Blog - Retired in Costa Rica

April 24, 2019April 24, 2019

Monteverde: The Book

I finished it last week but was waiting for Blurb to offer one of their discounts before I ordered my copies since I have to buy at least one copy to offer it for sale. That’s business! 🙂 I usually get about 4 copies, sending one to my host lodge/hotel and one to the birding guide I used and I’m saving a copy for some local library here in Atenas but I haven’t found the right one yet. Long story.

By including some photos from my 2016 visit to Monteverde the book has 123 photos on 78 pages with about 45 species of birds plus other animals and nature. I’m pleased with this photo book available in my bookstore at:

https://www.blurb.com/b/9427058-monteverde

FREE PAGE-BY-PAGE PREVIEW ELECTRONICALLY

Or click this cover image:

“My wish is to stay always like this, living quietly in a corner of nature.”
~Claude Monet

Thanks to Monet for my subtitle inspiration!

¡Pura Vida!

April 23, 2019

SOUTH AMERICA Pages & Galleries

373_7371-A-WEB — The Prehistoric Hoatzin Bird found only in the Amazon – photographed in the Mamiraua Reserve, Brazil, August 2006

I continue to dig up my old photos and stories of past travels in my blessed retirement days for the TRAVEL pages of this website with the bulk being links to my new “Pre-Costa Rica TRAVEL” photo galleries.

The newest web page and set of photo galleries is summarized on SOUTH AMERICA. The feature photo at top is of a boat similar to what we traveled & lived on for a week of the mission trip on a tributary to the Amazon River, Rio Purus. Just a few more reports on the blessings of my retirement.

If you prefer to go straight to the photo galleries they are linked here:

South America Travel Photo Galleries

In Pericatuba, Amazonas, Brazil, August 19, 2006. — In Paricatuba, Amazonas, Brazil, August 19, 2006.

Magical!

My two guides, Fran & Raimundo, in Mamiraua Reserve, Amazon River, Tefe, Brazil

“I will look back at it and smile because it was life and I decided to live it.”

April 18, 2019

Monteverde Gallery Completed

Finally, all the photos made during a week in Monteverde, Costa Rica have been sorted, culled, labeled and organized into the few best in each category as one of my “Trip Galleries” labeled as:

2019 April 7-13 — Monteverde, Costa Rica

Now I will start working on the photo book about Monteverde and making more photos around here as I report on things in Atenas like the progress on our central park remodeling and the climate fair here next week with our annual oxcart parade – always something happening! 🙂

Keep close to Nature’s heart… and break clear away, once in awhile, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean.

~John Muir

¡Pura Vida!

April 17, 2019April 17, 2019

44 Species – 16 Lifers – Monteverde BIRDS!

Now that I am wrapping up the photos from my week in Monteverde last week, I’m better realizing how good a trip it was! It was one of my best birding trips in recent years with useable photos of 44 different species of birds, 16 were first-time sightings for me or what birders call “Lifers.” See the 44 birds in the gallery:

2019 Monteverde BIRDS

IMG_2698-A-WEB — Emerald Toucanet with an attitude!

My Lifer List This Trip

20190410_095102-A-WEB — Golden-olive Woodpecker

Coppery-headed Emerald
Magenta-throated Woodstar
Ruddy Pigeon
Buff-fronted Quail-Dove
Golden-olive Woodpecker
Paltry Tyrannulet
Black-headed Tody-Flycatcher
Long-tailed Manakin
Azure-hooded Jay
Ruddy-capped Nightingale-Thrush
Swainson’s Thrush
White-throated Thrush
Lesser Greenlet
Gray-crowned Yellowthroat
Rose-breasted Grosbeak
Black-thighed Grosbeak

The featured photo at top is of a Wilson’s Warbler. And I am now working on the other parts of my trip gallery like other wildlife, the hotel, flowers, etc. which will go much faster than my huge collection of bird photos! 🙂 It’s at 2019 April 7-13 — Monteverde, Costa Rica which the birds gallery is just one part of.

I am thankful that when the Quakers came from the states and founded the little mountain farming town of Monteverde they also had the foresight to start preserving the virgin forest around the town and that other ecologists came and continued the effort with some of the largest forest reserves in the world! Nature is the main attraction of Monteverde!

