Author: Charlie

Retired American nature-lover, living in Costa Rica, photographing birds and other jewels of nature. This site simply reports on my joys of being RETIRED IN COSTA RICA!
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Tour de Atenas? And Bingo!

Some of the hundreds of bikes going by my house for more than an hour today.

I’m not sure what it is, but they don’t act like they are racing but rather completing a tour. For 30 minutes it was almost bumper to bumper bikes then the stragglers continued for an hour or two more. Participants are mostly Tico or local people with a few expats included. You see these large groups of spandex-clad bikers occasionally around here, usually on weekends and even out on the highways and rural roads. While during the week bikers are working people with baskets making deliveries or just getting to work, etc. Neither the town’s narrow streets or the narrow highways are safe for casual or transportation lone bikers, plus we are all hills which makes it difficult as well as dangerous. It is rare to see children biking the streets and neither kids nor teens bike to school. They all walk to school! Like me! 🙂 As much as I like biking, I think I will still to walking and maybe live longer.

After church online in Nashville I went to the Catholic church for another Bingo experience with other Su Espacio Spanish students. This time more students came, two tables full! A lot of fun. I report with photos in my new Español blog Aprendo Español en Atenas, titled Bingo a los números de práctica and I’m getting better with my numbers in spanish!

My table of 7 was one of two tables of students from Su Espacio this time.
Me and David are missing from the photo of this table.

Tico food and drinks are available for sale and this time I ate a big piece of pineapple cornbread with a Pepsi. Nope, I’m not doing without my sugar fixes here! Dulce is the name for sweets here.  🙂

They just call the numbers (No B-16, N-23 like in states) and we have a bowl of corn kernals on the table to mark our numbers. Susan was the only one of our group (1st on left above) who had a winning card but there were two winners and one prize. There was a drawing and she lost the draw. But the prizes are nothing to write home about!

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Evangelical Dancing in the Park

Youth doing expressive movements to Christian music in Parque Central.

I walked through the central park (never called a plaza here like in colonial Latin America) on my way to the Super Mercado. At first I thought it was one of the many dance classes performing, but they were dancing to Christian music, so I assume it was one of the evangelical churches in town. As I passed back through on my way home this Saturday morning, a preacher concluded a prayer and began speaking. So it was definitely a church. Churches here are involving their youth in many different ways and this “expressive movements” to music is just one. The Iglesia Biblica I have attended some does this in some services kind of like First Baptist Nashville did when there. I have mixed feelings about it in worship or for outreach. It doesn’t appear to be natural or “real” praise of God, but something artificial that is taught or staged (to me). Many youth have natural rhythm and need a way to express it, so maybe this is a good way. Secular dancing of all kinds is very popular here with many public dances and many places to take dancing lessons.

I will continue to put Spanish words in bold red in this blog. I may also reference something in my new Spanish language blog, which is just about my efforts to learn Spanish. Today’s post in Aprendo Espanol en Atenas simply acknowledges Su Espacio and David Salas Costillo as my primary source of learning Spanish. In the future I will share my experiences trying to speak Spanish. 

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New Blog in Español Added: Aprender Español en Atenas

No blog here yesterday. I am setting up another blog in Español because as my September 2 blog said, I really need to be using what I am learning with multiple Spanish learning efforts. Since I live alone and write a lot, it makes sense to write more in Spanish since I am not talking with people all day every day. It will be difficult and short for awhile, but hopefully will help my language learning! The title is Aprender Español en Atenas, linked here for your language experience. At least I won’t be so long-winded in a language I’m learning!  🙂

In my second post there I refers to a local book some university students put together on culture and language as the first in a series. This one on music, Dances of the Sun and Moon. I just reviewed it for Goodreads and basically a good idea for teens and young adults, but I will not be continuing the series. See my review for why.

My “Target Audience” for this English blog has been and will continue to be mainly friends and family in the United States, though stats show it is being read all over the world by about 150-200 persons a post!  🙂  It is about my retirement in Costa Rica and the other main audience is people who are thinking about retiring here which is a growing audience and by people already retired here!  🙂

The new Spanish blog is for Spanish-speakers, particularly in Costa Rica, whom I hope will help me in my journey to learn the language. It will NOT be a translation of this blog or visa-verso!

This English blog will continue to be what used to be my “Adventures” blog and “Nature” blog all in one. I’m including some “Spiritual” in this blog but may still restart or continue my old Spiritual Blog, “His Spirit Blog” since it is a more targeted subject and thus maybe audience. Not sure yet.

Pura Vida!

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A People Day

And not a single photo of all the neat people I related to today!

