Day 5 La Calandria to San Gerardo

Pictures to come tomorrow :-) 

We said goodbye to La Calandria and headed into the real rain forest to the San Gerardo field station.  Though only 25 minutes apart, La Calandria is on the western side of the continental divide, and is relatively dry.  To get to San Gerardo, we drove up to the top, in the cloud forest.  First however, we enjoyed ziplining and walking on the canopy bridge tour.  I don't have pictures of the ziplining, because I was on the canopy tour.  However, the students took many pictures and videos to share.  On the sky bridge we walked through the high forest canopy.  The highest bridge was a bit over 120 feet high, and 300+ feet long.  We saw a lot of bromilliads, orchids, and many, many tree species.  Periodically, we could hear our group whooping, hollering, and shrieking as they zoomed through the sky over and through the forest on the ziplines.

When we got done, had lunch at a nearby restaurant, and then loaded our day packs with all the essentials, and took off down the trail.  It's about 4-5km, or just short of 3 miles long.  Over that stretch, the trail drops 500m, for a 16% downslope.  Shortly after setting off, a caribbean rain storm caught us and DUMPED rain on us.  Luckily, most of us had ponchos and good rain gear.  However, the already muddy clay trail became an especially muddy mud wallow, tilted on it's side.  We were all slipping and sliding.  We were happy to finally get off that road, and onto the woods trail that led to the San Gerardo field station.

At the station, we listened to a frog lecture from Mark, had supper, and then Mark led interested folks on a night hike, where we found 2 orchid species, 4 species of frogs, many spiders, an Olingo (this an arboreal animal somewhat like a racoon), and many other small critters.   

The next day we had breakfast, then took off on a nature hike, led by Mark.  After about an hour, each student got dropped off on the trail, separated by about 300 feet, for a solitary forest imersion experience.  For this, Mark wanted the student to LISTEN, and draw a map of what they heard; to think up a testable question about some aspect of the forest; and to bring back something interesting.  After the appropriate amount of time, Mrs. Dr. V (who was running sweep) came along and one by one reassembled the group, ending up at the water fall where most everyone swam and stood under the thundering falls.  Eventually, we headed back for a well earned lunch.

For the afternoon, we had some quiet time, where a lot of students took advantage to write on their journals while others slept.  Eventually, (fortified by brownies and tres leche cake), we had a sharing session, where students reported back on their experiences.  

The day ended with another night hike where we spied many frog species, a snake, and many insects.  

 

Day 4 - La Calandria

Today we continued to learn about the realities of conservation work. La Calandria, the field station where we are currently staying, is part of the Costa Rican Conservation Foundation. A large part of the Foundation's work is active reforestation, They raise tress, many of them endangered species, and distribute them for free to farmers and also plant them, often with the help of volunteers. One of the tree nurseries is at La Calandria. We learned that last year, 30,000 trees were planted, with the ultimate goal of connecting all the preserves by corridors to each other and eventually to the Pacific ocean.  WSU students have been involve in this effort for nearly 20 years.

We started out today by loading 320+ trees onto a pickup to haul to today's restauration site, using a bucket chain, not a chain gang! (Yes, there are pictures, but the internet is slow today, here on the side of the dry forest).

Today's restoration site was a former coffee field. Research has shown that planting seedlings, even if you do not maintain the site after planting, still yields 50% survival and effective reforestation. Not needing labor expensive for care is a key factor in getting buy-in from landowners.

Deborah Hamilton, (Direction, Lecturer, Researcher, and President of the foundation's board of directors), met us to lead our planting effort, and to also gave us an overview of the history of CRCF and her own involvement.  Deborah has historically been one of the guides for WSU trips, but in the past few years she has been working on her doctorate in conservation.  We were ultra-fortunate that she managed to squeeze in a few moments of her time to chat with us.  Her son Liam, who we've worked with since he was little, managed today's planting effort.  

We managed to plant all our 320 trees this morning. Compared to the 30,000 trees planted in a year, or the 300,000 trees planted since 1990, this was a small drop in the bucket, but we were proud of our work.  BTW, while it is not very hot, the humidity and 4000 ft altitude do take a toll.  for many of the students, this hands-on restoration work, where they made a real difference in the world, was a very meaningful experience.

