Arenal

 On March 5th we had the usual pre-breakfast bird walk, and then drove up into the highlands of the Guanacaste Province to the shore of Lake Arenal.  A short boat ride took us across the lake and the Continental Divide (the 6th time we crossed it on this trip), with the Arenal volcano growing larger and closer all the time. A short bus ride on the other side of the lake took us to lunch and ice cream in La Fortuna.  The town was renamed in gratitude for being spared by the eruptions from 3 craters on Arenal from 1968 to 2008. Prior to 1968, Arenal wasn’t even considered a volcano as it had not erupted since the 17th century. 

We walked after lunch in another eco-garden created 25 years ago from the surrounding farm land. We saw a huge number of nesting boat-billed herons and both 2-toed and 3-toed sloths sleeping in the trees. (We also saw a 3-toed sloth on the move in the garden next to the lunch restaurant).  Actually we should call them 2- or 3-fingered sloths as both types have three toes on their hind legs.  We drove to the Arenal Observatory Lodge in the late afternoon and were rewarded with unusually clear skies to have direct views of the entire mountain from our rooms.  We went for a rainy night walk after dinner, seeing owls, frogs, reptiles, and a 9-banded armadillo.

On Saturday, our last full day, we spent the morning on a series of walks around the grounds. There is a feeder with fresh fruit for the birds near the restaurant which attracts a fair number of birds. We saw many new species both around the feeders and in other parts of the lodge grounds. In the afternoon we walked the Arenal hanging bridges and visited a hot springs spa. It was exciting to see three species of motmot and many new hummingbirds and tanagers. We had a fun final dinner, including a surprise 50th anniversary cake for two of our companions. 

Following an excellent morning bird walk, Sunday was all about returning to San Jose to fly home, but our creative trip leader chose a rest stop along the way that had a garden full of new species for us, and even figured out a way for us to have a proper lunch before our flights. 

Monteverde

 Yesterday was largely a travel day: bird walk before breakfast, boat / car ride to flight to San Jose and then into our travel van for the drive up to Monteverde. We stopped for lunch at a small family restaurant in San Ramon that serves traditional Costa Rican food. Our trip leader, Jimmy, found the place some years ago when he was looking for quetzals in the mountains above the town. The family was charming, the food was delicious. Their garden hosted many beautiful birds. When we arrived in Monteverde we visited a hummingbird garden. It was late in the afternoon, so there was a certain desperation to the 7 different species of hummingbirds vying for the last meal of the day.  Our last activity of the day was a presentation about conservation, reforestation and Three-wattled Bellbird studies in the Monteverde area.

Today was a packed day: a pre-dawn Covid test to enable us to fly home on Sunday, then a pre-breakfast bird walk around our hotel grounds. The two of us stayed here in early March 2020, and as was the case then, the grounds are so full of birds that it’s hard to know where to focus. After breakfast we went to the Curicancha Reserve, where we saw 6 different quetzals in a single wild avocado tree. We saw many other birds as well. We then visited a local organic coffee cooperative, where we had lunch and then toured the property and roasting shed, finishing with a coffee tasting to compare different preparation and roasting levels.  We spent the late afternoon walking on hanging bridges at or above the forest canopy. It was a new experience for most of our colleagues to “shoot down” to photograph treetop birds. 

Corcovado National Park

 Much of today was spent walking through the forest of Corcovado National Park, on the Osa peninsula. We took a 25 minute boat ride from the Inn, stopping to see a nesting colony of Brown Booby along the way. We also learned that Magnificent Frigatebirds do not have water repelling feathers, so they steal food from other birds rather than diving to catch their own. 

The land of the National Park was largely deforested for cattle, banana and oil palm plantations until the 1970s. Thanks to the tropical climate the forest has largely regrown since then, which is wonderful for the ecology but makes it harder to see the birds you can hear.  We were pleased to see Red-capped Manikins and Scarlet Macaws as well as a female Great Curassow. We spotted our first agouti, and saw some coatis (one female coati was very pregnant). We again saw spider and howler monkeys but the white-faced capuchin monkeys are proving elusive. 

After a late lunch back at the Inn, we went birding until dinner time, which allowed us to see several toucans, scarlet macaws, parrots, warblers and other colorful birds. 

On to Corcovado

 After an early morning bird walk and breakfast, we took a short boat ride back to the Tortuguero air strip. We flew to San Jose, where the pilots needed to refuel the aircraft for the flight to the Osa Peninsula. Unfortunately that required us to deplane and go back through security in order to reboard. We arrived at the Drakes Bay airstrip and boarded small cars for the ride to the town of Drakes Bay. This ride was quite the adventure over bumpy roads, across three substantial streams, and along steep drops to the beach (no guard rails provided). At Drakes Bay we were greeted by 8 scarlet macaws, quite a treat! A short boat ride brought us to the Aguila de Osa Inn.  Our cabin is spacious and boasts hummingbirds and a woodpecker nest just outside the door. It also has resident spiders and small scorpions, but at least we don’t have geckos like Darren and Cassie.  It’s a lodge in the jungle, so wildlife in the room is part of the experience.

Mid-afternoon we headed out to walk along the dirt track back into the town, looking for birds along the way. Birding has become a team sport, with most members of the group engaged in finding, identifying and photographing the birds we see.  It is a great help to have 8 sets of eyes, and 6 cameras of various capability, applied to the challenge.