Everyone was up early this morning – thanks to the incredible sounds of male howler monkeys staking out their territory – just a bit too near our cabin! The whole group joined Alex for a bird-watching walk on the way to breakfast. We did see lots of birds that morning, but most of them were around the feeder at the lodge – each morning, the staff put out bananas, guanbana and other fruit to attract birds to entertain the guests.
Some of the birds we saw: Clay-Colored Robin (Costa Rica’s national bird), Variable Seedeater, Great Kiskidee Flycather, Red-Billed Pigeon, Yellow-Throated Euphonia, Black Cheeked Woodpecker, Buff-Throated Saltater, Blue-Gray Tanager, Scarlet-Rumped Tanager, Collared Aracari, and the Brown Jay.
Back near our cabin, we saw a pair of Red Lored Parrots and a Broad Wing Hawk.Back on the bus, we headed down the mountain to Lake Arenal for a morning of kayaking and/or boating.
We saw all sorts of wildlife along the shore, including a White-Tail Deer and a River Otter. Birds were plentiful: we saw Mangrove Swallow, Great White Egret, Southern Rough-Winged Swallow, Green Kingfisher, Amazon Kingfisher, American Anhinga, Green –Backed Heron, Great Blue Heron, Ringed Kingfisher, Osprey, and a pretty Yellow Warbler. We heard, but didn’t see, a couple of troops of Howler Monkeys.
The Amazon Kingfishers were fun to watch – one of them caught a fish and his fishing buddy wanted to share lunch – the successful fisherman finally got it down.
We stopped briefly in Nuevo Arenal to check out the local tourist traps and to walk around a bit.
Then back to Eco-Lodge for lunch and a siesta. The clouds lifted for a while and we had a pretty good view of Lake Arenal below.In mid-afternoon, we went with Alex and the rest of our group for our first official walk in the rainforest. Before the day was done, we had ample evidence that we were in a rainforest – the raingear came in very handy! Not far into the forest, we saw a White-Nosed Coati Mundi. We had seen a couple of these the day before, but it was even better to see him in his natural environment.
We saw wood storks flying overhead, a litter toad hiding underfoot, and all sorts of interesting plants – Cecropia trees have distinctive rings on the trunk, with fire ants living in each ring; the strangler fig sprouts up high in a host tree and then drops roots to the ground, eventually killing the host; the Centropogon has red tubular flowers that a pollinated only by the long-tailed hermit hummingbird, which has a curved beak.
Alex showed us the “Panama Hat Palm” – the tree from which young leaves are picked to make Panama hats. The natives here also use it for making various clothing items.
He also introduced us to our first Leaf Cutter Ant (Atta sp.). This little fellow was marching along with a chunk of leaf, on his way back to the ant mound. We saw these ants on several more occasions.We heard lots of birds in the forest, but they were pretty hard to spot. Today we saw the Wedge-Billed Wood Creeper and a pair of Swallow-Tail Kites.
The most exciting wildlife spotting was a troop of howler monkeys. Thankfully, they weren’t howling – just swinging around the trees.The most amazing thing we” discovered” in the rainforest was a thatched hut that belonged to the native people, the Maleku. They greeted us with a hand-to-shoulder salute and the words “Capi Capi.” They told us a bit about their culture and the village where they lived, and then we had a chance to look at some of their handcrafts.
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