Read an interesting article in La Nación today (from the February 13th issue) in which bird experts are reporting seeing species of birds in the Rincón de la Vieja National Park that had before only been seen in other areas of the country.  Bird experts, or ornithologists, stated that reasons for the new sightings could be due to various factors such as air currents, climate, deforestation, and inadequate food supplies.  However, another, and perhaps more plausible, reason given is that there hasn’t been a thorough accounting of the birds in this area for a long time.  A recent counting cites 204 species.  Another counting is scheduled for next April.  The recent counting, which was conducted in September of 2009, found species not known to Rincón, but only common to the Central Valley, Caribbean and other areas.  However, this is based on reports such as the Guía de Aves de Costa Rica by Alexander Skutch, which is dated by some twenty years.  José Batalla, of the Hacienda Guachipelin, a hotel near the park, stated that findings of wider diversity in the birds of the region could be good for tourism.  He stated that while most of the tourism in the area is adventure related, findings such as this could attract more birding enthusiasts, which other areas of the country count as strong tourism draws. 

Link to Article in La Nación

Well now that I have utilized the new and greatly anticipated “carretera Caldera” that extends from Escazu to Esparza (where it connects with the Pan American Highway), I do have an opinion on the matter.  I have heard the criticisms about the fact that the road is only two lanes in some areas, that there has been some environmental damage and that residents in communities along the highway have been negatively affected in various ways.  But I guess with a project this big, there is always going to be some controversy, i.e., someone’s ox will get gored.  I am sure that some of the criticism is valid and deserved.  However, on the whole, my opinion is that this highway is the best thing that has happened in this country for a long time, at least as long as I have been here, even better than passage of the T.L.C., whose anticipated positive effects may take as long to be realized as the highway did to construct.  In short, the new highway cuts drive time by about an hour to points along the entire Pacific Coast.  I made a trip to Monteverde using the new highway to get from San Jose to Esparza and then the Pan American to the point where you exit to go up the mountain in a little over TWO HOURS!  That is nothing short of amazing.  Moreover, I used far less gas than I would have before and the trip was far less stressful, both to my car and to my nervous system.  This highway is a godsend for people who want to travel within Costa Rica and that includes just about everyone.  I anticipate it will be good for foreign investment and real estate values (I read recently that Atenas is already gearing up for it) and it will be good for tourism.  One of the most oft-heard complaints from tourists is the difficulty in getting from Point A to Point B in Costa Rica.  Well, this new highway, while not perfect, is a major stride towards fixing that issue.  The times I have used it, which have been both during the week and on the weekend, my average speed was around 80 kph, or more, versus the less than 50 average one would experience crossing the mountains either via San Ramon or the dreaded (though picturesque) Monte de Aguacate route.  The new highway should also relieve some of the congestion from those old routes as the many trailers will opt to take the new highway..and they were the principal source of the problem on those more mountainous routes.  I was highly skeptical of all the talk over the last decade of how great this new highway would be, primarily for Jaco.  However, now I am convinced and the benefits will extend far greater than Jaco, which as of late has gone from being Costa Rica’s most popular beach town to Cost Rica’s biggest eyesore.  My hats off to the Arias administration for getting the job done.  Thirty-two years was a long time in the making, but better late than never.  Okay Laura, let’s see some more of that over the next four years!  But start with a pocket full of ”monedas” for the many tolls on the road (5 in all) and gas up, because you won’t see any gas stations along this route, probably for a while.

I have made the trip through the mouth of the Sierpe River into Costa Rica’s Southern Pacific open waters a couple times and it can be a harrowing and gut-churning experience.  But for a few sailors who recently made the same journey, it turned out to be much more than that.  These seasones sailors and their captain, Cesar Augusto Franco, had no trouble getting out into open water…no, that was the easy part….but what happened later is the stuff of nautical notoriety.  They set sail from Sierpe down the winding river to the point where it dumps, sometimes with much fanfare, into the mighty Pacific.  Their plan was to sport fish in the area between the Southern Coastal shore and Isla del Caño, a popular attraction for the many adventurous tourists who want to know what the real and wild Southern Pacific of Costa Rica is like.  Their vessel was a twenty-footer christened, aptly, Tornado, because what they encountered on Saturday, February 6, 2010 had the force of a twister.  It was what sailors call a Rogue Wave.  One large enough to easily capsize their tiny vessel and send the four into the ocean with only a few coolers strung together and the faith and encouraging words of captain Cesar to keep them alive.  Two did not make it, but after some 58 hours drifting at sea a National Geographic expedition boat picked up the two survivors, Captain Cesar and his son, Henry, and carried them to safety where they received treatment for extreme sunburn and dehydration.  The two fallen sailors were Santos Benigno Espinoza Cerdas and Daniel Francisco Villalobos Valverde (whose current status is “disappeared”).  While floating at sea Captain Cesar repeatedly admonished his desperate fellow sailors to be calm and have faith in God and each other.   Their ordeal at sea proves an obvious point and that is that the ocean is to be admired, enjoyed and, most of all, respected.