After a scrumptious lunch at the station of burritos, we next went to the hummingbird garden.  Here, Mark treated us to coffee, tea, or smoothies, and a snack.  We began learning about hummingbirds, (just imagine how impactful this will be with pictures of hummingbirds), and stopped cold when Elise and Alli spotted White Faced Capuchin monkeys!  We spend the next half hour watching the monkeys, including a mother with a baby riding around on it's back!  Very cool.  (Shut eyes, and imagine image now).  On many trips, we don't see ANY monkeys, so this was a great find, and the students (and faculty) were very excited.

We finally left the monkeys alone to go about their business, and we headed off to the orchid garden.  This is Mrs. Dr. V's favorite.  She is an orchid enthusiast, with way more than 100 orchids.  At any time of year, we'll have 5-10 orchids blooming in the house.  Before we left for this trip, all the orchids got moved outside to their summer residence, in the "outside orchidarium."  So, she was very excited to spot new orchids that we don't have, and to compare the ones we do have to her own.  Very cool.

Next, students were given a scavenger hunt and 10,000 colones (That's a lot of cash), to go into Santa Elena and buy an interesting thing to eat which they were unfamiliar with, and learn how to prepare it.   They also had time to go out to eat a the restaurant of their choice.  As we write this, they're up on the porch laughing and writing their journals.  

Tomorrow, we are heading into the jungle/ deep cloud forest until Sunday. There will not be any cell reception or internet, so do not worry if you do not hear from us for a while.

PS.  We'll upload pictures as soon as we can get solid internet service :-)

Day 3 - La Calandria

 

What is the difference between an environmental student and a "regular" student?

ENVS student (f) 1: Oooh, there is a big bug in your hair

(expected reaction, regular student: Eewwwww, get it off)

ENVS student (f) 2: Quick, get a camera

ENVS student (m) 1: I wonder how many ants it would take to lift Nebraska

(expected reaction, regular students: That's just stupid, go to sleep)

ENVS students (m): Lets see. If we assume an total volume of .... and use only leaf cutter ants (a 30 minute discussion and calculations ensue)

Today, I thought we start by showing you pictures of our students hard at work - or not. See if you can spot yours.

We had an action packed day starting off with a three hour hike in the forest, where we saw agoutis, many different species of humming birds, orchids in and out of bloom, a baby tarantula (still big enough), a side-striped palm viper (at a safe distance, no worries),and  more birds and butterflies than we can count. Today's hike took us to the Curi Cancha preserve, which I understand is a former dairy farm that was converted back to forest starting in the 1970s. We had a chance to experience different habitats, from open fields to relatively new growth and also some ancient trees.  Your student will be able to tell you exactly what all we saw.

After lunch at a women's co-op (delicious) we visited a coffee plantation. Here, a group of farmers is trying to grow coffee in a more sustainable way, restore the fertility of the soil, and adapt to changing growing conditions such as a less reliable rainy season. It was impressive to see how knowledgeable, patient, and passionate our guide was. We also got to blind sample 5 different coffee roast and try to identify both he roast and the drying method of the beans. 

For supper, we visited a local family, were (almost) all of us were taught how to make tortillas from scratch, guacamole, fresh passion fruit juice, salad, guacamole, and desserts. Here you can see some of us working.

The food turned out so good, I forgot to take pictures.

The other people, those not working, prepared a secret special after dinner surprise, a Costa Rican dance complete with Cosa Rican traditional outfits. There is a video that I might upload once I have more bandwidth, but here are some pictures:

Finally, a shout-out to our driver, Senor Carlos, el maestro de autobus, who drove us up (and down again in the dark) some roads that now bus should be able to go. These roads are much steeper than they look in these pictures, and NOT single lane, there is oncoming traffic.

Day 2 San Jose to La Calandria

After an early morning (6:30) birdwatch that turned into a squirrel watch we took off for the  La Calandria field station. Kudos to our bus driver Carlos, who somehow manages to put  a 10 foot wide bus on a 8 foot wide road and leave room for oncoming traffic. I for one am glad a professional is driving. We headed South from San Jose to the Pacific coast, and then turned into the mountains. First though, we got to stop and sample assorted local fruit.

We had Passionfruit, Waterapple,  Guaba - Ice cream bean, Melon, Guanabana, Cashew (both the fruit and the "nut"), two kinds of plantain chips, a lychee relative, and a personal favorite the slightly like runny cheese tasting Nance. The textures were amazing, ranging from crunchy to fuzzy and frog-spawn like. All were delicious in their own, unusual way, and definitely an expansion of our northern palates.

