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Arenal Park is #6 in the World!

You’ve heard me brag about the forests of Arenal Volcano National Park several times and now it is not just me! 🙂 TripAdvisor just released their list of the “Top 10 National Parks in the World” (Tico Times article) with Costa Rica’s Arenal Park #6 on the list, right there with Maisa Mara of Kenya and the Grand Canyon of the United States as most popular by their volunteer reviewers. And I’m glad I’ve been able to see all three of those! 🙂 And especially to explore the forests that surround this beautiful volcano . . .

The best way to see the Arenal Volcano National Park is in the only lodge that’s inside the park, Arenal Observatory Lodge, which you may remember is where I was Christmas Week and it just so happens, because of pandemic airline changes, I’m going again this year in May! Yay! And to see why I like it so much, see my photo galleries from three past trips there:

But Tonight I Return to El Silencio

This short 4-night trip starting today is because the owner of El Silencio Lodge & Reserve liked my photo book about his hotel so much he gave me two nights gratis. And of course for me two nights is not enough anywhere, so I’m adding 2 more! 🙂 Makes it half price! 🙂 And I’m using my gift now! 🙂

There are two more waterfalls outside the lodge property I want to photograph and as always more birds! Hoping for more lifers. I got 4 lifers when there last September! And I get excited with just one! So it is obviously a good place for birding! Meaning that the rest of this week and probably longer will be more photos from El Silencio! 🙂 I’m so fortunate!

¡Pura Vida!

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Base Jump Highest Bridge?

You must be crazy, very young (or both?) or maybe a professional base jumper? It just so happens that the highest railroad bridge in Costa Rica is over the Rio Grande River right here in my adopted hometown of Atenas, Alajuela Province. But no trains have gone over it for many years and it is not considered safe and so difficult to get to, I don’t even have a photo of it. It would require me to illegally walk down a busy freeway and onto the freeway bridge over the river to get this old picture, which is from Tico Times online newspaper and very old since it shows a train going over the bridge! 🙂 Some people now walk over the RR Bridge but not me! 🙂

Read all about the crazy American who jumped off this bridge with a parachute and then got lost trying to find his way out of the canyon. Hmmmm. 🙂 In this Tico Times Article in English which includes a video of the guy jumping off which I also include in my continued post:

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First Morning, Great Backyard Bird Count

During breakfast this morning I got 7 species of birds from my terrace, but because I was eating, I photographed only one, just at the end of my time looking – The Yellow Warbler, both a migrant from the north and a resident sometimes, meaning I don’t know how to tell if this particular one is a migrant or a resident enjoying an insect for breakfast! 🙂

Yellow Warbler, Atenas, Costa Rica

And the other 6 birds I saw were Great Kiskadee, Turkey Vulture, one of the Swallow species (unidentified), Tropical Kingbird, and Clay-colored Thrush or Yiqüirro.

I hope you are counting birds in your backyard this weekend and reporting to eBird!

¡Pura Vida!

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The Beginning of Life 2 Outside

This fabulous documentary movie from Brazil present hundreds of ways to deal with the “Nature Deficit Syndrome” of modern children, particularly city kids around the world. Available on Netflix and other streaming services for free with English Subtitles though the audio is a mix of Portuguese, Spanish and English. Beautifully filmed and Life-changing for the whole world! It shows how NATURE is what the world needs now! 🙂 I RECOMMEND!

Nature is a tool to get children to experience not just the wider world, but themselves.

-Stephen Moss

¡Pura Vida!

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To Be in a Forest

To be in a forest may be my favorite activity in Costa Rica, like looking out over the forest below at Arenal Volcano National Park . . .

Arenal Forest from the Observation Tower, Arenal Observatory Lodge, Costa Rica.

Or seeing the inter-connectedness of everything in the forest like Jane Goodall says in this minute and a half YouTube Video:

Or to know that I’ve helped save an endangered globe by Planting One Tree! Check out that link for how you can plant a tree in parts of the world needing them most, OR go plant one in your own backyard or nearby park! 🙂

🙂

¡Pura Vida!

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Almost Harmattan in Costa Rica

A Dakar, Senegal Mosque Overlooking the Atlantic Ocean — Photographed while in The Gambia & Senegal, 1999-2002.

A few readers know or remember that I once live in The Gambia, West Africa for three years with many experiences recorded on this same website found by following my AFRICA Travel Page links or going directly to pages for The Gambia and Senegal. I made both of the above photos in Dakar, Senegal.

