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| A neighbors up the hill has yellow & orange flowers blooming together. Click for larger image. |
¡Buenos Dias!
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| My terrace view while eating breakfast and reading the Washington Post online! Looking over Atenas toward Grecia. It doesn’t show all the Yellow Bell Trees that surround the left end of my terrace. Nice! |
¡Buenos Noches!
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| Sunset from my Terrace. Yes, similar to an earlier post, but newer and the one I have ordered a 48X12 canvas print of. It will likely hang in my office/guest room. I’m running out of space to hang photos. 🙂 |
Mountains are the beginning and the end of all natural scenery.
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
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| 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:
The Trees Are Our Friends!
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| A new sign just appeared alongside the road I walk to Roca Verde, Calle 8 |
The rough Google translation to English:
The trees are our friends, always await us in the same place.
ADECA
ADECA is an acrostic for a conservation group in the Atenas area. Like many acronyms, there can be other meanings like it is also the initials for a commercial organization in Costa Rica that produces business yellow pages and another for a small artist group. But this is obviously the conservation group! Long live the trees! Some of my favorite friends! And here is just one . . .
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| My kitchen window friend! |
Hooded Mantis in the Dark!
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| A Hooded Mantis appeared in the dark at my last dinner at Rancho Naturalista No good photos possible |
But what was more entertaining was the group from Denmark on their first night at the lodge. They scrambled all over the dining terrace trying to get photos of this little guy! IN THE DARK! It was funny and of course none of my photos are good, but here’s the experience anyway!
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| They tried so hard they kept scaring the little bug around the terrace. Hope some of them got good photos! |
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| For about two minutes dinner was controlled by a Hooded Mantis |
4% of World’s Species Live in Costa Rica!
“Costa Rica supports an enormous variety of wildlife, due in large part to its geographic position between the North and South American continents, its neotropical climate, and its wide variety of habitats. Costa Rica is home to more than 500,000 species, which represents nearly 4% of the total species estimated worldwide, making Costa Rica one of the 20 countries with the highest biodiversity in the world. Of these 500,000 species, a little more than 300,000 are insects.” ~WIKIPEDIA
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| Photo of one of the many Anthurium flowers growing at Rancho Naturalista, one of my fave get-a-ways now! I was so excited about all the new birds there that I failed to say much about the flowers which were beautiful! |
Yellow Bells Keep Increasing!
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| Up close they are a very bright yellow trumpet-shaped flower |
The Yellow Bells are blooming earlier than I expected or remember from last year and do hope they are still around when Reagan arrives in February. They started with a few blooms on the high tips of limbs that get the most sun and are now spreading all over. They do attract hummingbirds!
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| From my lunch table today at about 1:30 facing NW. |
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| From the street today at 2:00 PM (bad time for photo) |
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| An even worse image at 2:00 PM but you can see that my terrace is surrounded! |
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| Bouquets on the terrace! |
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| And color below my horizon views! |
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| Plus they are already coloring the ground as blossoms drop! |
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| A tree in my neighbor’s yard. |
Flowers always make people better, happier, and more helpful; they are sunshine, food and medicine for the soul.~Luther Burbank
And I’ve added most of the new birds to my Costa Rica Birds photo gallery. It’s growing!
Pura Vida!
The Last Birds from Rancho Naturalista (Maybe)
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| Green Thorntail Hummingbird Rancho Naturalista, Tuis, Costa Rica |
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| Yellow-bellied Elaenia Rancho Naturalista, Tuis, Costa Rica |
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| Black-cheeked Woodpecker Rancho Naturalista, Tuis, Costa Rica 3rd species of woodpeckers at this one place. Lots of bugs to eat! 🙂 |
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| Brown Jay Rancho Naturalista, Tuis, Costa Rica |
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| Yellow-crowned Euphonia Female or Yellow Warbler Female Rancho Naturalista, Tuis, Costa Rica |
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| Gray-headed Chachalaca Better shot than one posted the first day. |
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| Green Thorntail Hummingbird Rancho Naturalista, Tuis, Costa Rica Different day, different bird and look than top of this post |
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| Black-headed Saltator Rancho Naturalista, Tuis, Costa Rica |
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| Black-headed Saltator Rancho Naturalista, Tuis, Costa Rica A totally different look than the photo before this, but same bird! |
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| Social Flycatcher Rancho Naturalista, Tuis, Costa Rica |
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| Bumble Bee (I think – no ID source) Rancho Naturalista, Tuis, Costa Rica |
I’m still going through my photos and may find some more good ones, but this is the last official post from Rancho Naturalista. It is amazing how just 3 nights at a lodge almost anywhere in Costa Rica can give me such joy and so many photos! And so many new species each time. This is my main reason for moving to Costa Rica and why you can expect me to stay here! 🙂
If interested, I reviewed both Rancho Naturalista and CATIE on TripAdvisor with a few of the photos, though they are “pending” as I write this, possibly for screening of some kind.
I heard the sweet voice of a robin, High up in the maple tree, Joyously, singing his happy song To his feathered mate, in glee!…
If we could be like this tiny bird, Just living from day to day, Holding no bitterness in our hearts For those we meet on our way…
~Gertrude Tooley Buckingham, “Heaven on Earth” (1940s)
Today’s Birds
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| Just 7 of about 300 photos today. Above is Green-breasted Mango Hummingbird. |
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| Chestnut-sided Warbler (My favorite shot of the day) |
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| Crested Oropendola Note head is different from Montezuma Oropendola My first time to photograph this one! |
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| Red-throated Ant-tanager with a moth it just caught. |
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| Mottled Owl |
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| Olive-backed Euphonia |
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| Crowned Wood-nymph Hummingbird |
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| Crowned Woodnymph Hummingbird My guide here says it looks so different from the other one above because of the different light. Other one in deep forest. |
Birds Galore!
This is just a sample of the birds I photographed at the lodge this morning before going out to a park! It will take a while to share all the birds I’m photographing here!
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| Montezuma Oropendola from the breakfast terrace |
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| Lineated Woodpecker in front of lodge |
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| White-necked Jacobin Hummingbird male at breakfast terrace |
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| Gray-headed Chachalaca joining us for breakfast |
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| Keel-billed Toucan seen from breakfast terrace |
All of this and much, much more at Rancho Naturalista near Turrialba, Costa Rica.