We are once again at sea, this time following a day spent exploring the Rich Coast.
I have been curious about Costa Rica ever since my boss's boss at a job many pumps of gas ago went there on vacation. I had never heard of anyone vacationing in Costa Rica and honestly, 15 years ago I'm not sure how many Americans did. But these days it is quite a popular place for North Americans to take in some sun, rain forests, exotic birds, and wildlife, all under the protection of a very stable democratic government that has no need for an army. As told to us by Andrea, our highly educated tour guide, Costa Rica is protected by both the US and Panama, so the Costa Rican government spends its military money on things like public education and medical care. The national literacy rate is something like 98%. The country is also home to a lot of defected Nicaraguans in search of a better life with more than two extreme social classes.
Our tour was an all-day thing, largely because the roads in Costa Rica are mostly two-laned and therefore it can take a long time to go short distances. We were up, dressed, fed, coated with SPF 30 and Deet, and sitting at the back of an air conditioned bus by 8:00am. We returned to the complimentary cold wash cloths on the gangway at 5:00pm. In between we glided above a rain forest, had a tasty Costa Rican lunch, and boated along a river in search of crocodiles.
The rain forest excursion was interesting. We quietly rode up through the three levels (floor, understory, and canopy) in a nine person gondola built about seven years ago in a national park. The guides were appropriately proud of the eco-friendliness of the construction and operation of the gondola, as it leaves a minimal footprint in the forest while still allowing access. We were told that during construction, the gondola's eight large towers were installed by helicopter so as not to require huge, tree-toppling machinery. Since Costa Rica doesn't have a military...and the accompanying accessories...it had to rent a helicopter from the Colombian army.
It naturally didn't rain during our visit to the rain forest. Odd how rain rarely meets our vacation desires. But we we were nonetheless treated to a variety of colorful butterflies, ferns, leaf-munching ants, a supposed sloth in a tree, and vines dangling many stories tall. We were also serenaded by an enormous choir of cicadas. And I saw flowers growing wild that I had only seen before in little plastic containers at Lowe's and then in my patio planters where they all met untimely deaths.
After we were back on the floor of the rain forest, we took a guided walk where I expertly avoided all of the glass enclosures of native snakes. I amused myself instead with tracking some iguanas padding about freely. Why am I deathly afraid of snakes but find iguanas engaging? Feet. I like feet. They predict which direction one is headed. There's no predicting a footless snake. Put some feet on a snake and you have a lizard or iguana or alligator or crocodile...and my calm curiosity. Chop off the feet and I'm in the next zip code if I can arrange it.
During our floor tour, we also got to see an adorably fuzzy little bat hiding in a fern tent, looking at my camera with some embarrassment and disappointment. As we learned, boy bats build these little tents from ferns as protection from the rain and to prove their responsibility and mate-ability to girl bats. There Bachelor Bat was, all ready to present a rose to a pretty girl bat, and he got me and my camera instead. It's an awesome picture, though. Sure hope he got a successful one-on-one date later.
Our lunch consisted of what we were told were the Costa Rican staples of rice and black beans. They were very tasty, as was the chicken in some sort of tomato sauce. But what Rob and I are still talking about and what I took pictures of was the sliced plantains. Denser and less mushy than a banana, these plantains had been sautéed in some sort of buttery cinnamon sauce. Oh, my. They weren't billed as dessert, which I guess means it would be OK to make a meal of them. Which we might try to do when we get home. The trick will be finding some plantains near Woodhaven. Hey, I found Greek yogurt (eventually) so anything is possible.
Popping some Dramamine (did I mention we were at the back of the bus?), we then motored to our last stop: a jungle river cruise. Of course, I had imagined something like the Jungle Cruise from Disneyland. Who wouldn't? But, alas, there were no elephants or tigers or water falls or dense trees or fellow tourists wearing Mickey Mouse ears. Instead, we saw lots and lots and lots of colorful birds of varying sizes, a small herd of cows that looked like Brahma bulls, and crocodiles. Yep, crocodiles just swimming along in the water, their bumps making them much less incognito than I imagine they wanted to be.
It was exciting seeing the crocodiles a hundred feet or so away, wading in the river or resting on the bank. Andrea and our boat driver (Emilio), though, seemed unimpressed. They finally perked up and exchanged some Spanish words as we boated to the river's edge. There we were introduced to a couple of crocs – a male and a female. The female was fully out of the water on the bank and her mate was slowly wading in the water nearby. Emilio drove the boat to the bank and essentially docked it so we could get pictures from mere feet away. We were all pretty excited and I was thrilled to get some photos with Piglet practically wearing a crocodile hat. However, the show was just beginning.
Without any warning, Emilio jumped out of the boat onto the bank and started slapping a rag in the water about a yard away from the girl croc. She opened her mouth, bared her teeth, and then scurried into the water. She and her hubby then started making their way straight for Emilio Our boat of tourists started getting very nervous and the woman behind me started yelling at Emilio to get back in the boat. A few of us then noticed that the big boy croc had disappeared. With visions of a Jaws-like encounter with a huge crocodile jumping into our boat, more of the tourists started getting visibly panicked. Emilio seemed unaffected and Andrea seemed a little annoyed that Emilio was ruffling the feathers of her ducklings. My reaction, as one might guess from Cartagena, was to take pictures. I'm learning that I am very calm in scary situations as long as I have my camera (anyone remember the yak charging episode a few months back? AWESOME close up of a yak on the move!). So I have some pretty cool pictures of Emilio and proximate crocodiles.
So our day in Costa Rica brought us some teethy ants, an amorous bat, a splendidly footed iguana, and some crocodiles only slightly amused by Emilio's Rag Dance. We were excited...and jealous...to hear of David and Carolyn's sightings on a different tour of an anteater and some monkeys. Yes, you can see all these things in a zoo but there is something altogether different about seeing creatures like this in their natural environment where we are the visitors. Except for snakes. Those footless wonders are much better observed behind glass, if at all.
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