its mountain air moist and sweet as sorbet, sharp as lime on the palette after so many days of sweltering heat. With the benefit of Rafael’s guiding expertise and his secret network, we secured our final prizes, both the magnificent Resplendent Quetzal and the Three-wattled Bellbird! Had any of those at your bird-table recently?

Shortly, we’ll be landing back at Houston, Texas, leaving behind a delightful Republic of gracious people, wonderful scenery and awesome wildlife of which we’ll dream forever. All too soon we’ll be facing the reality of US Immigration, with only five days left on our visas and momentarily unsure what the future might hold. We’re hopeful of an extension, but what do we do if they wave us goodbye? Wish us luck!


David and Janice. The grey-haired-nomads

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Photos

San Jose
Beautiful gardens at our first hotel

Poas Volcano
Still active and smoking

La Selva
Walking in the rainforest

A 3m Boa Constrictor!
Stand back!

Red poison-arrow frog
A useful component for the poison dart!

Scarlet Macaws in the treetops
Now, there's a pretty boy

Chestnut-mandibled Toucan
Mine's a pint, please, Paddy

The amazing Resplendent Quetzal!
Considered the most beautiful bird in the world, it posed for us near the car-park.

Sunset
over the Gulf of Nicoya on the Pacific side of Costa Rica.