Saturday, January 20, 2007
The woods at night
Last night, I went with Ricardo, who is not only my Tico brother, but also my official guide, chaperone, and now, photographer, to Hidden Valley Ranch, for a nighttime walk in the forest. There were lots of tourists there, but we wound up in a nice small group ...just us and a couple from Argentina...because we wanted the tour in Spanish, not English.
The guide was great: we saw racoons, and a cousin of the racoon which is more common in Costa Rica, small monkeys, a sloth, several tarantula dens, moths, an enormous ant colony...about 15 feet long. There were parrots and other birds sleeping on swaying branches...they ruffle up their feathers at night to stay warm, so they look like little round puff balls. The best was when we all turned off our flashlights and stood in the forest. It's so loud! All the insects calling and animals chattering, and the wind! Living in Monteverde sounds a lot like living right on the ocean. Ocean waves sound similar to the wind here. And the wind is just as constant as the waves.
We walked home, which was scarier than walking through the woods, since we only had one little flashlight and we weren't sure the taxis and cars bringing people back from the tour would see us. Ricardo enjoyed making shadow animals with the flashlight in the middle of the narrow road. I prefered to watch for cars and yank the oblivious Ricardo into bushes and barbed wire whenever one passed. We both think the other is crazy. "Tranquila, tranquila!" he says to me. "Cuidado, cuidado!" I say to him.
Ricardo has told me about the many accidents on his bicycle and shown me some of the hills where he's wiped out (he's broken several bones). Last night, he showed me statues of giant tiger and an animal called a dana (I think) and we took our pictures sitting on them. He says he would like to be a doctor. He is an expert at converting Colones into dollars and back and he is obsessed with how much things cost. He told me that he enjoys reading and that he's read Harry Potter (he told me this before I bought the book) but his mother tells me he's lying, that he never reads. So who's to say what's true.
We made it home safely. And on our way, we ran into Elbert, our guide in the Santa Elena reserve, who was taking his girlfriend for a ride on his motorbike. Kind of fun to see someone I know.
The guide was great: we saw racoons, and a cousin of the racoon which is more common in Costa Rica, small monkeys, a sloth, several tarantula dens, moths, an enormous ant colony...about 15 feet long. There were parrots and other birds sleeping on swaying branches...they ruffle up their feathers at night to stay warm, so they look like little round puff balls. The best was when we all turned off our flashlights and stood in the forest. It's so loud! All the insects calling and animals chattering, and the wind! Living in Monteverde sounds a lot like living right on the ocean. Ocean waves sound similar to the wind here. And the wind is just as constant as the waves.
We walked home, which was scarier than walking through the woods, since we only had one little flashlight and we weren't sure the taxis and cars bringing people back from the tour would see us. Ricardo enjoyed making shadow animals with the flashlight in the middle of the narrow road. I prefered to watch for cars and yank the oblivious Ricardo into bushes and barbed wire whenever one passed. We both think the other is crazy. "Tranquila, tranquila!" he says to me. "Cuidado, cuidado!" I say to him.
Ricardo has told me about the many accidents on his bicycle and shown me some of the hills where he's wiped out (he's broken several bones). Last night, he showed me statues of giant tiger and an animal called a dana (I think) and we took our pictures sitting on them. He says he would like to be a doctor. He is an expert at converting Colones into dollars and back and he is obsessed with how much things cost. He told me that he enjoys reading and that he's read Harry Potter (he told me this before I bought the book) but his mother tells me he's lying, that he never reads. So who's to say what's true.
We made it home safely. And on our way, we ran into Elbert, our guide in the Santa Elena reserve, who was taking his girlfriend for a ride on his motorbike. Kind of fun to see someone I know.
# posted by Anne @ 10:18 AM 