My wish is to stay always like this, living quietly in a corner of nature.

~Claude Monet

IMG_9570-A-WEB — Three-wattled Bellbird close to the ground in search of food – A 1st for me!

¡Pura Vida!

April 16, 2019April 16, 2019

Cloud Forest Scenery & Vistas

Just a few sample shots of the beautiful cloud forests of Monteverde, Costa Rica which I’m sorry I did not pay more attention to in my photography this past week. Every tree is a beautiful work of art and some are old growth or a part of an ancient virgin forest. I was particularly surprised to see how close we were to Arenal Volcano and what a beautiful view we had from the continental divide in Santa Elena Reserve shown above in the feature photo. I plan to go back to Arenal in November! So many beautiful places of nature here!

Monteverde Forests & Vistas

Selvatura Tree Tops Hanging Bridge

Another Vista from Santa Elena

Forest Trail in Selvatura

An Old Growth Ficus Tree in Monteverde Reserve

Looking Down on Forest from a Hanging Bridge, Selvatura

Arenal Volcano Seen from Santa Elena

My Guide Rodiber Finding Tree Information

An Unusual Tree that Got My Attention in Curi Cancha

Cloud forest is quite different from lowland tropical rain forest. The name comes from the observation that the forests are nearly always shrouded in clouds. These forests are situated at high altitude along the continental divide down the spine of Costa Rica. As the warm moist air from over the Pacific or Caribbean is pushed up the sides of the mountains, it cools, and the moisture begins to condense forming clouds. ~Costa Rica Guide, https://costa-rica-guide.com/nature/refuges/monteverde-cloud-forest-reserve/

I just realized that I have started to repeat some photos, so this will be all of my reports on a wonderful week in Monteverde. My “Trip Gallery” will be coming to my online photo gallery soon at 2019 April 7-13 — Monteverde Lodge & Gardens – just need a few more days for that and then “The Book,” my first on Monteverde even though I was there one other time. Watch my Bookstore for the Monteverde photo book! This trip alone yielded photos of 44 species of birds!

And check out some of my other trips in the Costa Rica Trips Photo Gallery! Almost every location is as beautiful and exciting as this one.

¡Pura Vida!

April 15, 2019April 15, 2019

Other Wildlife Monteverde

I go for birds and show mostly bird photos, but I love the other animals too and here is my collection from all four reserves and the lodge. Enjoy!

Other Wildlife Monteverde

White-nosed Coati, Monteverde Lodge & Gardens

Sleeping 2-Toed Sloth. Monteverde Reserve

Stingless Wasp Nest, Curi-Cancha Reserve

Cloud Forest Racer, Santa Elena Reserve

White-faced Capuchin Monkey, Monteverde Lodge & Gardens

Armadillo, Curi-Cancha Reserve

Side-striped Palm Pitviper, Monteverde Reserve

Red-tailed Squirrel, Bajo del Tigre

Agouti, Curi-Cancha Reserve

Deppe’s Squirrel, Curi-Cancha Reserve

White-faced Capuchin Monkey, Monteverde Lodge & Gardens

Green Spiny Lizard, Curi-Cancha Reserve

Armadillo, Bajo del Tigre

It takes a true encounter to realise that real animals, wild animals, have all but passed from our lives. ~John Burnside

See also my Other Wildlife Photo Gallery

All my photos & adventures this week made possible by Monteverde Lodge & Gardens

¡Pura Vida!

April 14, 2019

Butterflies & Moths Monteverde

I saw one really cool and new-to-me moth at Santa Elena Reserve, two butterflies at Selvatura Park and all the rest were at Monteverde Lodge & Gardens where they have a really nice small butterfly garden indoors. There is one dining table for up to 4 people that can be scheduled for a private Butterfly Dinner! 🙂 Kind of neat! And two of the moths I photographed on my little private room terrace/patio.

Selvatura claims to have the largest butterfly garden in Central America and the huge dome looks like it but this trip it was horrible with only two (2) species of butterflies. There is a Monteverde Butterfly Garden operated by a couple of nature lovers but I did not go this time. Three years ago it was great! There were a lot of butterflies, especially blue morpho, flying around in all four reserves, but difficult to photograph there.