I got one of my first shocks the first month there when I told the guards that it looked like a rain storm was coming from the north, even though it was “The Dry Season.” They laughed at me and explained that the first month of dry season was called Harmattan and was when the sand and dust from the Sahara Desert blew south and west and that we would soon be covered in dust and sand, thus close your windows. I closed them and it did not help much with everything in the little apartment covered in dust or sand. Incidentally, some years that same Harmattan blows part of the Sahara Desert all the way across the Atlantic to Costa Rica. Really! 🙂

In Costa Rica it is not called “Harmattan,” but we have a similar experience any time from late December to mid-March when the wind blows almost constantly and everything is dusty. It is not as heavy as West Africa, but it is for a longer period of time with just dust, not desert sand (usually)! It is worse if one of the volcanoes is erupting and we get the gray to black volcano soot like I’ve had a few times from Volcán Turrialba. 🙂

Thus when another WordPress Blogger posted this Poem by Danusha Lameris, I saved it to share right now during our “mini-harmattan” or windy weather or dusty season, none of which are titles Costa Rica brags about for our “Dry Season” (most popular tourist time). And incidentally, this years winds seem to be stronger and at night much cooler than the previous 6 Dry Seasons for me here. Now North Americans wouldn’t consider the low 60’s Fahrenheit cold, but that’s a “two-blanket night” here! 🙂

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Why Triquitraque?

Triquitraque or Flame Vine

Triquitraque – One Spanish Name for this Flower

Also called in Spanish: Tango, chiltote, chorro de oro, and San Carlos.

In English, most commonly called the Flame Vine

Translation of Triquitraque = Clatter

As in the clatter of a train going down the track

As in a string of firecrackers popping

As in jumping jack

OR

The first definition of triquitraque in the dictionary of the real academy of the Spanish language is noise as of repeated and disordered blows. Another meaning of triquitraque in the dictionary is those same hits.

So why is this flower called Triquitraque?

I wish someone would tell me! Maybe the scattered bright flowers along a vine reminds someone of a string of firecrackers exploding? Or a visual clatter? Please comment if you know! 🙂

¡Pura Vida!

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Costa Rica Returns to In-person School

Today, February 8, 2021, is the first time students will be in the physical school buildings in almost a year, having closed last March because of the Covid-19 Pandemic.

Primary School – Los Angeles

Some schools will offer the option of a “hybrid plan” mixing in-person with online school, fewer days in-person. And the many students who have no internet access for online school will be prioritized for in-person classes and parents who are not comfortable with in-person school for their kids can continue online schooling.

Those in the physical school buildings must wear masks and desks will be 1.8 meters apart, with hand-washing and other precautions in place. Read more details in the English-language Tico Times article. Or readers here in Costa Rica can get questions answered on the Spanish language Education Ministry’s Coronavirus Website.

High School – Colegio Liceo

All photos are my older file photos from earlier years. The feature photo as header of page is of Escuela Central, the largest and main primary school, K-6. The kids in costumes are at Los Angeles Primary School and the teens at bottom are at Colegio Liceo, the university-prep public high school.

This past school year will have a major impact on several generations of students around the world with so many poorer students unable to participate in online education. Much work and prayer needs to go into helping these students around the world to “catch up” or fit in with the more affluent. And Costa Rica will do it well, always being a leader in education.

“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world”

– Nelson Mandela

¡Pura Vida!

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My Team Wins! Yay Alajuela!

You North Americans think you are crazy about American Football, you should see some of the Ticos get excited about their REAL FUTBOL (soccer) team. Liga Deportiva Alajuelense survived a late scare to beat Saprissa, 3-2, and win the 2021 CONCACAF League. This is like the “Super Bowl” of Costa Rica!

Atenas only has high school football but we are in Alajuela Province, thus that is “our” team! No. I have not suddenly become a football fan! I wasn’t in the states and not here, BUT I am a fan of my local people and many of them, especially young men, are big fans. And this was so important because we (underdogs) beat the “big” team from San Jose! 🙂 They are arrogant, big city bosses who needed to lose a game! And they lost more than one! 🙂 And to show my support I chose my Banco Nacional credit card colors in the colors of Liga, our team!

Read about it in Tico Times. In English!

¡Pura vida!

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Costa Rica: “Best of the World!”

Check out this National Geographic Traveler Article online listing Costa Rica as #2 on their list of Best of the World: eight sustainable destinations for 2021 and beyond.

The above photo is one of mine from Drake Bay since Nat Geo used their Drake Bay photo and I think mine is just about as good! 🙂 It’s sunrise from Aguila de Osa Lodge and the full post online also has my Drake Bay snorkeling photo. 🙂

And for those email recipients who won’t click the magazine link above, I copied the CR part of the article into my full blog post on my site, just click below . . .

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