Heading from the coast into the mountains, the area was much drier than expected, with cattle farms and very steep terrain. We are just at the beginning of the rainy season, and some trees are just starting to leaf out. All along the roads are deep gullies, many hillsides area re-enforced with concrete of steel mech, and there are plenty of concrete channels. We could tell that much rain is expected, but luckily we escaped the rain today...even though the rainy season just started here.

Finally we got to La Calandria, just in time for lunch. The location of La Calandria is absolutely spectacular, with views of  mountains and cloud forest and the Pacific in the background.

In the afternoon, we split into two groups to go on the first of hopefully many nature hikes. My group went to the Childrens' Eternal rain forest Bajo del Tigre section. You can learn more about them here Bajo del Tigre. There were so many interesting plants, animals,  and birds to observe, it took us almost 2 hours to cover our first mile. Here are a two examples of what we saw:

Leaf-cutter ants

Leaf-cutter ants are the main herbivore in the rain forest. We learned that a single nest contains only sisters (i.e. female offspring of the same queen) and can span an acre or more. The ants harvest leaves to feed a fungus in their nest, which provides the actual food for the ants and also helps with temperature regulation. Males  do not exist in the hive, in their very short existence they mate with a new queen and that's it. The new queen will bring a tiny piece of her home fungus with her, find a hole and start a new colony.

Three-wattled Bellbird

According to our guide Mark, there are only about 300 of these birds left, most of them living in Costa Rica. We first heard their calls throughout the forest, and then we saw them. At one point, we saw three males together. We learned that bellbirds are a major disperser of avocado seeds throughout the forest, and that there are about 30 species of avocado trees. that are a vital component of the cloud forest.  Bellbirds are thus a keystone species and essential for the continued health of this forest and vice versa.

Supper was chicken, vegetables, and salad followed by passionfruit flan on the deck as a spectacular sunset slowly faded and a thunderstorm rolled in.

But wait, there is more: In the evening Mark gave us an introduction to conservation efforts in the region. We learned about the importance of the rainforest for biodiversity and the interplay of ecotourism, the local economy, and forest protection.  

We've used Mark as a guide for Westfield State University trips for about 20 years.  He has a unique way of not just telling you WHAT is in the forest, but telling the story of the organisms, their life histories, and the interactions of them with one another.  Mark has been guiding in Costa Rica for about 30 years and is the author and illustrator of The Mammals of Costa Rica book, the book all the other guides learned from.  I'm always impressed by the respect the other guides show Mark when we're on this trip.  He is, quite literally, the best.

Arrival at San Jose

 Well, I am happy to report that our travel here was completely uneventful (I am not sure one wants excitement when flying). We arrived with the same number of students we left with, our pilot skillfully avoided (most) storms and turbulences, and everyone cleared customs and immigration.

Flying into San Jose

Our amazing guide Mark met us at the airport with our bus and took us to lunch at a typical restaurant, where we sampled Costa Rian dishes. 

We then were taken to our hotel and assigned rooms (with complimentary cat). 

La Rosa de America

The grounds were absolutely amazing, with plants in bloom one only knows from pictures, such as a Frangipani tree, jasmines, hibiscus, and this angle trumpet tree. We also found a mango tree and some of us sampled the ripe dropped fruit.

Then we got an Intro to Costa Rican history followed by supper for those not too tired or full (which mostly was us adults). 

Most amazing thing list (as per the students)

• none of the luggage got lost
• lunch was soooo good
• the hotel set in all the cool tropical vegetation, WITH cat
• intro to peaceful Costa Rican history
• big angel trumpet tree in full bloom
• driving through and seeing the city
• all the colors and murals
• best food ever, especially the grilled shrimp
• the climate difference, and the moisture
• having a window seat
• all the different vegetation, the different everything environment
• expectation were broken, in a good way

Picture of the day: Student interacting with the local wildlife:

COSTA RICA 2025 -Welcome to our blog for this year's trip!

 

This year, we have a full trip of 18 WSU students going with us to Costa Rica!  I'll be leading the trip, and Karin, aka Mrs. Dr. SLA V will be the Student Life Assistant for the trip.  So far, we've had a few face to face classes at Westfield State University, learning about ecosystem basics and how they apply to the unique Costa Rica ecosystems.  On May 19th, we'll take off for our trip and get it on us!