Yesterday morning as I started to walk to town it was raining, thus I took a taxi. So I had to walk back from town since that is my only exercise here! With only a tiny sprinkle occasionally, I enjoyed these wet “3 little things” along the way and here are my shots of one day’s “eye candy” in little Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica.
Wet Passion Flower in someone’s yardNasty Storm Sewer Waterfall along the way – But sort of pretty! 🙂Central Park Progress? They keep welding more pieces to the future band shell. But now the rainy season will slow progress even more. In the meantime my landlord has nearly completed a whole house! 🙂 Our government at work! Slowly! 🙂
May is the beginning of “Rainy Season” in the Central Valley of Costa Rica including Atenas and this year there has been more rain and clouds than I remember having my previous four Mays and most agree, while the real “oldtimers” say this is just the old normal for the first month of rainy season. So . . . whatever! Things are fresh and green all over Costa Rica right now and it is my favorite time of year and though locals call it “Winter,” most also prefer this time of year too. And less gringos too! 🙂 Just a shower every afternoon and some early mornings or at night which I like for sleeping! 🙂
The top photo is a panorama of 4 shots with my 600mm telephoto lens and below is the less-focused snap of Atenas Central on my cell phone, both from my terrace at breakfast this morning.
This morning I received a WhatsApp Voice Message with the above photo from Rodiber, my guide at Monteverde last month. He was thanking me profusely for the autographed copy of my Monteverde photo book for himself, Costa Rica Expeditions (who service this hotel) and the hotel Monteverde Lodge & Gardens. The girl in photo is one of the several front desk persons who were all very helpful to me during my stay. I sent two copies of book, one for my guide and one for the hotel to use at front desk, in lobby or in their little loaner-library of books for guests.
Since I make a book for most of my trips or the first trip to a lodge, I usually send two books like this. I just concluded my second trip to Selva Verde Lodge and right now not planning a second book. Their two guides on my first visit plus the front desk got copies of my 2016 Selva Verde trip book.
I really enjoy surprising my hosts in thanks for a good experience with the little photo books – not something they expect nor receive from other guests. This is the first one to send me a photo with their thank-you note. A surprise for me now! My response was the typical Costa Rican response to a “Thank You!” which is ¡Con mucho gusto!“With much pleasure!” Ticos are such beautiful people! 🙂
I decided early in my visiting of Costa Rica to not live in the big capital city of San Jose because I wanted a more tranquil retirement life than most big cities can provide in their, busy, hectic, crowded, expensive and sometimes dangerous ways.
My first choice was always to live in the woods away from everything, but that would require an expensive 4WD car which I early decided I would do without plus in many cases it is actually more expensive, plus generally no where near the needed shopping and medical care a retiree needs.
Thus the “happy medium” or compromise location of the “Central Valley” of Costa Rica within easy bus or other transportation to the best shopping and medical facilities in the country (like most retirees to CR), yet still a somewhat easy trip to escape into the national parks and forests of Costa Rica which has worked well for me. And nature in the far corners of Costa Rica continues to be my focus. 🙂
BUT . . . sometimes there are fun reasons to visit the big city and especially an old, historic and artsy Latin-American city like San Jose (see my Trip Galleries below). Christopher Howard also explains it well in one of his latest blog posts:
And in that article you can see why I love the many parks in the city, plus the architecture, a tour I made of just the old colonial churches, the arts, the many museums, art in general and as shown here, as an example, some of the many public art sculptures in San Jose:
Pope John Paul II who visited San Jose in 1983
Sit on a park bench with John Lennon
The Kiss, Parque Morazan by Olger Villegas-Cruz
Lots of public contemporary art
The Flutist at Teatro Nacional
Anne Frank
Short-term contemporary exhibit in front of the cathedral
And how about my earlier visit to this same hotel with even more birds? See the TRIP GALLERY: 2016 December 23-27 – Selva Verde Lodge, Sarapiquior click the print screen image of that earlier gallery:
On Saturday, my 3rd day here I chose to do the boat tour of part of the Sarapiqui River and part on the Puerto Viejo River. When I was here before in a December it was one of my best places for a large number of bird, but this time, like everywhere else in May, there were not as many birds. But it was still a good tour and a nice young couple from Austin, TX also in Selva Verde Lodge went on the same tour with me plus about 5 others on the boat. Here’s my photos in three categories:
Birds on the River
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Other Wildlife on the River
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Boat & River Shots
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“Have you also learned that secret from the river; that there is no such thing as time?” That the river is everywhere at the same time, at the source and at the mouth, at the waterfall, at the ferry, at the current, in the ocean and in the mountains, everywhere and that the present only exists for it, not the shadow of the past nor the shadow of the future.”
― Hermann Hesse, Siddhartha
Today, Tuesday, is my last full day at Selva Verde Lodge, (link to their website) so of course I tried to get some more bird photos! Most of these are repeat birds, but different images and two are new for this trip. I just can’t stop photographing that baby Aracari and this morning after breakfast I saw him fly out of his hole to the nearest branch, not far, but he is learning! A treat to experience!
Last Day Birds
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I woke up this morning, Smiled at the rising sun, Three little birds, Sat on my doorstep, Singing sweet songs
These are just a few of the “other” wildlife I photographed here at Selva Verde Lodge, on the grounds. Of course birds & frogs have already been shown and I just got two different/new birds this morning, thus hard to keep up with. All will appear in the trip gallery soon to be announced after I return home tomorrow.
Selva Verde Wildlife
Brown Basilisk
Rhinoceros Beetle
Central America Ameiva
Unknown Caterpillar
Green Iguana
Leaf-cutter Ants
Emerald Basiisk
Long-nosed Bat
Variegated Squirrel
Black River Turtle
“The smaller the creature, the bolder its spirit.”
― Suzy Kassem
With the offical morning bird walk and personal walks around the lodge grounds today, I saw several birds not seen yesterday. The two special ones were the babies. The featured photo above is a baby Collared Aracari peeking his head out of the tree hole nest. Also in the slide show below is a baby Great Kiskadee. Both were first-time baby sightings here. It is that time of year, the beginning of the rainy season. Tomorrow I may share the birds we saw on our “Boat Bird Safari” Saturday, then sometime the other wildlife. It is so great to be out in a rainforest like this! Pura vida!
New Birds at Lodge Today
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“Pan, who and what art thou?” he cried huskily. “I’m youth, I’m joy,” Peter answered at a venture, “I’m a little bird that has broken out of the egg.”
― J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan
Last night’s Frog Walk was one of the best things done yet here! Ivan was my guide and it was just the two of us. He was one of my 2 guides the last time I was here in 2016 and he claims he remembers me (Ticos are so nice!)
He really knows his frogs and after I get these posted in my gallery I will ask him to identify them which I cannot now. We saw about 16 species, and here is 14 or 15 of those. One I did not get a useable photo of and another I have 2 photos of because they are so different.
This morning I received a WhatsApp Voice Message with the above photo from Rodiber, my guide at Monteverde last month. He was thanking me profusely for the autographed copy of my Monteverde photo book for himself, Costa Rica Expeditions (who service this hotel) and the hotel Monteverde Lodge & Gardens. The girl in photo is one of the several front desk persons who were all very helpful to me during my stay. I sent two copies of book, one for my guide and one for the hotel to use at front desk, in lobby or in their little loaner-library of books for guests.
