Manuel Antonio Park

While in Jaco, we took a side trip to Manuel Antonio Park in Quepos. We booked the excursion with Jaco360 and for a modest price we were picked up at our hotel, driven to the park and had an excellent tour of the park with our guide, Walter. We stopped at a fruit stand on the way and our guide bought a huge bag of fruit for each of us, including the most delicious pineapple I have ever eaten. While in the park we saw Two-Toed and Three-Toed Sloths, White-Faced Capuchin Monkeys, Howler Monkeys, Squirrel Monkeys, many birds and other little creatures.

Sloth


Forest Crab

White-Faced Capuchin Monkey

Monkey Family

Bats

Fiery-Billed Aracari

Basilisk Lizard

Crab

Return to Jaco

So now it's beachtime. After a hard few days of birding it's time for some rest and relaxation at the beach in Jaco. We stayed at our favorite condo at Paloma Blanca. We enjoyed walks on the beach, walks into town, dining out, sunning and swimming in the pool and of course a little more birding.

Jaco view facing south

Jaco view facing north

Anyone for horseback riding on the beach?

Got to bring home some Lizano Salsa, the taste of Costa Rica

And enjoy this while you are here

Crested Caracara... you didn't think we didn't do any birding did you?

Turquoise-Browed Motmot

Why are sunsets at the beach always so much more beautiful than anywhere else?

Kathy and George

Costa Rica June 2011

In early June George and I took a trip to Costa Rica. We arranged our trip through Costa Rica Birding Journeys, owner and operator, Randall Ortega Chavez. I have used Randall in the past on several trips and have never been disappointed. (There is a link to his website in the sidebar.) He arranged all our hotel accomodations, picked us up at the airport, transported us to all our hotels and guided us on our birding expeditions. He knows my bird list and what I am missing so he planned our destinations with the best possible chances of adding new birds to my life list. With this in mind our first destination was Heliconias Lodge in Bijagua, Upala in the north of Costa Rica. This was a rustic but very lovely and comfortable lodge that came with a daily 6am wakeup call from the nearby Howler Monkeys. Excellent birding was as close as the grounds of the lodge. There were beautifully maintained trails and a series of hanging bridges which take you to the canopy of the rainforest where the birds are. In two days of birding at Heliconias we were able to see 112 birds of which 29 were new. The highlights were the Ornate Hawk Eagle, Tody Motmot, Long-Tailed Manakin, Ocellated Antbird, Streak-Crowned Antvireo, Black-Headed Antthrush, Green Shrike-Vireo and White-Necked Jacobin.

There are 4 Hanging Bridges along the trails at Heliconias Lodge that take you to the canopy of the rainforest where the birds are. The average height of the bridges from the ground is 90 meters and length is 130 meters. They were very narrow and extremely shaky which made it a challenge to focus binoculars on birds, but the view of the rainforest from this vantage point was awesome.
We found this nest of the White-Neck Jacobin right along the edge of the trail.

Here is the White-Necked Jacobin (hummingbird) on the nest.


This is the Jicaro Danto tree. It is the only tree in the world to bear blossoms on the trunk.




Jicaro Danto blossoms

One of many wonderful old trees in the rainforest.

Heleconias Lodge is located at the foothills of the Tenorio Volcano. This is the volcano as seen from the Lodge.

Just to the north is the Nicaraguan border. If you look closely you can see Lake Nicaragua in the distance and two old volcanic mountains in the Lake.

Los Haitises National Park

Los Haitises National Park is located in the Dominican Republic near the town of Samana. It is made up of a large group of small limestone islands or keys. Since limestone is a porous rock, trees and other vegetation grows on top the islands. Being surrounded by water they provide the perfect habitat for many seabirds to nest. We were able to see hundreds of Magnificent Frigatebirds, Brown Boobies and Brown Pelicans. (click on the pictures for a larger view)

Bird Island

Magnificent Frigatebirds


One of the many islands of Los Haitises







This island is called Jaws Island by the locals.

Small fish and shrimp are plentiful in these waters, so the parent birds are constantly flying out to gather food for the young birds and returning to feed them. The sky is full of birds.

The pelicans chose this particular island as a training ground for the juvenile pelicans to learn to fish.

Several of the islands have caves that were used by the Taino indians in the early 1200-1400's for shelter and for ceremonial grounds. They painted pictographs on the walls that depicted the common birds and animals of the area.

Pictographs were painted using the local mangrove roots for color.

Happy Halloween

I don't know if I have been watching too much Ghost Adventures on the Travel Channel or not, but this entrance to an old mine at Soldier's Delight looks pretty scary to me. I wouldn't have wanted to go underground in this old shaft. The park itself was beautiful and I plan on going back in the spring to do a wildflower walk.

Ringing Rocks Park, Bucks County PA

I learned about this place on a show on the Travel Channel called Weird Travels and decided I had to go there. We drove two and a half hours to the Doylestown/ Bethlehem area of Pennsylvania above Philadelphia. The park is located in a beautiful wooded area. As you walk from the parking lot into the woods you notice that the ground is strewn with more and more rocks. The forest trail abruptly ends to reveal a large open field of boulders. The field is 5 acres big and 10 feet deep. It is a mystery how all these rocks ended up here. Furthermore, the rocks have unusual qualities. They ring, make music. Some have high pitch and others lower and then some just go "thunk". It is easy to determine which stones have a good pitch by their worn white marks from years and years of being hit with hammers by visitors. There is an eerie atmosphere as you clamber out over the rocks early in the morning, but as the park fills with visitors armed with hammers, all pounding on the rocks, the place becomes quite musical and entertaining.
(click on pictures for a larger view)

You can see that many of these boulders are very large.

A view of the field of rocks

This rock has a very good tone, visitors have worn a hole in the rock.

Another view of the rock field. It is said that a bird has never been seen flying over this area.

Interesting erosion patterns on the rocks

George "ringing" the stones.

A short walk past the rock field takes you through the forest to another interesting geological formation. There is a wide rock stepped platform that drops off to create a waterfall three stories high.

If this picture seems tilted it is because the rock floor does actually pitch to the right.

The rock floor is stepped down gradually toward the waterfall

View from the top of the waterfall.

Cascade Falls Trail at Patapsco State Park

The Cascade Falls Trail in the Orange Grove area of the Patapsco State Park is a 2.2 mile loop that treats the walker to beautiful cascades and rapids. (Click on the pictures for a larger view)

The combination of rock and water... lovely.

Me crossing the stream

A small waterfall on the trail

George

Patapsco State Park

A beautiful fall morning after a big storm seemed to be the perfect time for a walk. Today we went to Patapsco State Park. I was curious to see if the Swinging Bridge that I remembered from many years ago was still there. It is still there and still a wonderful place to walk and birdwatch.

The Swinging Bridge

Harpy Eagle (Harpia harpyja) - Chick on the nest | the Internet Bird Collection

Harpy Eagle (Harpia harpyja) - Chick on the nest the Internet Bird Collection
From our trip in July, this video was taken by our guide in Tambopata, Peru with a small camera held up to a spotting scope.