Costa Rica North

Costa Rica is full of Americans (passport not required to visit) and, along with Panama, the richer of the Central American countries. It also has many different ecosystems squeezed within a small area. For example, the Pacific Coast is desert while the Caribbean side is jungle.

My first stop was Liberia, Costa Rica. This is the tame Iguana that hung out at the hostel looking for food. It startled me at first when I nearly stepped on it. It camoflauged well with the gravel beneath the benches.

With a topo map of Costa Rica, I tried to be clever and hike out along the Pacific Coast where tourists typically don´t go. Well, let me clarify that, POOR tourists like me don´t go. I ended up hiking into a 5 star resort.

The guards were friendly enough and pointed me to a dirt road that lead to a little used beach. From there I hiked out along a penisula and set up camp. I had a nice view of the Pacific cliffs stretching to the North.

The sunset was spectacular. A pair of parrots (confirmed that they do hang out in pairs) spent the night in this tree. The talked quite a bit in the morning.

To see how much of a change in climate there was across the continental divide (it runs down the center of Costa Rica) I took a bus from Liberia to Upala, Costa Rica. I made a change of busses at this crossroads. There wasn´t anything there except for a token food stand (universal sign down here for bus stop).

Upala, on the Caribbean side of Costa Rica, was much more wet and green. From there I took a bus south towards Fortuna, Costa Rica which sits at the bottom of Arenal Volcano. I could see the volcano from a distance off (circled in picture below)

This volcano is constanly erupting and, given it isn´t cloudy at night, this is what it looks like. This is a picture I stole from the web because it was cloudy the night I went (of course all the guides assured us it was perfect the night before.)

At the hostel in Fortuna there was an older Dutch couple who were making there way around the world in their sailing boat. They were able to show me the red poisonous dart frogs they had found in the ditch out back. Very cool!

From Fortuna, I made my way to Santa Elena. This was a trip by bus, then boat across Fortuna resevoir, then bus. We landed on this lonely deserted beach where a couple of minivans picked us up.

Here we are hiking up the beach with all our gear.

The bus trip from the beach to Santa Elena was a bit disappointing due to the amount of jungle that had been stripped to make low grade pasture land. The hills were golf course green all around and the number of cattle quite sparse.

In Santa Elena there are two Park Reserves that protect cloud forests. I went to the Santa Elena Reserve and was very impressed with the bird and plant life found there (I very much recommend a visit to this place!) The jungle sounds here are the most unique that I´ve heard.

While there I was lucky enough to see a Quetzal Bird. Here is a picture I took with a blowup of the bird in the TLHCorner.

And here is a professional picture of the bird. Incredible colorful bird. Having spent so long in Central America, I couldn´t leave without seeing one. The guides carry binoculars and telescopes with them. I was amazed how quickly and easily they were able to get birds in the telescope. It was a jungle after all.