I waved goodbye to my neighbors Don & Judy and the landlord’s gardener Javier as I walked out our compound gate for my Spanish Class at Su Espacio. Then “Buenas Dias” to Luis, the guard at our Roca Verde gate.  It is my habit to say just “Buenos” (the new, younger greeting) to everyone I meet on the sidewalk walking to town. If someone refuses to make eye contact, then they don’t want to be spoken to, so I don’t force them!  🙂

I greet the shop keepers around the Su Espacio Community Center and whoever is already in the center, except the exercise class which is very busy! Everyone here is so nice and friendly and we all greet and visit at first. The two hours of Spanish with an hour and a half just talking in Spanish which is what I need the most to learn the language! After class I visit with another student a bit and then head for the post office to wait in line to get postage on a letter to the states.

I mailed my request for U.S. Voter Registration to Nashville as a citizen living out of the country. I’m only allowed to vote in national elections, which is mainly the presidential election every 4 years. To vote for mayor or governor you have to actually live in the city or state. Makes sense! My national election vote is counted among the “Absentee Voting” and I read somewhere that they only count those if the election is very close and it could make a difference. But I like doing my duty!

While waiting in line at the “Correos” (Post Office) I see the business associate from my old apartments, Hacienda La Jacaranda with the new manager. We talk for 5 to 7 minutes in Spanish no less! I’m so proud of myself! The new manager wants some of my photos to possibly use in promotion or marketing of the apartments. I will gladly provide them gratis. I really want that place to succeed! It has so much potential. Then after talking to the two ladies I got acquainted with a nice guy behind me in line who speaks fluent Spanish and English and he chose to use English mostly with me.

From there to Coopeatenas, my supermercado, for about 4 items and a visit in the produce section with Carol, a former Spanish student who may come back. She is from Inglaterra (England) and just got back from a business trip back there.  We talked in Spanglish!  🙂

By then it was late enough for lunch and as I was headed toward La Carreta I bumped into Jason, a local Tico young man who helps in Su Espacio Spanish and English classes, for conversation and tutoring. I offered to treat him to lunch for some Spanish practice (meaning we only talk in Spanish) and we did, mostly! Soon after we sat down Corinna and Nicole came in for lunch but they did not sit with us because they were using this time for Nicole to work on a jigsaw puzzle (he’s the 6 year old son). So they were at the next table. Then one of my first Tica friends in Costa Rica, Anna, came in with an American friend and tenant in one of her houses and did sit with us. The 80 year old friend just moved here from the states and speaks no Spanish, so English took over again with a few exceptions with Jason and Anna. Wow! A big day already and then it started raining (Hallelujah!). After lunch I walked Jason home under my sombrilla (umbrella) and then on home myself. We are going to start getting together more to just talk in Spanish. His cousin sells good wood fire oven pizza and I’ll have him over for pizza one night and talk in Spanish. Whew! Hey! It is really hard work for me to carry on a conversation in Spanish!  🙂

I’ve been home the rest of the day and still greatly enjoy being “Home Alone” but also enjoyed the many encounters with friends today and much of it in Spanish! The best Spanish Class is talking with live people in Spanish! It is one of my goals!  Pura Vida!

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Labeling My Wildlife Photos

Some of the books I use plus the internet now.

Before the Yorkin Trip I had four books specifically for Costa Rica wildlife (in above photo) and the bird book, A Guide to the Birds of Costa Rica, was the best of those (seen in above photo by Stiles & Skutch, 1989). I am now replacing it with a 2014 book by one of the members of the birding club I just joined, Robert Dean, The Birds of Costa Rica, A Field Guide. It is obviously more up to date and has more birds. This is the second edition of his book. I’ve ordered it from Amazon.com and it should be here by next week via Miami.

Our birding guide for the club and my first club trip, Pat O’Donnell, also recommends an app (he co-authored) which I got for both my phone and Kindle called “Costa Rica Birds – Field Guide” which is available from most app stores or directly from the producers at BirdingFieldGuides.com  It is very good with lots of photos of all the birds of Costa Rica and a filter to help you label your bird photo. I may end up using it more than the book. We’ll see! With my Kindle Fire I have gone to almost all electronic books anyway.

The Panama bird book (in first photo)is very good, more recent than my first Costa Rica book, and can be used as a backup for identification. We almost have the same birds with a few exceptions. It is our southern birds and their northern birds that overlap. Likewise our northern birds overlap with Nicaragua.

