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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Hamhed" data-source="post: 1716950" data-attributes="member: 70825">12-23-09    Out at first light, we had a couple of hours of birding before Henk was to drive us to Horquetas and the Rara Avis headquarters around 8:30.  Black-striped Sparrow, a new bird for us, a pair of Barred Antshrikes, the Canebrake version of the Plain Wren, and Green Ibis, on the lawn of Heleconia, were included in the morning's birds.  We ate breakfast at the lodge while watching Collared Aracari's eat their own fruit plate.  By 9, we were being introduced to the driver of the Unimog truck at Rara Avis.  We were the only passengers though a couple from Germany were traveling a parallel route by horse to meet with us later.  The Unimog is somewhat rough ride on a growling, mechanical beast over a  bumpy or rutted road.  Giant mudholes were partially filled with rocks the size of basketballs or cut sections of trees.  An hour and a half later, we had served our time on the Unimog and got off at a crossroads where we were to board the real test of endurance.  Johanna, a Tico guide and masseuse who had the luxury of riding in the cab of the Unimog with the driver, and Diego Nunee, a biology student spending his Christmas holidays working at Rara Avis, boarded the trailer drawn by a farm tractor and we set off on the next stage of the journey.  Ten minutes later, we wished we were back on the Unimog, where the danger of being thrown out of one's seat was unlikely and body part damage was not uppermost in one's mind.  It was far too long until the tractor found the road too rough to cross in a single pass.  When the driver got out to fill a monstrous hole with rocks, all of us elected to hike the rest of the way.  We came a large cleared area and the El Plastico complex of buildings not long afterward and took a short break, using the pit toilets and picnic tables in the covered area.  I could see the potential for showerless camping there.  Or maybe a small hospital, to complement the "transportation".  There we met the Germans, Thomas and Christina, who survived their horseback riding.  Led by Johanna and Diego as a group of six, we walked up the road under cloudy skies and onto the El Plastico trail for an hour and a half to Rara Avis.    We reached the grounds of Rara Avis at about 700 m (2300ft) in early afternooon, found out that due complications of a large group arriving, we had been "upgraded" to a less private cabin, just uphill from the restaurant.  Our luggage was still in the tractor, due to arrive later with the new arrivals.  With nothing to unpack, we ate a late lunch of rice and beans, cauliflower in a white sauce (!), blackberry (mora) juice and other vegetables and immediately set out on the Sendero Azul trail with Diego for a couple of hours.  We found a mixed flock at the entry bridge that included a Black and Yellow Tanager.  On the trail, we worked hard to get Mealy Parrots in the canopy and also found a Black-faced Grosbeak.  At the lodge hummingbird feeders, we saw our first Bronze-tailed Plumleteeer, Green Hermit and Violet-crowned Woodnymph.  It is unfortunate they do not maintain any fruit feeders at Rara Avis.  In hindsight, we should have set out fruit ourselves.  With the group of 14, our luggage finally came after dark and we unpacked by kerosene lantern, a little smoky and smelly in the cabin as we played with adjusting the wick.  Dinner at 6:30 was a humbling experience as we mingled with many people who were bilingual (we're working on it!) or even trilingual.  They generously spoke English when we were part of the conversation.  Showering by kerosene lantern was an experience of another type; we also had trouble adjusting the hot water, getting extremes of hot or cold and very little of comfortable temperatures.  Eventually though, we were clean and spent the last hour of our day in the restaurant which was also the library, browsing through their collection of damp books on the flora and fauna of the area.</blockquote>

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