They continue to work very slow (muy despacio) but have started the concrete seats that will circle the round stage or theater in the round. As some say here “It will be nice if they ever finish it! 🙂
The city has a Facebook Page presenting the remodeling with architect drawings of how they expect it to look. Nice! The vision of an architect! AND BEST VIEWED AS A MANUAL SLIDESHOW! Click on a picture, then the right or left arrows.
“There is no power for change greater than a community discovering what it cares about.” – Margaret J. Wheatley
And these photos are being added to the others in my photo gallery called: Remodeling Central Park Atenasfor a pictorial history of the park remodel.
Two butterflies scurrying around my garden the other day captured my attention much because of how fast they traveled and thus difficult to photograph. The one with red & pink is a Transandean Cattleheart (Parides iphidamas), while the one with turquoise is a Short-tailed Flasher(Astraptes brevicauda). These are both identifications using A Swift Guide to Butterflies of Mexico and Central America, Second Edition. On the Cattleheart especially, I trust the book more than the internet where the many different types of Cattleheart butterflies do not have their photos as finely separated as in the book.
The unknown yellow butterfly was on the parking lot by gym at Colegio Liceo (college-prep high school) – must have been pretty when alive but can’t find him in the book. CLICK images to see larger.
Transandean Cattleheart
Transandean Cattleheart
Transandean Cattleheart
Transandean Cattleheart
Short-Tailed Flasher
Short-tailed Flasher
Short-tailed Flasher
Short-tailed Flasher
Unidentified Butterfly
So we’ll live, And pray, and sing, and tell old tales, and laugh at gilded butterflies. ~William Shakespeare
🙂
¡Pura Vida!
And check out my Butterflies & Moths of Costa Rica photo gallery! I have not found another online Costa Rica Butterfly gallery yet with as many labeled butterfly photos, more than 80 with names!
You do not see strikes often here outside the capital city of San Jose (where they shut down the already horrible traffic), but the other day when in Alajuela a small group of city workers (police, fire, others) were striking across the street from City Hall which had police barricades to keep them off city property (sorry I didn’t photo that!). The homemade signs or posters taped to the railing of a closed business were complaining about waste of money by city and low salaries for employees – plus they were blowing horns and beating drums to attract attention and possibly annoy city offices across the street. Common low pay complaint around the world I guess.
Public employees picketing for better wages, Alajuela.
Though life is much better here than in the states for the poor, greed still causes the rich to get richer and the poor to get poorer. Life is not always fair.
Safe working conditions, fair wages, protection from forced labor, and freedom from harassment and discrimination – these must become standard global operating conditions. ~Paul Polman
¡Pura Vida!
I have an Alajuela photo gallery if interested in more from our provincial capital and home of the San Jose Airport.
Bonus for CR Travelers
One of the CR Travel Agencies I use is Costa Rica Expeditions and they just sent out this message with 5 Secrets of Visiting Costa Rica in October.Helpful information for traveling here near the end of our “Green Season.” (Rainy Season) Anytime is a good time to visit Costa Rica!
To maintain a vista from my terrace I have to top or prune off the top of both my Yellow Bells Tree and my Nance Tree about once a year.
I asked the gardener to write down the official name in Spanish which is “Arbole de vainillo” (Costa Rica only name – click for español description and other Spanish names by country). I just discovered that the Latin name Tecoma stans (click for English description) also has multiple English names listed in this order on Wikipedia: Yellow Trumpetbush, Yellow Bells (which I have been calling it because of the yellow bell-shaped flowers), Yellow Elder, and Ginger-Thomas. It is the official flower of the United States Virgin Islands and the floral emblem of The Bahamas, both using different names!
Topped the Yellow Bell & Nance Trees to preserve my vista. 🙂
And is very popular all over Costa Rica as a garden tree bringing 2-4 months of yellow flowers every year. You can see more photos of my trees blooming in my photo gallery named: My Home Gardens.
“In joy or sadness, flowers are our constant friends.”
Coming in October: A visit to Rincón de la Vieja National Park & Hacienda Guachipelin, a volcano park lodge, this one in the north of Guanacaste, above Liberia (a new area for me) and another hotel that promises a great birding experience. I continue to try new places while occasionally repeating favorites like a redo of Arenal Observatory (another volcano birding lodge) coming in November. In Costa Rica – the adventures never end!
Included are shots from their “Rainforest Trail” which is a fairly dense forest with a lot of old growth big trees which is refreshing but difficult to photograph birds in because of all the limbs and leaves! 🙂
I did not show my room this time but the rooms are on the hill just above the restaurant and pool seen at top of feature photo above or in the pool photo below at upper left. Rooms 10-14 look directly over the ocean and sunsets, while other rooms like mine have garden views with partial ocean views. (My room views are seen in gallery Day Vistas.) I got more birds from my garden view but the premium rooms have better sunset views (cost more) and with clouds & rain every afternoon in rainy season there is not much sunset to see. See the hotel website for more information at https://www.cristal-ballena.com/
Cristal Ballena Hotel, Uvita
CLICK Image to Enlarge
In a Beautiful Forest
Events Field
Weddings Platform
Ocean Views from Everywhere!
Rainforest Trees
Birds Slide Show in Bar When No Ball Game
Bamboo
Hotel on a Hill
Bamboo
Cabins
Yoga Chapel? Hmmm!
Rainforest Trail
Restaurant by Pool w/ Meeting Room Above
Stairs up to Rooms
Beautiful Plants
Trees Everywhere!
Banana Plant Flower
Old Growth Big Trees
Entrance Driveway
Hotel Seen from Ocean Boat
“There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore, There is society, where none intrudes, By the deep sea, and music in its roar: I love not man the less, but Nature more”
― Lord Byron
Just a few of the beautiful fruits and flowers blooming all over the hotel grounds at Cristal Ballena Hotel with 2 shots made on the river trip in same area.
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“Almost every person, from childhood, has been touched by the untamed beauty of wildflowers.” ~Lady Bird Johnson
Though butterfly season is past its prime, there were quite a few at the Cristal Ballena Hotel in Uvita last week. Here’s some I was able to capture photos of (many I couldn’t).
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“Happiness is a butterfly, which when pursued, is always just beyond your grasp, but which, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you.”
