Durán Sanatorium

Today my study abroad program took us to an insane asylum. Lying on the side of Volcan Irazu in the clouds above the city of Cartago, lies a collection of abandoned buildings claimed to be the most haunted place in Costa Rica. The long-uninhabited Durán Sanatorium was originally a hospital for those suffering from Tuberculosis in 1915. Throughout the years, the Durán Sanatorium eerily functioned as an insane asylum, a prison, and an orphanage. The Durán Sanatorium closed its doors for good in 1973, after the building sustained damage from nearby Irazú Volcano, but people say some of the patients never truly left… Ironically, I found the buildings beautiful with a feel of ancient history. The brilliant afternoon sun on the surrounding green hillsides completed a striking setting with the decaying buildings. It was a chance for some creative photography...

        

La Selva Biological Research Station

A couple weekends ago was my first Veritas field trip to a tropical research station in the Caribbean lowlands of Costa Rica. Both my Tropical Ecology class and the Ecological Photography class attended the weekend-long excursion. Before we left for the trip, the two teachers divided us all into pairs: one ecology student and one photography student. Our main assignment for the weekend was to help the photography student take ecologically meaningful photos that could be explained biologically. My topic was, of course, insects. Saturday morning, took road 32 out of San Jose directly into the mountain range on the Caribbean side of the central valley. The air became cool and inundated with thin fog. As we climbed, you could see layers of blue hued mountains rising up in the distance- a resplendent wilderness occupied only by remote fauna and a thick layer of tropical montane vegetation. We crossed a bright rusty orange river gushing over large boulders and engraving a valley in the mountains as we began the descent into the northern Caribbean lowlands. We stopped briefly at a line of fruit stands along the roadside for a rest. From there, it took us less than an hour to arrive at La Selva Biological Research Station. La Selva is a private portion of tropical rainforests and disturbed lands purchased in 1954 for research purposes. It is one of the central research stations for the Organization for Tropical Studies and publishes a scientific paper every 72 hours.

Immediately upon exiting the bus, the humidity engulfed us in a thick embrace of saturated air. The heat made me actually appreciate the wind in San Jose. The research station was composed of quite a few cabins nearby a large open-air dining hall next to a river with a suspension bridge leading to more research cabins and conference rooms. Not exactly rustic. While we were changing into proper clothing, we saw a black howler monkey outside our dorms. I looked at him through my binoculars; he was staring directly at us with deep black eyes.

Gecko

We all congregated at tables near the dining hall for a briefing about La Selva and then lunch. The next couple hours were designated “free time.” Michele, Collen, and I walked into the jungle to explore. We crossed the suspension bridge over the slow-moving river, seeing iguanas basking in the trees and bromeliads overwhelming the upper branches of the tallest hardwoods. On the opposite of the bridge was a labyrinth of primary forest, punctuated by thin concrete paths. We followed one path to the left and down towards the river. Along the way, Collen spotted a pair of toucans perched above our heads! We saw groups of peccaries, terrestrial pig-like animals related to warthogs foraging along the forest floor. They were completely immune to our presence. The vast majority of the other animals we saw were insects, although I did manage to capture a mini gecko nearby one of the river buildings.

Green Parrot Snake

Around 2 PM, the two classes congregated to go on a forest walk. We were supposed to stay with our project partners and take detailed notes on everything we saw. Almost immediately, we spotted a green parrot snake slithering through the shrubs near the dining hall. My miniature teacher, Wendy, walked in the front of the group of almost 40 students stopping every few moments to talk to us about some insect or plant. The highlights of the walk were a pair of chestnut mandible toucans, an oropendola, a golden orb spider, green iguanas, long-nosed bats roosting on a building near the river, and a three-toed sloth. The majority of species we encountered in the forest were, not surprisingly, plants. Fortunately that is intriguing to me. By the end of our walk, we had barely penetrated the jungle and it only took us a few minutes to return to our cabins. 

Toucan

After another scrumptious meal, we again trooped off into the forest for a night walk. You could hear the sounds of the forest coming alive in the night: insects calling and frogs croaking. We encountered a massive colony of leaf-cutter ants marching across the forest floor transporting pieces of leaves back to their nest. On the rest of the night walk, we found cane toads, poison dart frogs, leaf-litter frogs, lizards, geckos, preying mantises, cockroaches, spiders, bullet ants, and millipedes. All of us were incredibly exhausted by the end of our hike and I crashed in my bed almost instantly.

green iguana

Some students woke up at 5 AM Sunday morning to go bird watching. I couldn’t quite manage to drag myself out of bed at that hour… and so I got up around 7 AM for breakfast. Afterwards, a couple girls and I found Doc walking down a forest path and followed him. Doc is an elderly professor at Concordia University whose real name is Lawrence Meissner, although everyone refers to him as “Doc.” Walking through the rainforest with him was the best part of the trip. He is a biologist who has been teaching field schools around the world for many years and hence he has a wealth of information to provide. His love for the nature around us was contagious and I soon felt entirely captivated by the forest. We kept quiet while walking through the beautiful jungle, observing everything around us—gaps in the forest being colonized by pioneer tree species, strangler figs suffocating their host plants, old hardwood trees decaying into piles of rich nutrients on the forest floor. We could hear howler monkeys calling high in the canopy and eventually I was able to spot the troop of monkeys climbing through the trees far in the distance. On our way back, we saw more peccaries on their eternal search for food.

Golden orb spider

Leaf cutter ants

Before we packed up and left La Selva, we each had to present our photos and describe them in ecological terms to the classes. Each presentation was relatively brief, thankfully, although I enjoyed looking at some of the beautiful photos from the photography students.

Our journey home was somewhat uneventful and we arrived back in the city in the afternoon. I am returning to La Selva this weekend, and hope to see more monkeys this time!

Strawberry poison dart frog

Mariposas

Gram, this blog post is for you! A couple weeks ago, three friends and I went to a butterfly garden in San Jose. It was somewhat secluded and small, but beautiful regardless. Enjoy the photos!

Playa Hermosa

This weekend was my first self-planned excursion. An exotic escapade to some unknown beach in a country I barely speak the language of. Perfect! My roommate, Macey, and I decided last Thursday afternoon to buy public bus tickets and venture to the Pacific coast to a beach named “Hermosa.”    

Playa Hermosa

Friday after my Spanish oral final exam, we took a rickety little bus to downtown San Jose. After some confusion about where we were supposed to get off, we emerged into the chaotic city and attempted to find the bus station for “Jaco,” a nearby town to Playa Hermosa. Our bus was scheduled to depart in a few minutes and time was running low for us to maneuver our way through the cluttered streets. Somehow, someway we found the randomly placed bus station and clambered on our onto the bus with a few moments to spare. The chaos wasn’t over yet as we found the first two available seats, which were then rudely usurped by a large tica woman. Apparently there is assigned seating on public Costa Rican buses. Who knew! Macey and I shuffled towards the back and promptly sat down with obvious commotion as both of us managed to drop some of our things loudly. It only took a few moments to realize we were the only non-Ticos on the bus. And noticeably so, at that. The bus lurched forward at exactly 1 PM (a gigantic surprise considering that this is Costa Rica). The bus took the same route west as we had taken to Manuel Antonio a few weeks ago, and as we neared the coast, it became unbearably hot and humid. A couple guys were sitting on the floor in the aisle of the bus and everyone was crammed in their seats. I felt like I was on some sort of disorganized airplane.

Me turning myself "black" with the sand

Eventually, Macey and I struck up a conversation with a tico named Daniel who was going to Hermosa to surf. The man sitting near him turned out to be a Peace Corps volunteer named Eric and offered to share a cab with us to Hermosa from the bus stop at Jaco. It was a short drive South along the pacific coast to Playa Hermosa. We were dropped off at a little beachside hostel where Eric was staying. The hostel manager came out to greet us, a relaxed American man with sun-bleached blond hair and no shirt. Welcome to the Playa. He unfortunately had no rooms available for the evening and so Macey and I headed to the ocean. 

With a name translating to a word that means more than “beautiful,” Playa Hermosa is stunning. The dark grey sand was glistening in the afternoon sun. The beach extended for 12 kilometers of exquisite coastline with the clear pacific creating a spectacular view. The culmination of the dark sand, turquoise sea, and rows of palm trees lining the shore was paradise. For how lovely it was, I was shocked so few people were to be seen. Maybe that was part of the charm. A black sand 12 km long beach all to ourselves in Costa Rica. After setting our towels on the scalding dark sand and basking in the glorious sun and frolicking in the warm ocean, we called our new friend Daniel to see if he knew of a place to stay. No luck. Instead, we walked up to a nearby restaurant/bar under a roof thatched with palm branches. Another American man with deep blue eyes offered us a little private room for 10$ each. I’ve never stayed in a hostel before, but it was significantly better than I expected. Our room had some steep, sketchy stairs leading up to an almost attic-like space with creaking wooden floors, a steeply pointed roof, and two beds equipped with sheets. After setting our belongings down, we walked back to the beach and sat on a piece of driftwood, watching the surfers catch the waves as the sun set behind them in a magnificent array of yellows, purples, blues, pinks, oranges, and reds. By this point in the evening, there were copious surfers out in the sparkling water. Hermosa is known as the best surfer destination in the country for experienced surfers. It was clear that was true as we watched the men catch wave after wave and flip over their crests effortlessly. The sunset was just as lovely as those in Manuel Antonio and I took a thousand pictures. As the red sun made its way down toward the horizon, we walked to the “Backyard” restaurant and bar—the main hub of Hermosa and set ourselves up at a table where we could see the sun cast deep golden hues on the palms and dark sand. Hermosa is little more than a few hotels and restaurants that sit right on the shore. 

Surfers

Our hostel room

Back at our hostel, Macey and I attempted to go back to our room and accidentally went to the wrong one. An unnamed tico man tried to warn us in Spanish that we were going to the wrong place but neither of us understood him and just laughed. It was about the fifth time he repeated himself that we got the message and awkwardly walked to our actual room. We sat on our springy beds laughing when suddenly the light flicked off. I immediately go: “So that happened.” That night, we decided to go swimming and clambered down to the beach in the darkness. The sky was perfectly clear and moonless. You could see thousands of bright stars creating a beautiful haze of light on the ocean surface. One of the most beautiful sights I have ever seen. We walked along the crashing waves and as each wave receded, you could see the reflections of the stars glistening on the smooth black sand surface. We tumbled through the waves and floated on our backs staring at the stars above. I didn’t have a care in the world in that moment.

Scarlet Macaw

The next day felt like we were on a vacation. It’s hard to believe that I actually live in this country and go to school here and can just take a 2 hour bus ride to paradise for the weekend. Welcome to one of the best decisions I have ever made. I woke up with the sun streaming in through the uncovered screens of our little attic room and immediately rolled over and went back to sleep. Probably the first time in Costa Rica that I haven’t needed to get up early for class or some sort of excursion. When I did decide to emerge, it was only 9 AM. We put on sunscreen and bathing suits and began walking along the sand. The dark grains were already hot in the morning sun. We migrated to the Backyard for breakfast. Surfers were already out riding the waves. What a life. We set our towels up directly in the baking sun and both ended up drenching ourselves in the playful waves to keep cool. Several pairs of scarlet macaws landed in the nearby trees flanking the beach; their blue, yellow, and bright red feathers shinning in the sun. Iguanas lazily sprawled themselves out on tree branches nearby.

Macey and Me

That afternoon, we decided to try another hostel just for fun. We wandered back to the place we had been dropped off at yesterday, called Brisa del Mar. The manager confirmed that he had a room for us. It was not quite as nice as the last place we stayed, although we did have our own bathroom. And again the beds were made with simply one sheet. I guess that’s just what they do here.

We decided to get smoothies for lunch in an attempt to cool ourselves off from the heat of the day. As luck would have it, we walked up to a beachside bar and immediately were given free smoothies! The afternoon was spent watching scarlet macaws, reading in hammocks, and enjoying the sun. Around 4 PM, an informal surf competition began on the beach. The water was saturated with eager surfers, boogie boarders, and skim boarders ready to ride the waves. Macey found a little dog friend she played with while I watched another glorious sunset paint the sky with a mosaic of colors and reflect bright rays on the clear ocean surface.

Pura Vida

The next morning, we planned on spending the day in Jaco before our bus back to San Jose left at 5 PM. Jaco ended up being a significant let-down and was full of tourists, souvenir shops, and filthy water. The waste water from San Jose and the central valley flows into the estuaries in Jaco and then out into the sea. It made for a disgusting sight watching little children play in the repulsive water. The day was so hot, that we were on a mission to find palm trees to sit under. It felt like we walked for hours through the tico families camping under the trees until we found a place to settle down. We rested for a couple hours before venturing to the bus stop and waiting for our transportation back home. It took us a few hours getting back to San Jose due to traffic, but with what a wonderful weekend we had had, it didn’t matter! We reached San Jose around 9 PM. Not wanting to take a taxi and pay extra money, we decided to simply march our way swiftly through downtown to the bus stop that would take us back to Veritas. We barged through the streets like little birds fleeing from some sort of predator and made it safely back to the bus and called mommy to tell her we would be home for dinner soon. She had a delicious meal prepared for us when we got home. This place spoils me in every way.