We’re staying in a 3-bedroom house above Monteverde. I know I’m getting repetitive but I just have to show you our shower; the wiring to the shower head is particularly inventive, I thought. Can you imagine wiring like that in the UK where not even a 13amp socket is permitted in a bathroom? Once you’ve figured out that to get hot water it must be turned on only slightly, it does work and so far nobody has been zapped. [Try to ignore the pink.]
Mr. Leader spent his morning cup of coffee getting online and booking our tickets to the Reserva Biológica Bosque Nubosa Monteverde. Tickets were a stiff $29 each. The difficulty is that you have to book for a specific one of their three trails. Knowing nothing about the trails, it’s a bit of a crap shoot but surely not that critical.
After our usual crack of sparrow-fart departure to take in a panaderia, we duly arrived at the reserve car park, which is a 15-minute shuttle bus ride away from the reserve itself. We boarded the bus and arrived at the entrance shortly before 08:00. The weather was grey and overcast so things were not looking great. Now the importance of trail selection when booking became painfully obvious. Once on site with descriptions, we realized that our chosen trail was “sub-optimal” for odonata. Once you’ve coughed up your not insignificant entrance fee, can you opt for a different trail? No! Can you do your chosen trail and then do another? Well, yes, but that’s another whopping $29. You have to be friggin’ kidding. $29 is not the entrance fee to the park but to a single trail. Jeez! Nowhere else works like that. This place is a complete rip-off, plain and simple. I couldn’t give it few enough stars.
In a somewhat irritated frame of mind at the way this reserve was “run”, we set out on our 3.5km trail. They at least allowed us to start before our appointed time of 08:45 [amazing, really, given the other restrictions]. At Mr. Leader’s meticulous pace – three steps, examine every leaf thru’ binoculars; three more steps – we ambled our way around in about two hours. Mind you, there was clearly no rush. I did see a handful of uncooperative butterflies but other than that, just leaves and very many of them. It was still overcast so the concept of shelling out a second extortionate $29 each for the more appropriate (shorter – 1.5km) trail, one with water, was a non-starter. We boarded the return shuttle bus.
Mr. Leader had been picking the brain of one of the local guides and had got a pointer to a road leading to another reserve: La Reserva Bosque Nubosa Santa Elena. [I’m sure you’ll have figured it out but all these Bosque Nubosa references mean Cloud Forest.] It was actually only about 6kms from our rental house with the pink, curiously wired electric shower. We set off a little before midday to get there.
Now, all the roads around Monteverde, which nestles beneath very many lumpy bits of land, must be 1-in-6 or steeper, and the majority of those are gravel/stone/rock with just a few intervening short runs of tarmac. We began climbing (slowly, the car is underpowered) out of Monteverde and fairly soon left the overcast murk behind. We had won some sunshine.
The road leading to our next intended reserve wound its way up the side of one of the local high lumps of land. Such roads are frequently crossed by “mountain” streams which provide good habitat for dragonflies and this road was no exception. Mr. Leader stopped our car three times beside such habitat. In the welcome sunshine, quite quickly our day went from zero to hero as we finally had subjects to point our cameras at. We’re very familiar with the Sympetrum genus of dragonflies in the UK, what we call the darters. this red job is an Americas cousin, the Cardinal Meadowhawk (Sympetrum illotum), meadowhawk being what Americans call darters. The blue and black damselfly is a Sky-blue Dancer (Argia medullaris).
Approaching 13:30 we still hadn’t arrived at our second reserve and my worms were biting. Being 6kms from our house, the thought of driving back down into town for lunch, then returning, didn’t appeal. There did, however, seem to be a restaurant of sorts at the reserve. We completed the climb to the reserve with hopes of food.
Sure enough, there was a restaurant within the reserve. Furthermore, there was no entry fee to a reserve with four trails. How different is that from the morning affair? We wandered in and my spirits soared at the sight of a hamburger on the menu. I have had nothing but excellent papas [chips] in Costa Rica and this basic greasy spoon restaurant was no exception. Our substandard home chippie needs lessons from the Costa Ricans.
After our late lunch the boys hit one of the trails but I stayed to relax watching some of the England v. Croatia World Cup opener being screened on the restaurant TV, not that I usually find footie in any way relaxing. Looks like we won 4-2, after throwing the lead away a couple of times. I was waiting for the good old “snatching defeat from the jaws of victory” scenario while I was watching but it seems we got away with it.
I didn’t miss much on the trail, mercifully. There was, though, a poor large hawker-type dragonfly – what the Americans call darners – trapped in the restaurant and flying around frantically looking for a way out. It eventually hung up in the roof and we managed to get pictures of it. It’s been identified by those in the know as Turquoise-tipped Darner (Rhionaeschna psilus).
Back at the house, the thunder and rain began at 17:00.
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