The Costa Rica butterfly book in the top photo is very limited, so I also use the U.S. National Audubon Society guide (glad I kept it!). The only more thorough butterfly book for Costa Rica I’ve found is a college textbook for $80+ and I haven’t gone that far yet! Plus it is probably more technical than I want. I just want images to help me identify my photos.

The internet is good for some creatures, but not all. I still have unidentified butterflies and birds in my photo collection! I have also joined some websites or online organizations to help with birding and bird identification, but not a lot of help yet. So please know that when I label something “Unidentified,” it is not because I didn’t try!   🙂

Likewise I have one book on Costa Rica plants and it is about as limited as the butterfly book. So plants are sometimes even more difficult to label and I’m learning that the common Spanish names and English names are not simply translations of each other. Maybe I should go with the Latin!  🙂

Research is what I’m doing when I don’t know what I’m doing.
~Wernher von Braun

——
“Costa Rica Extra” Sports Tidbits:

Was Recreational Ziplining Really Invented in Costa Rica? Yes indeeeed! No data on whitewater rafting which is also big here.

The most popular sport in the little farm town of Atenas is el voleibol (volleyball) with one high school the national champion most years! We have a park with a beach volleyball court, all sand! I don’t know how it ranks in popularity in the country of Costa Rica, but is definitely popular, especially on the two coasts along with surfing there.

Though el futbol (soccer) is the most popular spectator sport in Costa Rica, el beisbol (baseball) is a close second as is el practicar surf (surfing) and el ciclismo (cycling) where we were just ranked high in the El Tour de Francia. And Costa Rica has the Latin American Champion Surfista (surfer) almost every year!

The happiest people on earth love their sports and recreation and smart gringos avoid driving to the beach on weekends when the highways are literally packed bumper to bumper with Ticos at the beaches! Pura Vida!
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Heraclitus

“Time is a game played beautifully by children.” 
― Heraclitus, Fragments



Bill Watterson

“Weekends don’t count unless you spend them doing something completely pointless.” 
― Bill Watterson
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RAIN in the Garden!

Has the “Rainy Season” really started now? Afternoon rain for 2 days in a row! 🙂

Rain dripping off a Guarumo leaf.

Wet Palmetto leaf in my garden.

Wet Heliconia leaves in my garden. Camera doesn’t show rain, just wet!
My miniature rainforest in the rain; habitat of birds, butterflies, frogs, & lizards.
But you can’t see the rain in the photo.  🙂   Believe me. It is raining!
Babies!
My pride and joy, rare Maraca Plant (Shampoo Ginger), has 4 new sprouts!
Snapped this as rain stopped and I finished post. See ground cover filling in?
My garden is one of the best things about this house and done from scratch!
With a rare plant to boot! It came from being nice to the gardeners.  🙂

“Open up, heavens, and rain.
    Clouds, pour out buckets of my goodness!
Loosen up, earth, and bloom salvation;
    sprout right living.
    I, God, generate all this.”
Isaiah 45:8
The Message


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Fork-tailed Emerald Hummingbird

Back to my garden . . .

Fork-tailed Emerald Hummingbird
In my garden, Roca Verde house, Atenas, Costa Rica

This is my second time to photograph this species in my garden. Both times the light is not good for a clear and colorful photo. He/she is an iridescent green all over except for the dark, forked tail. The first time was no better.  What I need is sunlight shining directly on the bird!  🙂

SPANISH LANGUAGE UPDATE
My progress has been so very slow. ¡Aprendo poco a poco español! (I learn Spanish little by little.) Is what I say to some people. So I have joined a second class that meets only once a week at the little evangelical church I have attended some, Iglesia Biblical. It provides a text book and workbook for homework and it is too early to see if it will help me learn faster, though every effort is of some value! What I need most is to just talk more in Spanish, ignoring the embarrassment of doing it wrong. That is what David Castillo at Su Espacio is trying to get me to do. We are down to just two in his class right now, so it is almost like tutoring. I also try to do one little activity each day on duolingo.com which is a great free language learning site! And I just ordered another CD-based course. So I’m trying! ¡Pero es difícil! (But it is difficult!) Or slow! David suggested I do this blog in Spanish, but that would leave too many of you out, so I won’t. Maybe a separate blog in Spanish?
DROUGHT
This has been one of the driest “Rainy Seasons” on record for the Central Valley and I have to water my garden and new trees every other day. Everyone says the rain should really come in September and October. We’ll see! It is cloudy and thundering right now, but that often means little or nothing!

The only exception to the drought has been the Caribbean side of the country and a few places in the north. It rained every day we were at Yorkin. The northwest or Guanacaste  area is always the driest part of the country and it is even drier this year. It is really hard on farmers!

