Discovering Costa Rica - 2020 (1 Viewer)

[GeeJayW]

Back in early January 2020 just ahead of the Covid pandemic, my wife and I took a trip to Costa Rica for a guided small group tour. This took in a number of ‘centres’ where we were able to enjoy viewing a range of habitats including urban, coastal, low-level rainforest, cloud forest and rural farm/woodland. Our guide and driver were amazing and our group got along so well, that we are still in touch with each. During the trip, a number of us managed to grab a few thousand photos and I think we saw more than 240 species not counting plants and insects.

The trip started and finished in San Jose, with stopovers in Tortugeuro, La Fortuna/Arenal, Monteverde, Manuel Antonio National Park, Esquinas and Savegre.

Shortly after our return to the UK with the pandemic and resulting lockdown, I found myself with lots of time. So, after a week or three of sorting through, processing, identifying and cataloging the images, I decided to build a google website to share images with the rest of the group. I don’t have any on my iPad to share directly, so for now (forgive me) here’s a link.

OurPuraVida

Welcome to our website, aimed at recording and sharing an amazing wildlife experience in Costa Rica in early January 2020. Pura Vida! The text and photographic content of this website is all original material and subject to copyright. Our sincere thanks go to all those that made this trip both

sites.google.com

Please feel free to come back with comments/feedback, any would be appreciated.

 

[GeeJayW]

OK, now I'm back home I can post some images...

Firstly from Tortuguero. This is an interesting place accessible only by boat along the river or by light aircraft onto a simple landing strip as there are no roads. A thin strip of land with the Caribbean coastline habitat on one side and a freshwater/brackish lagoon on the other side as the river feeds out towards the ocean. Our accommodation was simple bit very comfortable and friendly, with excellent food. The grounds were well kept with a variety of wildlife sightings on offer. There were also two swimming pools, one of which proved very welcome after lunch, before going on a walk around the grounds. We stayed from two nights, with one early morning and two afternoon/evening excursions by boat into the rainforest. We took the opportunity in the late afternoon to walk into the village and loop around via the beach to our hotel. We also went out after dark with hand lamps/torches to seek out tree-frogs and anything else that would show up. Unfortunately it was not the best timing for sightings of Green Turtles, but maybe we'll get to return in the future to do that.