Monteverde and Arenal: Costa Rica is for Birders! Part One

We had been looking forward to traveling with Pete's sister Csilla and her husband Dale. Csilla and Dale are avid birders, so we knew they'd also teach us a lot about birds.

We wasted no time starting to birdwatch in Monteverde, and we were rewarded with seeing a pair of Lessons's Motmots.

Pete was able to get a cool photo of the motmot flying. 

We rented the perfect Airbnb for the four of us. Here Csilla and Dale have settled into the living room rocking chairs with views out to the forest.

Monteverde is in the cloud forest at 1,400 meters elevation. It was misty, cool and windy most of the time. Later Csilla brought a rocker out to the deck. She kept her binoculars around her neck, so she could take a closer look whenever she spotted a bird.

Csilla and Dale had wanted to visit Costa Rica ever since they received Birds of Costa Rica as a wedding gift over 25 years ago. We thought it was a good omen that the Airbnb had a copy of the 'bird bible', and that each couple had brought travel size bird books.

Kristina spent time nesting in a rocker too. She was able to learn about the history of Monteverde by reading other books at the house. 

The house was built by the Mendenhalls, who were part of the original Quaker community that emigrated here from Alabama in the early 1950s. They were a group of pacifists who valued Costa Rica in part because the country had recently abolished their army. The community bought 3,000 acres and named the area Monteverde.

The house is still called Mendenhall even though in 1970 it was purchased by the Lowthers. It was clear the house was built for a large family. We could choose between the four bedrooms, all simply furnished but quite comfortable. 

In 1997 the current owners took half their land, 100 acres of virgin cloud forest, and created the Curi Cancha Wildlife Refuge. They kept their house and 100 acres that had been pastureland and are slowly reforesting it. 

As a memento to the past, the living room still has the old party line phone. In the framed photo to the right we could see the names of the Quakers who first settled in Monteverde. 

Kristina was curious about the paintings throughout the house. Our Airbnb host cleared up the mystery. Bill Kucha and Ron Tomlinson came to Monteverde in the '70s and started an art movement that encouraged others in the community to paint. 

This is a David Lowther on his horse Firefly by Bill Kucha. David let Bill and Ron build a house his property in the '70s, and they made paintings for the Lowthers. 

One morning as we walked down our driveway we saw this horse being exercised. It was similar to the dancing horses we had seen in Nicaragua.

Here's a photo that shows the grounds around the house. There were several ponds for irrigation.

This is the front gate of the property. It says Curi Cancha, the name of their cloud forest refuge.

As we walked up the dirt road toward Curi Cancha Wildlife Refuge we saw birds and butterflies, like this owl butterfly, whose 'eye spots' help deter lizards from eating it.

We also spotted a Black Vulture as we walked. The tree branch shows the many epiphytes and mosses that grow in a cloud forest.



We walked about 200 meters up the road and entered Curi Cancha. There are two other Lowther horses that live up top in the refuge. 

The cloud forest was stunning!

Here Dale, Kristina and Csilla are looking out into the clouds at the Continental Divide.

It was lightly misting all day, and we saw a variety of mushrooms.

There were lots of impressive strangler figs in Curi Cancha. 

The crazy trunk shapes reflect the fact that the trees grow downwards from sprouts that start high up in the host tree.

We could see remnants of the host tree that had been killed by the strangler fig.

It looks like this branch has gotten ahold of Csilla!

As we walked we saw an agouti, and he was not afraid of us.

This Blue-gray Tanager looked like it was building a nest. 

We never got tired of seeing Lesson's Motmots, with their long tails that end in racquettes. 

And we were so excited to see Resplendent Quetzals. Afterwards Dale kept saying, "The Quetzals were AMAZING!" With 64 cm long tails, the males like this one looked incredible when they flew. 

We watched seven Quetzals in an aguacatillo, little avocado tree. Aguacatilla fruits are the Quetzal's favorite food. Their beaks open wide enough to swallow the fruit whole, and later they regurgitate the pit.

After our hike we went for lunch at Stella's, a pleasant coffee house that dates back to the 1950s.

Dale, Kristina and Pete appear to be jumping out of the giant coffee cup.

Stella's has bird feeders with fresh fruit, so we hung out watching the birds. This is a Hoffman's Woodpecker.

The Blue-gray Tanager is such a pretty bird.

Take a look at these ice cream cones. The Monteverde Cheese Factory was started by the Quakers in the 1950s, and at its peak 210 families were supplying milk that was made into all kinds of cheese and really good ice cream. 

We all love good coffee, so another day we went on a Costa Rican coffee tour to learn more. 

We picked Monteverde Coffee after reading that it was a group of a dozen local farms.



This is our coffee guide Sergio. Sergio explained that 27 years ago the Low Impact For Earth (LIFE) Monteverde Coffee growing association was formed by two brothers and a friend. Today LIFE has nine members including the original three. They cultivate fifteen hectares of coffee.

LIFE Monteverde Coffee has relationships with a dozen US colleges, and students come to work and study here. One student had built this bike contraption to chop up sugar cane so it can be eaten by the goats.

The baby goats were so cute! They came running over to eat sugar cane leaves from us.

The pigs were also cute. LIFE uses the pig manure to make methane that they use as their cooking fuel.



Next we toured their organic vegetable garden. Monteverde is windy so they've planted trees as wind blocks around the periphery.

This is Sergio and his grandfather. We were impressed to hear his grandfather is 80 years old and still works on the farm. 

Note that Csilla, Pete and Dale all have binoculars or a camera at the ready because they never knew when an interesting bird might appear. And in fact, during the walk, an Emerald Toucanet would fly overhead. 

These are coffee blossoms. At LIFE Monteverde they grow different types of Arabica coffee, which is a bit more difficult to grow than the more common Robusta. Arabica, however, has more varieties and is generally more complex in its flavor. 

It was warmer at LIFE farm, so we were glad for the shade and wind-blocking trees that had been planted around the coffee fields. The coffee plants on the right were about five years old.



Sergio told us that this beautiful guava tree was at least 80 years old and had been consciously saved by one of the LIFE founders. It was surrounded by coffee plants.



Pete tried out the swing.

These are mostly unripe coffee beans.



Only the red beans are ready for harvest, so the harvest season stretches over four months. Csilla and Kristina had fun picking the fruit.



As we continued our tour we saw a bank of clouds coming over the hill. It reminded us of San Francisco fog.



We took our coffee beans to the drying area. Dale cranked the wheel to separate the husk from the beans.



These are the husks that will be composted. LIFE has a goal to make all the compost it needs for its coffee plants.



Here's a look at coffee beans that have been drying for a week. LIFE specializes in unwashed coffee beans, which they call honey-processed. They believe that the thin outer coating on the bean makes the coffee taste more complex so they some of their beans are dried without washing.



Finally it was time to taste their coffee. We first tried the washed beans, then the honey-processed.



Our favorites were honey-processed medium roast and washed dark roast, so we bought some of each for later. On the left is a device for brewing coffee in the traditional Costa Rican way. 

We went to the Monteverde Cloud Forest and took a night tour. On the tickets was an Orange-kneed Tarantula, which we were able to see with the help of our guide.

This cricket landed on Csilla, so Dale coaxed it onto his glove and we all took a look.



On the night tour our guide showed us some sleeping birds. This is a Sooty-capped Chlorospingus. Somehow it sucks its head into its neck feathers and puffs itself up like a tennis ball when it sleeps.

This is an Orange-bellied Trogon catching some zzz's. Seeing the sleeping birds was the highlight of the night tour.

During the daytime we got to see many different hummingbirds around Monteverde. Here's a Green Violetear.

Here's another look at the Green Violetear. We noticed how much the colors of the feathers appear to change, depending on the light.

In Curi Cancha Wildlife Refuge they put out feeders to attract the hummingbirds. On the left is a female Magenta-throated Woodstar, and on the right is a Green Violetear.

There are 54 different hummingbird species in Costa Rica. This male Magenta-throated Woodstar is only ten centimeters long from beak to tail. We thought it had great form with its tail held high.

This is a Green-crowned Brilliant taking a rest on a branch.



Here are two male Green-crowned Brilliants.

One morning we went to the Hummingbird Cafe by the Monteverde Cloud Forest. We saw eight different species. This is a female Green-crowned Brilliant.

This is a male juvenile Green-crowned Brilliant. Luckily Pete got these great photos so we could identify all the hummingbirds!



The Green Violetear gets its name from its green head and the violet patch over its ears.

Here's a female Purple-throated Mountain-gem. (The name reflects the male coloring.)

We were curious to learn more about bats, so we went to the Bat Jungle.



We learned that bats are just as important as birds, bees and butterflies for controlling insects, dispersing seeds and pollinating fruit. This exhibit shows how large bats' ears are relative to the human body.

Be careful what you whisper when Csilla has her bat ears on!



Bats look cute when they are made out of felt.



The Bat Jungle has about 100 rescued bats that are behind glass. Our guide gave us flashlights so we could see them better.



Bats might not be the cutest creatures, but they are smart and social. We left with a greater appreciation for bats.



Happy day, we went to the Monteverde Cheese Factory for some outstanding ice cream cones! Today's flavors were: sour cream strawberry, fig, soursop and coffee.



We drove from Monteverde to Arenal. Csilla and Dale are sitting outside our Airbnb place watching the birds.



Our Airbnb host put out bananas every morning, and we saw many different types of birds eating. Here are a couple of photos of the Red-legged Honeycreeper.





On the right is a Passerini's Tanager. We loved his striking red rump. On the left is a Clay-colored Thrush, which is the national bird of Costa Rica. The reason a common-looking bird is the national bird is that it's mating song coincides with the traditional time to plant crops. It was said that farmers knew when to plant when the birds would come and sing.



The Airbnb place even had a hot tub, although the water wasn't very hot. It had cool waterfall, though.



We drove around the Arenal Volcano to go birdwatching.



We saw a wake of Black Vultures feeding on a Tayra that had been killed by a car.



We arrived at the Arenal Observatory Lodge and started walking on their trails.



Here Dale, Csilla and Pete are on a short suspension bridge.



It was a bouncy suspension bridge that went over a dry stream bed.



We spotted a Passerini's Tanager.



These two Crested Guans were resting in this tree.



At the frog pond Pete got a great shot of a dragonfly.



There are so many interesting plants in Costa Rica.



The highlight of our hike was spotting a Northern Tamandua Anteater. We watched him climb up the tree with the help of his prehensile tail. Anteaters are normally nocturnal so we were really lucky to see him. His markings made it look like he's wearing a vest.

We saw about 20 Montezuma Oropendolas. First they were eating fruit at this feeding station, and then they were flying in and out of their colony of nests.



Here's another view of the Arenal Volcano. It's a young stratovolcano that first erupted in 1968. The eruption was unexpected and it destroyed the small town of Tabacón.



Since 2010 the volcano is thought to be dormant. There was just a tiny puff of smoke coming out of the top.



Behind the glamorous Csilla and Kristina is Lake Arenal. It's a reservoir with a hydro-electric dam that produces 40% of Costa Rica's electricity.



We are having a great time in Costa Rica!



Our adventure will continue in the next blog.