Tag: rain

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Sleet or Hail – In Costa Rica !?

Sleet or Hail !
The fact that it was raining a second afternoon in a row is amazing in February!
But ICE is unheard of in the Central Valley of Costa Rica, at any time! (only at tops of a few high mountains)
I increased the contrast of photo a little – all the white spots are bits of ice – sleet or hail. (cell phone photo)
Ticos were trying to photograph something they had never seen before! It melted fast!
Atenas, Costa Rica

Okay, so you have had some strange weather in the states too! Weather seems to be out of the ordinary everywhere in the world now. And there are still people who don’t believe in climate change or global warming. Wow! Saturday and Sunday afternoon were the first two rains we have had in this calendar year, unusual even without the ice! It is Dry Season here! Shocked tourists?

I was eating a late lunch of fish at Colinas del Sol Hotel Restaurant near my house when it started raining with the first minute or so including ice. Above shot on concrete sidewalk outside restaurant.
¡Pura Vida!


5.2 Magnitude Earthquake Shakes Costa Rica This Monday Morning  This was way down south where I will be in two weeks, near Puerto Jimenez and Corcovado National Park. We did have a smaller tremor in Atenas Saturday which strangely I did not feel but “heard!” Mejor clima del mundo?  🙂


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The Great Kiskadee Sings in a Good Rain!

Great Kiskadee
He was singling loudly on the edge of my terrace today before the rain started.
Sorry that it was shot through both glass and screen of my sliding glass door.
When I opened it, he flew away!
He sang his loudest just before we got a very unusual big February rain!
Atenas, Costa Rica
To hear what his song sounds like (hint: his name), click on the below reference and a button there that says “Listen” to hear him sing: 
And see more in my photo gallery BIRDS
¡Pura Vida!

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Cloudy Time of Year

October is usually the wettest of the rainy season months (May-November)
And this year is therefore normal with rain every day in afternoon & evening or night.
With mornings sometimes clear and sunny, but the last week or so just cloudy. Early October.
Earlier this morning you could not even see the hills above for the clouds!
 Atenas, Costa Rica 
A week or two later photo with a Pacific front moving in.
We had very heavy rain with the beginning of Hurricane Nate that started here.
Then 2 or 3 weeks with very little rain and now it may be coming again. We will see!
This shot 25 October.
Atenas, Costa Rica

Mornings are very foggy . . .

Even as the sun comes up!  Though hard to capture in a photo! 


AccuWeather Forecast for Atenas  which is usually pretty accurate, though this week we did not get the quantity of rain they forecast. Now we are suppose to get back to normal afternoon showers until sometime in November when it fades away to the dry season. I prefer the greener rainy season!
Actually I rarely check the forecast unless traveling. It is what it is!  🙂
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Torch Ginger or El bastón de emperador . . . . . . . . . . . . . . + Nothing Escaped Nate

Torch Ginger or El bastón de emperador
My Garden, Atenas, Costa Rica

Torch Ginger or El bastón de emperador
As seen from the street in front of my house
Roca Verde, Atenas, Costa Rica

And don’t you love the Spanish name for this flower? El bastón de emperador translates to “The Emperor’s Staff.” This particular one was a gift from my gardener. The first one I got and paid for died because it was in my busy flower bed and did not get enough sun like this gets in the front yard. Note that I have 3 flowers at different stages, bud, small flower and large flower. It is one of my favorite tropical flowers and I have wanted one since I moved here. They are hard to find with most nurseries (viveros) not having any in stock. But my gardener Cristian knows where to find things!  🙂  Like when I wanted the Maraca plant (Shampoo Ginger) none of the nurseries had one, so his partner Alfredo got mine from his uncle’s yard! Wow! They are more than gardners. They are good friends!

And in spite of the horrible weather we have been having, I still have flowers blooming!  🙂

UPDATE ON TROPICAL STORM NATE IN COSTA RICA
Schools have been closed since Wednesday and most government offices. Everything was closed yesterday (Thursday) the main day it hit us with medium high winds and very heavy rain, closing many more roads including parts of the two main highways to Atenas because of mudslides. The saddest was a mudslide just on the edge of Atenas that killed a little boy and destroyed many houses. He was the only death in Atenas. For all of Costa Rica, Nicaragua & Honduras I heard this morning that 23 were killed and 27 missing. The major causes of death are drowning and buried by mudslides, though some in auto accidents. Here is a locally produced slideshow video of rescue and cleanup efforts.  Or the usual live video from Weather.com.  And the Tico Times Article in English. 

If this is just a “tropical storm,” think how bad it will be as a hurricane, which is what it is becoming tonight (Friday) when it hits Cancun, Mexico and moves on to the U.S. Gulf Coast, possibly New Orleans by Sunday morning. This could be a “biggie!” 
Costa Rica is directly to the left of the word RAIN
In Atenas everyone stayed home yesterday (Thursday) with strong winds and heavy rain all day and all night. Today we are getting a little sunshine and I walked to town. It is interesting that all hills, cliffs, dirt walls have lots of water coming out at the bottom. A hill near my house has so much water coming out that it is literally a little creek pouring down to the street drainage ditch. Government and schools are still closed, but banks and most businesses open and we had the regular Friday morning Feria or Farmer’s Market. So almost back to normal with a few trees down and spotty electrical outages. But me and my house are good on all counts! I can even make this blog post, meaning internet works! That’s a big deal here!    Here are some more  photos and videos of Nate Hitting Costa Rica from Tico Times.



