Palo Verde

After a 4-hour bus ride from San Jose, we arrived at Palo Verde National Park yesterday just before noon.  We unpacked the bus and moved into our dorms, bunk rooms with room for 4-6 people each.  The weather here is incredible - dry, sunny and warm with an almost constant breeze.  Lunch is served each day from 12-1, so Madeline took the time between lunch and our afternoon walk to go for a run down the road, where apparently she saw an ocelot!! 

In the afternoon we went for a hike around some of the trails in the park and saw our first troop of monkeys! They were white-faced Capuchin, in a troop of 15 or so, with a few babies.  Further along we also saw a coatimundi, an agouti, and a million kinds of birds and bugs...and we heard howler monkeys, but didn't see them.  Right in front of the field station there's a huge wetland (the floodplain of the Tempisque River) that's protected as part of the national park.  At the end of our hike Ryan showed us a boardwalk that goes out into the wetland and a tower that we can climb to look out over it, both of which gave us some amazing views of the birds that live there.  Finally, near sunset we hiked a trail that leads up to a ridge a little ways from the field station to a place called "La Roca" (yup, it means "the rock").  The trail basically ends at a huge rock outcropping high above the wetland with the most incredible views.  I can think of few other places I've been where you can look as far as you can in every direction and not see a single sign of civilization - it's incredible.  It felt almost like we were in a movie, watching the wind move over the wetland grasses with egrets flying in pairs over the river.  It was such an incredible spot that a few of us decided to come this morning to see the sunrise.  This involved waking up at 5:20 am, searching for our clothes and hiking boots with our headlamps while hoping not to run into any scorpions, and hiking/running back up the trail in the early morning light.  It was more than worth it...the pictures don't come close to doing it justice.  While the rest of the group walked back towards the field station for breakfast (which starts at 6:30!!) I went for a short run down the road that leads into the field station, obviously hoping to come across a jungle cat, but instead saw another group of capuchin monkeys and some pretty cool birds.  I made it back just in time for breakfast, which included rice and beans (obviously) and SO MUCH delicious fruit.

That's all for now!

-Madi