Butterflies & Moths

Blue Morpho at Lodge

Four Windows Moth at Santa Elena

Blue Morpho at Lodge

Blue Morpho at Selvatura

Unknown Moth at Lodge

Heliconia at Lodge

Owl’s Eye at Selvatura

Unknown Moth at Lodge

Whitened Bluewing at Lodge

2 Blue Morphos at Lodge (open-wings & closed-wings)

Blue Morpho at Lodge

See also my Butterflies & Moths Gallery – a growing collection!

I do not know whether I was then a man dreaming I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly dreaming I am a man. ~Zhuangzi

¡Pura Vida!

April 13, 2019

Bajo del Tigre Reserve

Bajo del Tigre Reserve is the smallest of the nature reserves within Monteverde even though it is a part of the largest total Nature Reserve in Costa Rica called Children’s Eternal Rainforest or better known here by its Spanish name Bosque Eterno de los Niños. The better part around Monteverde is outside of town in the forests where you must stay in cabins to see many birds or other wildlife. And the very best area of the bigger reserve for birds is east of here near Arenal which I hope to visit sometime.

Here’s my better photos of wildlife seen in about 2.5 hours on the Bajo del Tigre Trail. The close-up of a Three-wattled Bellbird was when he came down near us (me & my private guide) feeding or looking for fruit to eat. Wild avocados are ripe right now. 🙂

Bajo del Tigre Wildlife

Lesson’s Motmot (formerly Blue-crowned)

Red-tailed Squirrel

Emerald Toucanet

Three-wattled Bellbird

Brown Jay

Long-tailed Manakin

Armadillo

Brown-hooded Parrot

“Away, away, from men and towns,
To the wild wood and the downs, —
To the silent wilderness,
Where the soul need not repress its music.”
—Percy Bysshe Shelley

¡Pura Vida!

April 12, 2019

Selvatura Park, Monteverde

Selvatura Park is (or was) a great combination Nature Park next door to the Santa Elena Cloud Forest Reserve AND an Adventure Park (which part is now taking over). It was a super place when I visited 3 years ago with the biggest and most impressive Butterfly Garden I had ever seen and they claimed it to be the largest in Central America. Well this time the butterfly garden had only two species of butterflies – my hotel has more in their tiny butterfly garden! Their Hummingbird Garden is flowers & feeders attracting wild hummingbirds, so what seemed like fewer this year may just be what is happening in the wild (or what they are feeding them and fewer butterfly-attracting plants). I refused to pay extra for the serpentarium or insect exhibit, expecting they had gone down like the butterfly garden.

The hanging bridges seemed to be about the same and like before I saw one Bellbird and one Quetzal. So they are more about the forest than birds and I enjoyed the bridges the most, but I do not recommend spending the high amusement park prices if you just want a nature visit. The adventure business of zip lines, tram ride, a new “Superman” zip and other such has taken over here. For nature lovers and birders I recommend sticking with the four nature reserves in Monteverde. Here’s 4 slide shows of what I saw there which was still nice as I hope the photos show.

Hanging Bridges

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Birds

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Butterflies

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Flowers

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“Nature always wears the colors of the spirit.”

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

¡Pura Vida!

April 11, 2019

Birds at Curi-Cancha Reserve

A day late because I had so many photos and so little time yesterday. Curi-Cancha Reserve is probably my favorite reserve in Monteverde, not only because I photographed more birds there but because I think it is the most beautiful and I apologize for no scenery photos except this one unusual tree below. I use my cell phone for scenery shots and had let Rodiber, my guide, carry my phone because he gets great bird shots on it for me through his high-powered scope.

In 1970 the Lowther family purchased the property of Hubert and Mildred Mendenhall and named it Curi-Cancha, the name derived from “Golden Enclosure” in Inca. At that time the property was approximately 1/2 pasture and 1/2 virgin rainforest. In the ensuing 45 years the Lowthers cleared no areas and allowed the majority of the pastured areas to re-grow into forest.

The fact that some pastures still remain there as meadows is part of the beauty and that openness makes it easier to photograph birds. We saw a lot more birds, but here are 17 that I got decent photos of: