Costa Rica 2017

Comments – CR Trip Turtle project – interesting and educational; one day was sufficient. Delfines was comfortable, except that there is no place to walk or do much of anything (heavy traffic on the paved road; the lane too muddy for walking after about ¼ mile). Managers very nice, food basic but good. I would not stay there again except maybe as a stop on the way to somewhere else. El Remanso – very well run place, friendly competent staff, comfortable room with a good view, excellent tour guides. Two full days was enough, though – not much to do. We had the impression it was right next to the national park, but it isn’t, and after you’ve taken a couple of tours and walked the handful of trails, that’s it. Crystal Ballena – pretentious architecture, badly over-priced restaurant. Chintzy box breakfast – LaJean did not eat the bread; I had to take the flour tortilla back to get something I could eat. Room very comfortable with a lovely view. Otherwise, more glitz than substance. The drive to Sierpe for the two tours, 50 minutes each way, was too much. There is a hotel at Sierpe which would have made much more sense – we could have started the tour 2 hours earlier, reached the national park earlier for better conditions, and probably saved a lot of money on the hotel. The tour of Corcovado was great, but would have been much better with an earlier start. Excellent guide, nice tour of some of the waterways in the wetlands. Cano Island was a disappointment – mainly, I think, because of the recent heavy rain, but also there were about 50 tourists snorkelling in a very small place. It would probably be better in the dry season when the water is clearer. The boat trip back was good because we got to watch some spider monkeys for a half hour. La Cusinga was excellent – comfortable, a more reasonably priced restaurant. However, it was extremely difficult to find in the dark – small sign, impossible to see with headlights from on-coming traffic; I ended up going way past it on the way back from the night walk. Villa Blanca – comfortable but overpriced. Also more glitz than substance. They advertise as a wedding site, and the price / quality ration shows it. Meals good, but both chicken and fish overcooked and dry. Waiter screwed up LaJean’s order the second night – but the manager didn’t charge for it so that was okay. Not much to do. The tour was a disappointment – few birds, no mammals, but some interesting new information about plants. Not much to do, and a horrible road served as a barrier to go elsewhere. I would not go back here, and would not recommend it. Tours: The animal and bird tours at El Remanso were both great. Corcovado National Park great – would have been better if we’d stayed at Sierpe and got a much earlier start. Dave would have enjoyed camping in the park for a late afternoon and early morning tour (some people had done that – tents still up when we arrived), but LaJean would not have wanted to camp out. The Private mangrove hike in Hacienda Baru was good (although the guide seemed unenthusiastic compared to the others, he was very knowledgeable). The twilight part of the “twilight tour” was interesting, but when night fell I wish I’d said “enough” – that was the only time mosquitoes were a problem, and there really wasn’t much to see after it got completely dark – a couple of spiders, a tarantula, one frog. I enjoyed night hikes in the Peruvian Amazon and even more in Madagascar, but I wouldn’t do another one in Costa Rica. Getting around: A nightmare, and the main reason we won’t even consider going back. There are few road signs and the ones there are aren’t very helpful. Google Maps works intermittently, and the instructions were unhelpful. It ended up taking over 6 hours to drive from Uvita to Villa Blanca, because we ended up going all the way to San Jose, then ended up going all the way to San Luis. (We missed the Villa Blanca sign, mainly because the one at the turn is a different color and design than all the others.) Traffic is ghastly. The Costa Ricans we met were all charming and gracious – except when behind the wheel of a car when they become brutally aggressive. We were almost run off the road several times; came within inches of fender-benders a half dozen times. There is no place to pull over to look at the map and figure out where we needed to turn. No route number signs, no signs to San Ramon. Signs are a problem everywhere; small signs for hotels (non-reflective paint), very few road signs; the desk clerk at Villa Blanca did not give adequate instructions – everyone seems to assume that you know where you are going already. Many parts of the trip were wonderful, but the horrible drive to San Ramon, and the almost equally horrible drive back to the airport (no instructions on how to find the rental car return; when we called the agency the instructions we got were still incomplete and we ended up driving halfway downtown because if you miss a turn you’re screwed) – the last 3 days more or less spoiled the entire trip. We were shocked at prices – Crystal Balleno and Villa Blanca restaurant prices were as high as some of the best restaurants in Portland, higher relative to quality – and I know their labor costs are no where near as high. We drove to another restaurant in Uvita that was more reasonably priced – but still about what we’d pay in Portland for a similar priced meal. Golfo Dolce – Turtle project Nice day today, warm & humid, occasional showers. We went on a turtle tagging expedition with LAST (Latin American Sea Turtles) – a marine biologist and two RAs. The Golfo Dulce (named for the fresh water that pours in from rivers all around) is a long narrow inlet, mostly stagnant, but the sea turtles enter the gulf to feed on very short sea grass along the shallow margins. The project was to catch, measure, weigh, and tag sea turtles. The day started with laying out a net (specially built with large mesh to minimize by-catch) about 100 meters off shore. Then we and the two RAs were put ashore; the biologist and boat driver went back out to watch the net and wait. The turtle is pulled aboard and placed on a large plastic mat, padded around the perimeter, with straps to restrain the turtle. We all gather next to the boat and four people grab handles to carry the animal onto the beach where is gently laid down on a couple of old bike tires, to keep it up from the hard sand. Two people measure while one records and two others hold the flippers (to keep the measuring crew from being swatted.) First the top shell is measured, front to back then across the widest part. (Three of every measurement are taken, for accuracy.) Then the turtle is turned over. If it’s not large, it is “pancaked” – two people grab the front flipper at the shoulder, next to the shell and lift it; a third person at the tail end swings the tail under. If it is large, one person sits beside it and it is lifted up to lean against that person’s lap while one person holds the flippers and two measure. The bottom carapace is also measure front to tail and side to side. Then the tail is measured, first from the edge of the carapace to the tip then from the cloaca to the tip. (That helps determine sex.) Then the turtle is turned back onto its belly. If it does not already have a tag (like cattle ear tags) on its front flipper, one is put on – it’s like an ear piercing, and obviously a bit of pain. Finally, if it does not have a radio transmitter chip, one is implanted with a long needle – another bit of pain. Then four people pick it up again and carry it knee deep or more into the surf, and release it. One bit of a bummer – walking up the beach between turtle sessions, I found a dead baby turtle (33 cm. long) lying in a grove of mangroves. It had obviously just died – no smell, and the biologist reported, no rigor mortis, and when she took a tissue sample the blood was still liquid. She measured it on the spot, then bagged it up and took it back to do an autopsy on it. We stayed and watched – very interesting. It was completely healthy; good tissue color and texture, no parasites, no obvious explanation for why it died. At the end of the day we pulled the net up and, halfway through that operation, found our third turtle, a very healthy green turtle, which we took back with us to measure. It was a pretty interesting day; we were both glad we went along for the ride.