Last Field Trip

Hello everyone! I had my last field trip this past weekend, for Conservation Biology. We went to Palo Verde, which is a National Park in Guanacaste. It contains a large wetland area for migratory birds, so it is an important habitat. We stayed at the biological field station and did a couple of hikes through the park. Saturday night we accompanied a biologist during her data collection period. She was conducting a study on frog species in the area. She had set up a length of mesh fencing along the forest floor with a series of buckets embedded in the ground. Anytime a frog (or other reptile) comes to the fence, it gets funneled into one of the buckets. The scientists can then take measurements and collect data on the species that they find. We got to see a lot of frogs, a turtle, and a couple of snakes. One of them was a coral snake, and it was beautiful, but venomous. The scientists actually take venom samples from these snakes when they catch them to produce antivenom. It is an important job, but they have to be extremely careful. It was interesting to see research being conducted in the field, and I'm glad we got to go out with her that night.

Palo Verde was beautiful, but it was really hot and dry, and there were millions of mosquitoes. It was pretty miserable in those respects. One can always tell how bad the mosquitoes are by the sleeping accommodations. Each bed in the field station at Palo Verde had a heavy-duty mosquito net, and it was a relief to take refuge under it when we went to bed. I'm still pretty itchy though. Oh well. Part of the experience I guess.

More like Hawaii....

Well, a few of my friends and I (four of us total) took a trip to Tamarindo this past weekend. It is a beach in Guanacaste, on the northern Pacific (not as far north as Santa Rosa). There are a lot of beaches up and down this part of the coast, and they have the reputation of being the most beautiful beaches in the country. The beach in Tamarindo certainly was gorgeous, but the town atmosphere is also important. Tamarindo felt a lot more like Hawaii, or a beach town in Southern California. It was very touristy, with a lot of shops, night clubs, fancy restaurants, and fancy hotels. More people spoke English than Spanish, which was slightly disappointing. It was a different experience. I am glad we went, however, as we had two gorgeous sunsets and some relaxing beach time. Getting there and back was interesting though. We had one broken down bus on the way there, and we got on the wrong bus while we were trying to come home, so it ended up taking us an extra two hours. Oh well. Adventures in traveling. Enjoy the photos!

Field Trip #2

Hello All! I hope everyone's weekend was good; mine was very relaxing. We started off on Friday by heading to San Jose. A few people had to run errands in the city; namely to buy bus tickets for their Thanksgiving plans (some of them are going to Nicaragua for the break as we have four days off, so they had to buy tickets ahead of time; I am planning to go south down the Pacific coast to Dominical, Uvita and Marino Ballena National Park).
I'm going to do a short side note about traveling here. I'm sure some of you are wondering how exactly we get around and manage to go to all of these amazing places. The bus system here in Costa Rica is pretty decent. One can get almost anywhere from San Jose, so it's really nice that San Ramon is so close. The buses between San Ramon and San Jose are frequent (every two hours), the ride is only an hour, and it costs less than $2. Many buses from San Jose also happen to pass right by San Ramon, so we just have to go out to the main stop on the highway to hop on the bus that we need. The only downside of that strategy is that the buses are usually crowded, so my friends and I have had to stand for an hour or so with our stuff until someone gets off and we can take their seat.
The other travel gateway is Puntarenas, which is only about and hour and a half from San Ramon. From there one can go north to Liberia or the north Pacific coast, south down the Pacific coast, or across on a ferry to the Nicoya Peninsula. So there you have it.
Anyway, my friends and I made a day out of San Jose on Friday. As we had already done the sightseeing of the city on a previous trip, we did something completely different. My friend Kelsey and I like to rock climb, so we found a gym in where we could go. Rock climbing is not nearly as popular in Costa Rica as it is in the US, but it was fun to get some exercise, meet some Ticos (what the Costa Ricans call themselves), and do something that reminded me of home. I'm glad I went.

The next day was our second field trip with USAC. All 16 of us went, so it was fun to travel with everyone for a change. We went to Arenal Volcano. We stayed Saturday night in the town of La Fortuna, which is a fun little town (although touristy) with the volcano as the back drop. We went to Los Termales de Baldi (Hot Springs) on Saturday, which was wonderfully relaxing. It is a huge resort, with about 20 pools of different temperatures. The hottest one is about 150 degrees F, which is ridiculous and there was no one in it. I put my toes in and it was not enjoyable. The other pools were much better. Anyway, the next morning we went to Los Puentes Colgados, or the Hanging Bridges. We took a stroll through the forest, stopped at a waterfall, and had some fabulous views of the Volcano and the scenery. We also saw some monkeys. It was a pretty nice weekend.

I can't believe it is already November. This trip is going by really fast, but I am enjoying it. I will be ready to come home in December, however, to see my family and friends. I miss everyone.

On a happy note, I had a good weekend. Friday we celebrated All Hallows Eve. The Costa Ricans don't celebrate Halloween, so the kids from Puntarenas and Heredia came to San Ramon for the fiesta. There were about 90 of us gringos, and our professors, but it was fun. We discovered that the Puntarenas kids really like to party (hence I'm glad I chose San Ramon because I wouldn't have fit in with that group). Mostly everyone had a costume, and I was a scarecrow. It was a fun evening.



A group of my friends and I then went to Monteverde. We were there Saturday and Sunday morning. We stayed in a little hostel and cooked a family style spaghetti dinner on Saturday night, which was really fun. Monteverde was beautiful, but it reminded me more of a place in the US (Cannon Beach, Oregon, in particular). It was very touristy (fancy hotels, Italian restaurants and art galleries and souvenir shops everywhere), everyone spoke English, and the activities were all very expensive (it even cost money to hike, which was annoying. We were lucky on Saturday to find a trail that no one was guarding, so we didn't have to pay. We found a little waterfall, and saw some monkeys. We also visited the cheese factory. I'm glad I went, but it was definitely a different experience.