Costa Rica Manuel Antonio Part 2

Hi Guys,

The adventure continues. I do believe this is the day the Montezuma oro Pendula began taunting me. This bird by the end of the trip became my photography adversary. Showing itself only long enough for me to scramble with a camera, only to fly away out of range or behind a branch...

We hiked up to a vista and had a gorgeous panorama of the area. The beaches below are where La Playa de Puerto Escondido (Puerto Escondido beach) is located.


This little butterfly landed right next to use, only these things are quite twitchy and very had time getting a photo.
The view from above was so great I almost forgot to look down when one person mentioned he look at that 3ft long Iguana below.

We found this guy at Puerto Escondio beach laying on a log. Surprising how close you could get, though I stayed back and used the 300mm lens. By this time, the temp had risen to Hot and humidity was way up there. The water at the beach was barely cool....and to think 3 days previous, I was in snow in Washington.

On the way out of the park we came across this beach leading back to the town of Manuel Antonio. What a gorgeous area. When I come back to Costa Rica some day, I am headed out to the West Coast for sure. Very nice coast line and relaxing atmosphere.

In Quepos, we walked over to the levy wall and watched the sun go down. This area didn't look so hot for swimming, but very nice for sunsets.

A couple of kids were in a boat riding the surf in. They all had big grins on their faces.

This ends Day 2 of the Coast to Coast adventure. Day 3 starts the trans Costa Rican adventure with Mountain Biking and lots of Hiking. Day 2 of the taunting by the bird.

Costa Rica-Manuel Antonio Park-Part 1

Hi Guys,

Sorry for the delay in posting. Here is part 1 of Manuel Antonio National Park. We got to the airport 30 minutes before the flight left, drove up within 100ft of the airplanes got in the terminal handed over our passports and were given a yellow plastic ticket the size of a dinner plate with the number 1 on it. I guess they re-use these tickets. Security consisted of a guy opening a zipper on your bag, feeling around and waving you through.


Then came the plane...12 seat Cessna single prop. What a fun flight. You could see the Ground Prox system next to the pilot and GPS course pre-programed in. The landing was crazy. We circled around at a crazy steep bank then saw what looked like a small 2 lane road cut out of the jungle just wide enough for the wings to clear the jungle on the side of the road. Well that was our runway...

Our plane was in the background. Yes, this is the airport.

We dropped stuff off at the hotel and headed for Manuel Antonio national park. The maps were quite good here.

We saw a sign for a catarata (waterfall) and took the side trail because the masses weren't taking it. We stumbled across this 3-Toed Sloth.

He or she was quite active actually moving.

When they sleep 18 hours a day, kind of nice to see one awake.

See the three toes...this one didn't have a care how fast he got anywhere.

So we hiked all the way to the waterfall, only there was no waterfall...dry time of year there. Nice hike though.

Back on the main road, this deer decided to cross the road and say hi.

On the walk up to a vista, we heard something in the trees and found around 12 of these guys bouncing around the trees.

Seeing something run across the path, it took 5 minutes, but we finally spotted this guy. This shot I was at a full 300mm to pick this up.

Part 1: Lots of walking, through jungle paths, down to nice beaches seeing all sorts of wildlife. No need to pay for a guide because the groups are so big you can walk, catch up to one, look at whatever they found, continue to the next group and group guide hop not having to spend 10 minutes watching a hermit crab.

Costa Rica - Feb 14

Hi Guys,

Here begins another tale of adventure. Prior to this trip, I had a horrible time getting to Morocco and got a $750 voucher with NW Airlines. So I found NW had a flight to Costa Rica and Bike Hike Adventures happened to have trip crossing the entire country by human power. Sounded fun.

Day 1: Feb 14
My Luggage made it! Yeah! Arrived in San Jose and got to the hotel around 3pm. Met up with Erica, one of the other travelers and decided to walk back into San Jose. So nice to go from snow to 80's T-shirt weather.

I forgot my map so, I hope I get the names correct.

Initial view is that Costa Rica has a significantly higher standard of living conditions than other parts of Central America. Here is the local theater and main square of town.

Proving true to just about every other major city square, there were Pigeons. Here I am on 4 hours of sleep in the main square (red eye flight) and pigeons. Still don't get the attraction to have pigeons crawls all over you.

I love putting together panorama photos. My auto stitch program does some pretty cool stuff sometimes. Look at the red car on the lower left. Really plays tricks with ones eyes. The see-thru person is also pretty neat.

Near the square there were these neat looking fountains. Next to them was a McDonald's, Starbucks, KFC, and equivalent of Chick Fillet. The more I travel, the less I want to go to fast food.

The street vendors were quite friendly. They lay their spread out of the street and hope you buy something. Small leather goods, necklaces, and random stuff I had no clue on were for sale.

On the way back from town we saw this Mediterranean looking building. Turns out it was a restaurant. After walking nearly 2 miles at night looking for a place to eat, we went back here for dinner. Good food. Kind of reminded me of Morocco in Costa Rica...odd combination.

Day 1 was pretty short. Still tired. For those going to San Jose, El Pueblo had a bunch of nice restaurants and when you go on Valentines day, the middle-high end restaurants are packed. Also ask the front desk. They recommended several. If you go with Bike Hike, their recommendations were very nice as well.

Our walk back at night was very interesting. I think we passed 3 disco-techs with lines 200 people deep, a punk rock bar with Glen Plake style Mohawks, and finally the Guy/Girl (not sure)-hooker-drug dealer corner. If I was walking alone, may have taken a cab.

Did not see the Bird that would mock me the rest of the trip: Montezuma Oro Pendula. I would show you a picture...but that would give this bird too much credit.