South Caribbean — The Book!

Just click the image above to go to the online preview of the book in my online bookstore. Free!
Or if you just want to see photos of my latest trip there, go to the TRIP Gallery below or one of the other trips made to this area of Costa Rica.
STILL CONFUSED ABOUT ME LIVING NEAR THE CARIBBEAN?
If you still find the word “Caribbean” confusing, think of it this way: All those islands south of Florida (Cuba, Bahamas, Jamaica, Puerto Rica, Haiti, Virgin Islands, etc) are in
THE EASTERN CARIBBEAN SEA
And me, Costa Rica, all of Central America, part of southern Mexico, Columbia in South America are all on
THE WESTERN CARIBBEAN SEA
Does that help with geography? Now to complicate it a little more, all of us in Central America (except El Salvador) have an east coast and a west coast. Our east coast is the Caribbean Sea (I think technically a part of the Atlantic Ocean) and our west coast is the Pacific Ocean. So I just spent 5 days on an Atlantic Ocean beach and in December I plan to spend 6 days on a Pacific Ocean beach. But still always in Costa Rica!  🙂

Hotel Banana Azul

Too many clouds for a traditional sunrise this morning, but I thought this shot to left of the sun was okay.
Hotel Banana Azul, Puerto Viejo de Talamanca, Costa Rica

 

The Garden I face from the Dining Room  —   Bird feeder off to the right
Hotel Banana Azul, Puerto Viejo de Talamanca, Costa Rica

 

This morning I decided to not keep posting so many photos on the blog, thus began my trip photo gallery for this experience where you can find lots of photos! Since this was to be the hotel post today, I will give links to three sub-galleries on the very relaxed and enjoyable Hotel Banana Azul:

 

 
Or for the whole trip, go to my trip photo gallery called
2017 Sept 4-8 — Caribe Banana Azul Puerto Viejo
including my visit to Cahuita National Park & Samasati Reserve
 
And/or check out the Hotel Banana Azul Web Page
And plan ahead! They stay booked solid much of the time,
even in the “off season” which it is now.
This new caribe gallery is the latest of my “TRIPS” Photo Galleries
where I am working backwards to document my Costa Rica trips
and neighboring countries’ trips in my bigger CR gallery:
At the time of this posting, I’m back to July 2015
and the trips started in January 2015!
Almost finished! Travel with Kevin is next!
¡Pura Vida!

“Professional” Landscape Photos

See this article about an Italian Landscape Photographer here with 10 of his photos. Some of his landscapes I haven’t seen yet. And my equipment is not as good. But I will end up having most of these photos in time except for the time lapse at Poas. Not my thing. Also note that beneath that first beach photo is a web address to his website with a 360 degree image of that same beach which is really cool!

My March trip was partly to get this photo, but a closed trail stopped me.
I will go back and make my own photo one of these days!
Rio Celeste Waterfall
Tenorio National Park, Costa Rica

And for some of my “amateur” landscapes, see my Vistas gallery or my Waterfalls gallery. 

-o-

LOCAL REPORT: The rain is bringing in some new bugs and while typing I just watched one of my geckos eat one. They are little with long wings, chase the light, and pester me! Life in the jungle!  🙂

Corcovado! THE BOOK

A 100 page book with 84 photos form two visits to Corcovado.
 CLICK the image or this to preview the book on Blurb.com.

Note that I set up the softcover book with “standard paper” which makes it a little cheaper, but the hardcover is set up with a higher quality paper for better photos. Sorry they are so expensive, but most “print on demand” self-publishing is, since they often print just one book at a time. And see my Facebook page for how you can make and order your first book with Blurb at 30% off.

See also my trip gallery on the recent Drake Bay Trip  for some of the same photos and

For the 2009 Corcovado Trip, click for my old Pbase gallery which includes photos from that visit to Corcovado along with my first visit to the cloud forest of San Gerado de Dota.

Atenas, Costa Rica – A Photo Book!

New Photo Book About Atenas
Click image or this caption to go to a PREVIEW of the book online.
You can thumb through the book page by page for free.
Just keep clicking the pages.

Now that I have finished it, I just realized I left out the Farmers’ Market & Central Mercado. Oh well, I guess every book has to be imperfect!  🙂  Enjoy anyway! And I will do more!

And check out the “official” video on Atenas, just 2 1/2 min.

