Category: Mountains

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The Other Side of Atenas Yesterday

My birding friend from British Columbia, Canada, is here this week and we went birding on a former rural road on the west side of Atenas with lots of houses going up of course! Here’s 3 shots of the area and most of my bird shots were not real good because of light and distance plus I lost about 1/3 of them when somehow my computer deleted a bunch from the camera disk. Aghhhh! (I know! It was me hitting a wrong key or something! Grrrr!) Technology will be the death of me yet! :-) But the cows are cute! And that bright yellow tree is a Cortez Amarillo (Tabebuia Ochracea) tree that is blooming all over Costa Rica this time of year and in the landscape shot you can see yellow spots of them blooming. Thursday morning we will try a real country road south of Atenas and then Friday morning we are visiting a nearby nature reserve that I hope will be birdful! 🙂

Vista from a road on the west side of Atenas with my house on the side of that mountain across the valley.

And read on for a photo of a cow & calf nursing and a close up of the Cortez Tree! :-)

Continue reading “The Other Side of Atenas Yesterday”
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Hotel Savegre Grounds & Gardens

Just one photo that is linked to my Trip Gallery Grounds & Gardens Sub-Gallery with more photos and then in a few days I will share some really beautiful flowers, but this week has become overwhelming and I will be a few days later processing my flower photos with a guest from Canada here, medical lab work tomorrow at the National Hospital de Geriatria in San Jose, a trip to a new nature reserve for me Thursday with my Canadian friend and removing all my stuff from the Galería on Saturday. A really full week! But I see tranquility in next week! :-)

Just one corner of many gardens! CLICK IMAGE for more photos.

¡Pura Vida!

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20 Bird Species from Savegre! A Gallery

I’ve completed one more chunk of my Christmas Trip Gallery, the BIRDS Gallery with 20 species and some of my better bird photos including 5 species of Hummingbirds! You can click the gallery first page image below this one bird photo or just go to this web address: https://charliedoggett.smugmug.com/TRIPS/2023-December-22-28-San-Gerardo-de-Dota/BIRDS

Talamanca Hummingbird, San Gerardo de Dota, Costa Rica. Indigenous to Costa Rica!
1st 6 of 21 galleries! CLICK this image for my Christmas Trip BIRD GALLERIES.

For locals in Atenas:

This is my last week (Jan. 8-13) in the Gallería Artenas! (At Plaza Calle 2 next to Linea Vital.) So if interested in any of my photos there or the Floral Accent Pillows, this week is your last opportunity to shop for them in person, in town, except the Photo Greeting Cards which starting next Sunday, January 14, will be available at Hotel Colinas del Sol, with everything else available only online through my Gallery, – – – Bookstore, or – – – CafePress Shop. 

From now on I will consider my nature photography as my fun and for this daily blog post, with any online sales and the Colinas del Sol greeting cards as “incidentals” to my fun hobby! No more gallerías, arts & crafts shows or physical selling for me! (Which, by the way, has always been tiring and at a financial loss for me.) Now I photograph only for fun! :-)

¡Pura Vida!

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Rufous-collared Sparrow

To me, every bird is a work of art and thus I try to make each photo of one a work of art, though I do have some ugly photos just to document seeing a species! :-) This common Rufous-collared Sparrow was seen a lot at Hotel Savegre this trip and I have a trip gallery of Rufous-collared Sparrows that will soon become a part of the Trip Gallery for this 2023 time at Savegre. And of course in my big birds gallery there’s a larger Rufous-collared Sparrow GALLERY with birds from this and other mountain lodges and even one at a hotel in San Jose and it includes my very first photo of this species from my 2009 trip to this same hotel (then a smaller mountain lodge) which is interesting, of a mother feeding her chick a worm, if you don’t consider that gross! :-) And you can read about this tropical bird on eBird. It is found only in Central and South America. The scientific name is Zonotrichia capensis.

A mature or older adult Rufous-collared Sparrow while the feature photo is of a younger bird,
Hotel Savegre, San Gerardo de Dota, Costa Rica.

¡Pura Vida!

