Keel-Billed Toucan, Ringed Kingfisher, Black-Headed Trogon (Birds heard not seen, except for the Trogon. Not our photos.)

The restored jungle where we’re staying, Pura Jungla, is located in Paraiso - yes, Paradise. The morning jungle chorus is always enlivening and interspersed with background roars of howler monkeys. They don’t show on the ‘birds heard’ chart below, of course.

We use two different bird listening apps by Cornell Ornithology Labs - Birdnet and below, Merlin. Birdnet is nice because it automatically keeps track of birds heard. But while Birdnet requires highlighting the sound pattern to identify the bird, Merlin lists each bird as it’s heard and highlights the bird making the current sound. Soon, we’ll figure out the app, E-Bird so we can contribute information as citizen scientists :)

Today, March 13, 2023, probably because of an unexpected rain shower yesterday, it was a bird paradise of songs and calls. I included photos of a few on the list. Most birds we don’t necessarily see other than our regular bird visitors. We did not see the Keel-Billed Toucan, but it was thrilling to know it is, or was, here in our jungle.

It’s also worth noting that the Clay-Colored Thrush, a plain yard bird, is the Costa Rican national bird. That of all the big, showy birds here, that was chosen. They often are found near homes, singing musically or whistling as if calling you to come outside.

Todd’s below piece on Costa Rica, written for Plex: Collective Sense Commons, contains a great summary of the insight, foresight and progressiveness of this country. What I hope it also does is show people in the U.S.that things that can seem impossible there are possible! Low taxes and excellent low-cost health care. (WHO ranks CR above the U.S. in health care quality.) Reversing environmental harm. HAVING NO MILITARY! And maybe most powerfully of all, the possibility for everyday people instead of being divided and at each others’ throats, to be happy.

(First published here)

Howler monkey’s brave leap witnessed from my desk (on the porch)

Just over a year ago Costa Rican UNDP (United Nations Development Program) Resident Representative José Vicente Troya Rodríguez provided the reasons why Costa Rica was the first nation to implement Inner Development Goals in its public sector. His essay is a beautiful encapsulation of the Tico (Costa Rican) philosophy summarized by:

Climate Action is Development,
Protecting Nature is Prosperity,
Women at the center of this Transformation is imperative.

While the country is not perfect–underemployment is an issue, and it has its share of corruption–Costa Rica an amazing place to live and work. It is the first tropical nation to reverse deforestation. It has had no military for three generations. The nation has effectively legislated and enforced gender parity in government. Oil drilling is banned, and 95% of energy generated in the country comes from renewables.

While the US spends just under $13,000 per capita on healthcare, Costa Rica spends under $1,000, but has better outcomes. The country has parallel public and private health systems which provide choices in service and cost. Public health was redesigned thirty years ago, starting with rural communities. Where we live, it's common to see a health worker on a motorbike show up at a neighbor's house for a check up.

These could all be great reasons to move to Costa Rica, but for us, it's not the whole story. After vacationing here for ten years, we wondered whether the hospitality and happiness we experienced while here were reserved for new faces. After more than 100 days of living in Guanacaste, Pia and I can vouch for the authenticity of their collective happiness. People help each other, they greet each other, and they routinely do both with strangers.

On one afternoon in Santa Cruz, our closest city, Pia witnessed a horse that had been hitched get loose and trot down the city street, weaving between trucks. In many northern hemisphere cities, there would have been honking and shouts through windows–complaints that life had been slowed down. But here, traffic stopped, people got out of their cars and trucks to help, and the onlookers on the sidewalk began to corral the horse. The horse's caballero was reunited with his horse, with smiles, laughter, and cheers up and down the street.

My theory is that the uniqueness of Costa Rica starts with their commitment to living in harmony with the land. The landscape smells, tastes, looks, feels, and sounds alive with vitality. (I am still getting accustomed to the spiders, large insects, and muscular, tri-colored squirrels that are a part of that vitality). I wonder whether the widespread warmth and embraces–even for Americans–arise from a sense of pride in their commitment to working with Nature and not against each other. I can't help but wonder what the effects of nearly 75 years of being demilitarized might be.

I experience the neighbors' morning “buenas” as joy that we, too, are taking part in pura vida - the pure life. For Ticos, the pure life is very connected to protecting and nurturing the source of their joy–the lands, animals, and waters they tend–and their connection with life itself.

They share their joy, and it's contagious.

Costa Rica with its mountainous spine and oceans on both sides has a remarkable variety of microclimates as well as varying character of place. (For better or worse, one of the main differences with the latter is how much gringo influence there has been. But that’s mostly another story.) We’re staying along the northern Pacific coast in Guanacaste, in dry tropical forest, within a stretch of small beach towns with beautiful, uncrowded public beaches (see some in previous posts). According to what we hear, and what we’ve experienced, ours is one of the most laid back parts of the country. Many of the roads are gravel and dirt, so that helps keep the pace down.

Recently we decided to take a weekend trip with our visiting friends to one of the best-known mountain regions, Monteverde, a cloud forest and ecotourism destination. And because it would be on the way, we also chose to stop and visit an indigenous town called Guaitil, which has kept alive the Chorotega pottery legacy that goes back a millennium or more. The name, Guaitil, comes from the guaitil tree that provides dye for the pottery. Historical designs and skills have been handed down through generations of families, many of whom have a kiln on their property. In a model sustainable process, all tools and materials are made locally. Around the charming little town green and beyond, we found small pottery shops with demonstrations underway of stomping barefoot on the clay to knead it, throwing pottery, and painting it. It’s not far from Santa Cruz in Guanacaste and well worth the trip. Here’s a good, more extensive dive into what’s special about Guaitil.

As with our travels to the capitol town, San Jose, the drive up into the mountains to get to Monteverde was gorgeous and at times, harrowing. It helped that we had rainbows as well as stunning views for most of the trip. The cloud forest is a kind of variation on a rain forest with the moisture provided by heavy mist more so than rain. Even during what’s the dry season where we are, everything was lush in evergreen Monteverde.

One highlight was a guided night hike through the forest, during which we saw three different birds balled up and sleeping on tree branches, including a toucan. Another was climbing out onto an old strangler fig tree that had been trained to bridge a river. Down below, we hiked along the river while getting bathed in sunlit, rainy mist. A blessing.