 Time flies, but not backwards, like a hummingbird can.
(-:


Good night from Atenas, Costa Rica! The little bit of rain passed fast and gave us fog. Pura Vida!
View from my balcony of course!


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Textures of the Rain Forest

While along the Yorkin River in a Bribri indigenous people village I captured several shots of the forest & its textures.
East of Puerto Viejo, Costa Rica

 

All photos made by Charlie Doggett at the Casa de las Mujeres Yorkin

 

 

 

 
Study nature, love nature, stay close to nature. It will never fail you.
 
Frank Lloyd Wright

 

 

 

Gustave Flaubert

“I tried to discover, in the rumor of forests and waves, words that other men could not hear, and I pricked up my ears to listen to the revelation of their harmony.” 
― Gustave Flaubert, November

 

 

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Shots of Birding Club Members

Though my focus is always on nature, I did make a few shots of the 18 club members on trip.

Pat is our club birding guide and very good at finding birds!
He is from states but married to a Tica with CR children now!

“Now are you sure everything is in a waterproof bag?

Our feet were wet before we ever got to canoe.

Dugout canoes with outboard motors on the rear and traditional pole in front.

Right outside our thatched roof housing we find many birds!
At least once we didn’t have to wade the stream!

There are about a hundred members of the “Birding Club of Costa Rica” with expats possibly being in the majority (or at least were for this trip). Each and every person is so nice and very interesting with people like my roommate who still works for the World Bank, another retired from the United Nations, and another who sold his software company to Steve Jobs and built a home in Costa Rica. Then there’s the writer and the fun Dutch couple, the author of the latest Costa Rica birding book and so many many more to get acquainted with! I look forward to it!

The only meeting is an annual business meeting with everything else being field trips to find birds. And a cool Christmas Party they tell me! I never made time for a birding club in the states, so this is going to be fun! I’ve already bought the club T-shirt!  🙂
“I think the most important quality in a birdwatcher is a willingness to stand quietly and see what comes. Our everyday lives obscure a truth about existence – that at the heart of everything there lies a stillness and a light.” 
― Lynn Thomson, Birding with Yeats: A Memoir
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Birds in the Yorkin Bribri Forest

We heard and even saw hundreds from a distance. Two club members had big lenses on their camera and I’m sure got much better photos. This is what I could do with my cheap 300 mm lens. Many have been cropped and enlarged to the point of almost seeing dots, but I’m still happy with these 13! 🙂

Montezuma Oropendola
Yorkin River Bribri Indigenous People Forest, Costa Rica
Long-tailed Hermit Hummingbird
Yorkin River Bribri Indigenous People Forest, Costa Rica
Scarlet-rumped Tanager
Yorkin River Bribri Indigenous People Forest, Costa Rica

Rufous-tailed Jacamar
Yorkin River Bribri Indigenous People Forest, Costa Rica

Violaceous Trogon
Yorkin River Bribri Indigenous People Forest, Costa Rica

Boat-billed Flycatcher
Yorkin River Bribri Indigenous People Forest, Costa Rica

Long-tailed Tyrant
Yorkin River Bribri Indigenous People Forest, Costa Rica

Pale-billed Woodpecker Male
Yorkin River Bribri Indigenous People Forest, Costa Rica

Blue Ground Dove
Yorkin River Bribri Indigenous People Forest, Costa Rica
Gray-capped Flycatcher
Yorkin River Bribri Indigenous People Forest, Costa Rica

Paltry Tyrannulet
Yorkin River Bribri Indigenous People Forest, Costa Rica

Short-tailed Hawk
Yorkin River Bribri Indigenous People Forest, Costa Rica
Black Vulture
Yorkin River Bribri Indigenous People Forest, Costa Rica
White-fronted Parrots
Yorkin River Bribri Indigenous People Forest, Costa Rica

And the Blue-headed Parrots photos were even darker silhouettes than these, plus another 10 or so bird photos that are not very good and/or unidentified. It was an effort to photograph in mostly poor light of a dark rainforest with overcast or rainy skies while wading through mud. So with those conditions and my amateur camera, I’m happy to have gotten these photos! I’m easy to please!  🙂

They will eventually be added to my Costa Rica Birds PHOTO GALLERY, so check it out sometime for a lot more bird photos collected over the last six and a half years in Costa Rica.

“Sweet bird!  thy bow’r is ever green, 
Thy sky is ever clear;
thou has’t no sorrow in thy song,
No winter in thy year.”
–  John Logan 

And yesterday’s post on Bribri Insects has been updated with a correct identification on the unsure one and three more butterflies added!