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Christmas Day Wildlife Photos

The 6 AM Bird Walk had a different guide, Ronald, and a lot more birds today! Of course most photos are on my SLR camera, but the guide used my phone on his spotting scope for the next three photos below. I have some better ones on my real camera. All the guides here are provided by the Selva Verde Lodge, at a reasonable extra cost or in my case as part of a “Birding Package.”

Snowy Cotinga  (A first sighting for me)
By Nature Guide Ronald on my phone through his spotting scope
Selva Verde Lodge, Sarapiqui, Costa Rica

Yellow-throated Toucan (formerly Chestnut or Black-mandibled Toucan)
By Nature Guide Ronald on my phone through his spotting scope
Selva Verde Lodge, Sarapiqui, Costa Rica

Mantled Howler Monkey
By Nature Guide Ronald on my phone through his spotting scope
Selva Verde Lodge, Sarapiqui, Costa Rica
And I haven’t mentioned that I hear them often in the forest here.

Nature Guide Ronald at the front entrance
to Selva Verde before we cross the road
for birds in a botanical garden.
Then, late morning I got out of our lodge reserve to visit Dave & Dave’s Nature Pavilion which several people had recommended. It is basically a lot of different kinds of feeders on the edge of a thick secondary rainforest with a lot of birds. It provided me with some good close-ups and of a few new birds. So it was worth the 10 km drive down the highway. The father-son project has a great story behind it but I will let you read about it on their website at Dave & Dave’s.
More hummingbirds than I’ve seen almost anywhere else.
Some eating out of that heliconia flower.
Dave & Dave’s Nature Pavilion, Sarapiqui, Costa Rica

There was a group of German photographers there with their big lenses.
Dave & Dave’s Nature Pavilion, Sarapiqui, Costa Rica

Dave Senior putting out more fruit for the birds.
Dave & Dave’s Nature Pavilion, Sarapiqui, Costa Rica
Tonight I am going on the “Night Hike” and hope to get another good shot of a red-eyed tree frog. We will see. Animals are unpredictable. The restaurant has had this Christmas tree up since I’ve been here and they play Christmas music.
Christmas Tree
Selva Verde Lodge Restaurant #1
Sarapiqui, Costa Rica

Tomorrow I’ve scheduled an early morning boat trip, Guide Evan is going with me. And oh yes, in the rainforest there are still afternoon showers, even in the Dry Season. A shot from my room this afternoon during the short shower to keep everything watered!  🙂

Rain seen from Riverside Room 45, Selva Verde Lodge, Sarapiqui, Costa Rica

¡Pura Vida!

And all these photos were made on my cell phone!

Merry Christmas Day!  ~Charlie
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Dripping Wet!

Dripping Wet!  (Heliconia in my Garden, Atenas)
Is how we feel in Atenas as if Rainy Season will
never end! Though usually it has stopped by now.
Long range forecasts show more through Christmas.
And we are not in a rain forest!  🙂

I wrote this a couple of days ago to “get ahead” and sure enough it did not rain today (Friday), so maybe dry season is nearly here! Today I took Anthony to one of my favorite birding places, Tarcoles River for a boat ride and will report on it in the next couple of days. So more bird photos and another first sighting for me! And the weather was clear and sunny!

Cell phone snap on Tarcoles River, Costa Rica today, 16 December 2016
And no, I do not miss the snow in the states! Its either rain or sunshine here every day!
Tomorrow I help with the Angel Tree party and then start anticipating my next big trip 23-27 December to Selva Verde on the Rio Sarapiqui. And well, some Christmas fiestas this weekend. Busy time of year!

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Its a Jungle Out There!

From my kitchen looking across the DR/LR and terrace at another rain.
Our rainiest rainy season in years has everything growing. 

Step out my back door and the flower garden is 6-7 feet tall!

And the screen of little palms outside my office/guest room is growing too! 

Usually by December the “Dry Season” or our summer has begun, but it is raining again today and forecasts are for more. Its a good thing that I love the jungle!  🙂

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Ready for Hurricane Otto!

Copied from La Nacion  –   Heavy rains & flooding BEFORE the hurricane hits in Caribe.

Costa Rica’s first hurricane since 1851 is expected to hit land tonight in the northern Caribbean near by beloved Tortuguero National Park or further north in Nicaragua. Atenas is not in the “Red Zone” that expects the most wind and rain, but we will get both all day on the American Thanksgiving while I eat turkey with my neighbor.

For more on the hurricane, today’s Tico Times article

And track it on The Weather Channel and a hundred other websites!  🙂

And the best coverage in Spanish is in our national newspaper La Nacion which Google will translate into English for you. Lots of photos and videos.

They are forecasting up to 20 inches of rain and very high winds in the path (north of us) as it travels all the way across the peninsula to the Pacific Ocean. We will get rain as we have all day today and some winds, but probably not the very high, damaging winds. Yet hurricanes do change paths sometimes, so I bought my bottled water and prepared if it knocks out our power and water. Which could mean no blog post tomorrow night! 🙂

There wasn’t a run on water at the supermercado,
meaning I guess that most don’t really expect us to have much damage.
I’m always the Boy Scout! Being prepared!