What a difference a few weeks or even days makes… Today most of the world is on lockdown. A month ago I was in a cloud forest for the first time. I look at Uwe’s photos and am filled with wonder.
February 2020
Monteverde in northern Costa Rica is one of the few cloud forests left on the planet. We arrived yesterday, using a bus service to travel from the hot, sunny Pacific coast. Now we’re at a higher (and definitely colder) elevation. Winds from the Caribbean smack into currents from the Pacific. The results are a steady light mist all day.
Or, like this morning, a heavy falling rain. Uwe and I both wear the super-duper, Chinese-made raincoats we bought last year in Borneo for a $1 apiece. We unfold them and discover that these are thin, glorified garbage bags with holes cut out for our arms and heads. I’m glad to have mine – it’s still pouring. Uwe’s bummed. It’s raining so hard that he has to leave his camera equipment in its special backpack. It’s windy here, too! His camera’s way better protected against the weather than we are….
The park guide tells us about primeval forest, secondary growth, the Quaker settlers who came here and founded this nature preserve. We see almost zero wildlife, and that’s because everything is hunkered down against the shitty weather. He points out an orchid the size of my thumbnail as my sneakered feet and my blue jeans grow damper. It. is. cold.
Uwe’s face is glum. His cellphone camera is a poor substitute for the Nikon. I try hard not to think about how little fun he’s having. Then the guide points to a pale slender green object on a leaf. I peer closer in the rain.
It’s a walking stick! I haven’t seen one of these in the wild since I was a kid! I’m suddenly a kid again myself, I’m way beyond excited. “Any biosphere that’s got walking sticks is an intact one for sure!” I exclaim. Oh my god! I stand there and stare at it, wetter by the minute.
Thirty minutes later we’re back at the park entrance’s buildings. The downpour vanishes. Uwe gets out his telefoto lens to capture the 7 varieties of blue, emerald, crimson, orange, purple hummingbirds darting in and out to the feeders on the porch. A white nosed coatimundi scurries under the hummingbird feeders, licking up the sugar water that’s dripped down onto the floorboards.
“A walking stick!” I murmur.
Everybody’s happy.
NOTES: I’m still mad at my spousal unit for not taking a photo of that walking stick with his cell phone! Monteverde orchids and hummingbirds © Jadi Campbell 2020. All photos © Uwe Hartmann. To see more of Uwe’s animal photos and pics from our trips go to viewpics.de.
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Something must have been fixed because I can comment in the reader. Any photos of hummers are fabulous! And these are beautiful. It sounds like a special time despite the rain.
Alison
Thank you for sharing your observations and wonderful photos from Costa Rica. We have friends living there during the winter, then Montauk in the summer. Mary and I will go there someday!
Hi Clint, I just saw this message! You and Mary would love Costa Rica – it was one of the best trips we’ve ever taken! Where are your friends living? They are really lucky. Basically every place we went to in the country is beautiful. I still can’t believe we were there less than a month ago.
See, and my problem is for whatever reason, I can “like” some blog’s posts but not others!
Hi Kim, I’ve had the same problem when I want to interact with other blogs, too. Click to open each individual post and that seems to allow the reader to comment and ‘like’. Glad you were able to do so with this one – in our current stressful times it feels good to look at these hummingbirds!