Becoming a Part of the Silence

“In order to see birds it is necessary to become a part of the silence.”

― Robert Lynd

By Charlie Doggett

My latest book is nearly 350 photos of bird, mostly in Costa Rica, but also from our surrounding countries.

Click book image to Blurb website, then click the image there to “preview” electronically.
This one has to be ordered through Amazon.com – trying something new.

New Photo Gallery Under Construction

For many reasons I decided to move all my Costa Rica photos into a new photo gallery outside my old PBase gallery which for now I will keep for “history” or pre-Costa Rica photos as is. After checking out several possibilities, I chose SmugMug.com as the host and I am working on a new gallery there that will be formatted more like a website I am calling:

Screen Print of Home Page  –  GO THERE NOW!

Please be patient. It is a long way from finished since I have to upload and label each individual photo one at a time. But I think you will like it when finished! You can simply BROWSE as on any website, but also with a powerful search engine you can SEARCH for and bring up all photos for say one place name or one bird, etc. In the case of birds, they are listed alphabetically by the English name, but with SEARCH you can get a lot of other combinations.

The GALLERIES of photos are organized first in FOLDERS by subject or theme such as “Birds” or “Vistas.”  In each gallery you can click the button SLIDESHOW for the best full screen viewing of those photos. Or PASS YOUR CURSOR OVER PHOTO FOR TITLE & LOCATION. Then at the bottom of each photo and top of each gallery is a button labeled BUY that takes you to a multitude of sizes and mediums to order a copy of the photo, from a regular 4×6 print or large wall hanger to a greeting card. Fun!
————–

Changing the subject:

Interesting Article: Expats Moving to Costa Rica Discover Healthier Lifestyles!

My TripAdvisor Reviews Read by 61,000+!

In case you didn’t know, I write reviews of places I visit on the TripAdvisor website. I think you can see all my reviews at: http://www.tripadvisor.com/members-reviews/29charlied  try it. The address is from my member page, so hope it works for the non-member. I have mixed emotions about TripAdvisor, which is good for some things but not all. I don’t recommend it as your main trip planning source. If a hotel, lodge, park, restaurant, etc. has its own website, then your best information is going to them directly. Don’t believe the promise of big discounts from TripAdvisor. And for turnkey trips in Costa Rica I have had good experience with My Costa Rica (https://costarica.org/ ) at reasonable prices. And if you want to get acquainted with Costa Rica, the absolutely best tour of the country at the very lowest price is from Caravan.com  from $995 including all meals and hotels! And of course my friends have me as an possible personal guide or trip planner, though I don’t have the discounts these big companies have. But my advice is free!  🙂

Millions of reviews to help you
plan and book your perfect trip
Hi Charlie Doggett
Level 86 reviews 12,492 total points
Your advice has helped thousands
Charlie, 61,888 readers have read your reviews – impressive! As a leading contributor, your advice has really made its mark in our travel community. You’ve also earned a Readership badge with TripCollective. Congrats.
Good advice travels fast – so keep on sharing to see how many more travelers you can help!
Add a Review

Christmas in San Jose Photos

Big Cities like to do everything bigger and better and San Jose, the capital and largest city in Costa Rica is no exception. See a few photos of Christmas decor and events by Tico Times:

http://www.ticotimes.net/2015/12/25/photos-christmas-2015

Tico Times photos – this of the lighting of tree at Children’s Hospital

AND MY DAY AFTER CHRISTMAS?

I’m hoping to stay home all day with no interruptions to the many things I want to do and some rest! 

WITH CHRISTMAS COMES THE WIND!
It actually started some a couple of weeks ago, but it is here full force now! I’m having to keep the sliding door screen closed and my garden door with no screen closed because so many leaves, flowers, bugs and dust blow in! This will be the norm through February or March with it getting more dusty the longer we go without rain. And if Turrialba erupts again, we will get ash or gray-black dust! That is just part of living in paradise!  🙂

And the crazy thing is that it is during this windy, sometimes dusty period that we have the most tourists and snowbirds trying to get away from cold weather up north. I think I’ve decided I like the rainy season (Jul-Oct) or “green season” better and it’s two shoulder periods (May-Jun & Oct-Nov) which have very little rain but are greener and more pleasant. So for the next 3 months or so we put up with wind, dust and snow birds! Then tranquility begins again!  🙂

And for my Canadian friends: