Monte Verde

And on the seventh day (of our stay in Costa Rica) we moved from underneath the Arenal Volcano in La Fortuna to the mountains of Monte Verde in the province of Puntarenas. In the mountains, but we could see the Pacific Ocean clearly from our porch.

This is our room (cottage?) at Senda Monte Verde near the village of Santa Elena. We liked every one of the places where we stayed in Costa Rica and had no complaints, but this was probably our favorite.

On our first full day there, we enjoyed a half-day guided birding trip and on another day a walk in Monte Verde’s National Cloud Forest Reserve. Our knowledgeable guide would happily have made it a full-day hike in the mountains, but we opted for a shorter tour. (Once in a while you just have to act your age.) Instead of more time in the wild, we visited a hummingbird garden –a tourist attraction certainly, but a well-done one.

I’ve already showed in past posts some of the birds and some of the forest that we saw on those tours, but the rest of the birds and beasts in this post were all seen “accidentally” as we walked on the grounds at Monte Verde. Often just going to and from the on-site dining room (where the food was amazing.)

We saw spider monkeys and heard howler monkeys (a lot), but this white-faced capuchin was the only one I got a picture of.

The first picture of the Motmot is from the bird tour, but we also saw this bird several times on our own. There were hundreds of hummingbirds on the grounds here too — again, no pictures, but it was amazing to see them flitting between all the flowers.

These guys, the white-nosed Coatis, were common. We saw them here as well as back in Fortuna. They weren’t a bit afraid of people and would sometimes come up to the outdoor restaurant seating.

I learned that the males are usually solitary while females travel in packs, so I guess this is a picture of the ladies who lunch.

This is the village of Santa Elena, zoomed in from the porch in our cottage. In between our tours, we could have visited the village and I’m a bit sorry we didn’t — it was within walking distance. But the grounds were so lovely and the food was so good right where we were. Especially after those mountain tours! We felt very fortunate to spend three nights at Senda. On our fourth morning, we would be heading back to San Juan and the end of this lovely trip. Thankful for living in the moments and for reliving and remembering them here. Thank you to the hosts of these sharing opportunities:

SATURDAY CRITTERS; NATURE NOTES; THANKFUL THURSDAY; and SKYWATCH FRIDAY