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Flame-colored Tanager

Indigenous to Central America, this colorful Tanager is found only in the mountains of Mexico to Panama, from 1000m up to the timberline, on both slopes, Pacific & Caribbean. Read about him (red-orange) and her (yellow) on eBird. And you can see all my photos of this species in my Flame-colored Tanager GALLERY. I’ve seen them only in San Gerardo de Dota (3 locations) on the Pacific Slope and at El Silencio Lodge in Bajos del Toro on the Caribbean Slope. Here’s one male and one female photo . . .

Adult Female Flame-colored Tanager, San Gerardo de Dota, Costa Rica
Immature or Juvenile Male Flame-colored Tanager, San Gerardo de Dota, Costa Rica — A Mature Adult is in the Feature Photo at top of online Post.

¡Pura Vida!

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The Acorn Woodpecker

This distinctive little woodpecker is one I have seen only one other time, in 2015, and it too was in San Gerardo de Dota, that time at Mariam’s Cabinas, now called Quetzals Cabinas. You can see that shot and all my decent ones this year from Savegre in my Acorn Woodpecker GALLERY. It is found only in the mountains above 1500m, from California south through Central America to Columbia.

Acorn Woodpecker, Hotel Savegre, San Gerardo de Dota, Costa Rica

¡Pura Vida!

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Savegre Mirador

The Spanish word “Mirador” is translated to English as a lookout point, vantage point or viewpoint to see a “vista” which in several languages is a view or sight. With a 2.5 km hike up the hill or a 4×4 jeep ride from the Hotel Savegre you can see the hills on the other side of the Savegre River that runs through the hotel property. After our hike through the cloud forest, we saw the views and then like sissies, rode back down the mountain in the jeep! :-) I did walk it the last time I was there! :-) Here’s five photos below or see them in the gallery: Savegre Mirador.

Savegre Mirador, San Gerardo de Dota, Costa Rica
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Thank You for 2023!

I am immensely grateful for each and every one of you who read my blog regularly, occasionally or just look at the photos! My site host reports more that 2,000+ “hits” online at my website/blog every month! 🙂 And that doesn’t count many of the 500+ subscribers who only look at the email version nor most of the 650 Facebook Friends who look at the one feature photo without clicking the the link to the post! 

I also appreciate the hundreds of comments left on the posts monthly and many “contacts” or messages through my contact page or by email. Just yesterday I responded to a man in England with questions about photographing wildlife at Esquinas Rainforest Lodge and a friend in the States commented with a meaningful Bible verse about my post yesterday on hugging the 800 year old tree. Nature is fun! :-) And you who read or just look at the pictures are the ones who make it fun for me! :-) THANKS! Keep reading or looking at the pix! And click the gallery links for more pix!

As usual, I’m ending the year with 12 photos from this year, equaling one per month but not literally from each month, since some months have weaker or fewer photos. Nor are these necessarily my top 12 favorite photos from this year, but are representative 2023 photos from “Retired in Costa Rica” this year, with birds and butterflies obviously being two favorite subjects again! :-) One shot here for the email version and eleven more online with a quick click below of “Read More”!

Black-cheeked Woodpecker, Maquenque Eco Lodge, Boca Tapada, Alajuela, Costa Rica
Continue reading “Thank You for 2023!”
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4×4 Jeep Up the Mountain

Of course many choose to hike all the way up to several different trails and the Mirador (vista platform) which I did last time here, but I chose the jeep ride up and down this time with just a short nature trail which I will tell about tomorrow. Here’s one shot of the jeep we road up in with its dog co-pilot! :-) I road with a 3-generation Tico family on vacation there, a 3 or 4 year old boy, his parents and grandparents. The two weeks either side of Christmas are vacation time for most government employees and many big companies not involved in retail sales of course! :-) Thus half or more of the people at the hotel were Ticos. The rest were tourists from the States, Canada, Australia, and all over Europe. Another charming thing about traveling about Costa Rica! :-)

The jeep we road up and down the mountain in with it’s dog co-pilot. 🙂

See some other photos in my gallery: 4×4 Jeep Ride up the Mountain. And tomorrow some photos from our hike on the Pioneers Trail!

¡Pura Vida!