Day Two afternoon

The tour director was fabulous. Carlos Mora had a B.Sc. in Ornithology, a Master's degree in Tourism and a Ph.D. in Phonetics (Linguistics). Not only could he identify every bird we pointed out, but he was incredibly knowledgeable in geography, geology, culture, and the flora and fauna of Costa Rica. The next stop was Poas volcanoe. The plants around the volcano are unique, due to the high concentration of acid rain created by the volcano itself.

I did manage to get some good pictures of the beautiful flowers in the area.
This is a common little bush that grew on the path to the volcano. According to Carlos, the natives used the flowers of this plant to decorate their bodies, much like henna. When heated, the flowers turned blue.
Carlos heated the edges of this flower with a cigarette. The heat turned the petals a beautiful blue-green, but didn't seem to harm the flower at all.
Some areas along the climb were almost completely void of vegetation, because of the acid rain coming from the volcano. You can see the mist billowing over the trees at the rear of this photo.

This is all we saw of Poas volcano. We should be looking out over a vast cater, with a lake at the bottom, but the mist was so thick, it was like a solid white wall. There were a lot of people who had made the trip to see the volcano, and they hovered around, waiting for the mist to clear, but we had an agenda, and couldn't wait. While there, we noticed a man discretely taking pictures of some of the girls on our tour, and he followed us back to the tour bus. We were quite creeped out by his suspicious behaviour.

After leaving Poas, we headed off through La Paz, which ws supposed to be a shortcut on the way to the Arenal region, our final destination for the night. However, when we got to this bridge, we ran into a few problems. The bridge was crumbing, and was only wide enough for one car at a time. There was a huge line up of cars on both sides of the bridge waiting to cross.

We were asked to get out of the bus, and our tour director directed traffic while we explored the waterfall. We had to walk across the bridge while there were no other vehicles on it, because the tour director was worried that the bridge would collapse if the bus went across with us in it. This is a picture from behind the falls.

This traffic jam, in the middle of the jungle, went for several kilometers. This narrow road was considered a major highway. Our bus driver was incredibly skillful, and passed these vehicles with only inches to spare.

We stopped at Baldi Spa (a big american-style spa with multiple hot and swimming pools). All the money I brought with me was stolen at the spa (about $85 US). The group spent a couple of hours swimming, and then we headed off to our hotel at the base of Arenal Volcano for supper and bed. We were all exhausted, and ready for sleep.

Day two

We spent the first day flying, leaving at 7 am, which meant that most people had to get up at 3:30 am to get to the airport on time. We had planned to check our large luggage and then say goodbyes, but we were ushered through the security gates immediately. I was the lucky one chosen for a complete security check, including a full body pat-down (like a gentle full-body massage!). The guy in the line-up behind me had concealed a razor knife in his backpack which was of course found and confiscated, so I didn't mind the increased security too much, and the staff were very nice.

It seemed a bit prophetic that we were flying by a full moon, but I chose to consider that a good sign, rather than anything sinister.

The first flight was only a couple of hours, and then we had a lay-over of four hours in Pheonix - not enough time to leave the airport, and just long enough to eat lunch and then get really bored. The next jump was much longer, and the movie screens weren't working, so it was very long and boring for those passengers who were hoping to pass the hours watching a movie.

It was already dark whem we arrived in San Jose, Costa Rica, and we just had enough time to grab a quick supper and head off to our hotel rooms. The hotel we were staying in was right in the worst part of town, and we were warned not to leave the hotel anyway, so nobody really felt like they were going to miss anything by going to bed.

This is the view from the balcony of our hotel room first thing in the morning:

There are nearly as many hours of daylight as night that close to the Equator, so our days usually started with a 6:30 breakfast, and we were on the road by 7:00. It must make sense to people who are used to that rhythym, but we are from much farther north, where the days are short in the winter, and 18 hours or so in the summer.

Our first stop was the INBioparque, which is a natioanl research institute of biodiversity. The small park has nature trails through areas representing the different climate and land zones found in Costa Rica, and the trained guides are very knowledgable. The park is home to lots of birds, deer and turtles, and quite a few of these caymans:

We all anxiously watched these adult birds trying to protect their babies from the cayman (on the left in the photo). They babies were so tiny and fuzzy, and seemed quite oblivious to their impending doom.

Of course there were also quite a few iguanas for a more personal encounter than one would find in the wild:

Visiting the park before venturing out into the wild lands also enabled us to capture on film the incredible blue butterflies. We would see lots of them throughout our adventures, but they never sat still enough to see them through the camera viewfinder.

The most outstanding feature of the landscape that first day was the incredible color - banks of brilliantly colored flowers everywhere.

Once we completed our tour of the park, we were back on the road, heading to Poas volcano. We passed this oxcart on the road,

and our enthusiastic tour director stopped the bus to allow us to get pictures of the cart, and to bribe the owner into letting us sit on the ox for pictures. Note the width of the road - that is the main highway.The ox was quite a beautiful creature, and while they were tolerant, they weren't friendly. This type of cart and decorative headgear for the oxen are very traditional, and even celebrated with a festival once a year! I don't really get it, but it is a good thing if it encourages people to keep these lovely creatures.

More next post...

Costa Rica

We returned from Costa Rica on Sunday night (actually Monday morning), and it took me a couple of days to recover and feel rested and 'normal' again. Although I took all the supplies along, I didn't do anything creative, other than taking a lot of pictures. I don't feel confident of my drawing skills anomore, and didn't want to draw where people could see the results, so it was difficult to find enough isolated time when I could do any drawing or painting.

I am disappointed in the results of the pictures too, because I seem to have trouble getting the auto focus to actually work, but I am hoping that there are one or two good ones in the lot. It was nice to have the digital cameras instead of the film camera, because I gelt free to take a lot more shots, but in the end, I think film is still superior. I always come home with a few awesome shots if I have the film camera, but can't say the same about the digital.

I will go through and try to find some good images, and will tell you all about our experiences in Costa Rica over the next few days.

The Creekbed

This is another tiny encaustic painting (5x5). It actually looks a bit more vibrant in the photograph than it should, but that just gives me ideas for the colors in the next one.

Prairie winter

I started out trying to make a fairly abstract prairie winter landscape, but it ended up being quite detailed. It worked, though, so I didn't want to ruin it by making it more abstract.

I have a lot of partially completed projects that I have stored away over the years. Often I get halfway through and find I need a particulary supply or something that I don't have, and the project gets put on hold until I can find or buy the missing item. Then it gets packed away for some reason or other, and I never get back to it. Other times, it isn't working the way I thought it would, and rather than go with it, and risk embarassment if someone should see a failed attempt, I hide it away, waiting for some kind if inspiration that will resolve the ugliness and let me make it into something wonderful.

I had a lot of failed attempts at doll making too, before I heard about Art Dolls. I thought that dolls all had to look perfect, and life-like and beautiful. Then I saw images of other people's interpretations of the doll - funny, quirky and sometimes ugly on purpose. That inspiration gives me new purpose to finish those ugly attempts, and turn them into something that makes a statement, or makes someone laugh.

And it gives me an excuse to dig out 'failures' and turn them into successses, which has got to be a good thing!

cactus flower

The sun was just setting when I got home after work, and I had time to take pictures of this beautiful flower on my Christmas cactus. It is supposed to flower at Christmas, but since flowering is triggered by the number of hours of sunlight, mine flowers twice a year in the fall and again in the spring. I never noticed it before - probably because I never really sat down and looked closely at a flower before - that the flower is a true red, or maybe even slightly orange-red, but the stamen is actually hot pink.