Link to  Article in La Nacion

You may have heard by now that the answer to the question posed by the previous post was a resounding YES, as Laura Chinchilla was handed a landslide victory in yesterday’s presidential election.  She thus becomes the first “President-A” is the country’s history.  Of course the paper has been full of election coverage over the last month or more.  One story that really touched me was that of Chepito, Costa Rica’s oldest registered voter.  Chepito’s real name is Jose Delgado Corrales.  He is 109 years old.  Not only did the story say he was the oldest voter, but also the oldest election day volunteer.  Chepito lives in the Hogar de Ancianos (or as we would say in the U.S., “nursing” or “rest” home) in the Santa Ana section of San Jose.  He has been living there since its founding in 1995.  He is considered a virtual “icon” of the home and is loved by all.  Chepito is described by others as a “man of few words.”  He stands at a mere 1.5 meters in height (or about 4-foot, 8-inches).  The article in La Nacion stated that he loves to dance, draw and enjoys very good  health.  He will reach the age of 110 on March 10, 2010.  The story of Chepito shows just how much most freedom loving ticos cherish their right to express that liberty at the ballot box.  Chepito may not cut too long a shadow, but his love of life and tico pride speaks volumes. 

Link to Article in La Nacion

The answer to that may just be yes, as the latest Unimar poll data shows that Laura Chinchilla, the PLN (or Liberacionista) candidate is showing a strong lead over her closest competitors in the days leading to the election on February 7th, this Sunday.  To be declared the winner, Chinchilla would need to muster at least 40% of Sunday’s popular vote, otherwise there will be a second round of voting.  This is a constitutional requirement in Costa Rica.  Right now Chinchilla stands at 42%, with Guevara at 23% and Solis at 20%.  Chinchilla is the PLN candidate and has the full support of popular Presidente, Oscar Arias.  Arias has been busy lately cutting the ribbons to inaugurate the many completed infrastructure projects in the waning days of his administration…showing off a little just how successful his term has been in helping Costa Rica progress towards “developed nation” status.  Who do I support?  Well I am not allowed, as a non-citizen, to express support for any one, but I can at least inform readers of this blog the differences between the three top candidates.  Let’s start with Otton Solis, the PAC (Citizen’s Action) candidate.  Solis actually started his political career in Arias’ first administration back in 1986.  But the two just didn’t get along that well.  Solis has always been the anti-corruption champion, as well as a supporter of agriculture, unions and the environment.  His wife, Shirley Sanchez, is an important environmental lawyer.  He almost defeated Arias in 2006, losing by just a few thousand votes.  His major cause was heading the opposition against passage of the TLC, or trade agreement with the U.S.  I believe that gives you in a nutshell enough background to understand where Solis is coming from.  Guevara is the candidate of the Movement Libertario.  He once was a staunch advocate of the legalization of drugs, saying that money spent fighting the battle against them was a tremendous waste of government largess.  He has now changed his tune, saying that he has left such radical views behind him.  Ironically and perhaps a bit inconsistent with past views is his major platform for election in 2010, which is in being the candidate who will end “delinquencia,” or the rising crime rate that has all law abiding residents alarmed.  Would he be able to do so?  Well crime starts in the head, heart and home, which are all areas where we don’t generally like for government to intrude. In fact, a Libertarian candidate who claims to be “tough on crime,” would seem a bit of an oxymoron, would it not? Finally we have Laura Chinchilla, who like Arias, is a centrist candidate with positions that are strikingly similar in political ideology to a Barack Obama.  With her election surely the country can expect four more years of the same….but is that necessarily a bad thing?  No one can deny, honestly, that Costa Rica has enjoyed tremendous infrastructure improvement in the last four years and despite a world-wide economic crisis, things didn’t get too bad here as compared with many other places in Latin American and the rest of the world.  The question is, are the Costa Ricans, a Latin American population that certainly has not escaped stereotypical machismo, really ready to elect a woman?  Well, we will find out in just a few days, now won’t we.

Link to Article in La Nacion

1500 meters is all that’s left to complete the Costanera Sur, the coastal highway that was begun in 1962 and that stretches from Puntarenas to Palmar Norte, a distance of 280 kilometers.  It is Costa Rica’s only legitimate coastal highway.  The most troubling spot has been the stretch from Quepos to Baru.  A stretch of 42 kilometers that has remained unpaved for decades….until now.  I can remember the days of having to actually cross “bridgeless” rivers in order to arrive to Dominical.  Back then that short 42 kilometer (or 26 mile) trip could take you two hours or more.  Well, it is almost completed and will be the final missing link to complete the full breadth of the Costanera.  The only thing left is the bridge over the Rio Perla and a little 1500 meter segment that the government is having problems appropriating sufficient land to complete.  That’s because foreigners have been buying up land in the area in anticipation of the road being completed and thus most are absent landowners that the Costa Rican government is having a hard time bargaining with.  However, officials with MOPT (Costa Rica’s Agency for Public Works) assures that this final segment will be completed this year, around April to be exact, missing the previous deadline of December 2009 by four months.  That’s not bad since we all have been waiting 48 years for the Costanera to be a done deal.  Travel in Costa Rica just keeps getting better thanks to Oscar Arias, who by the way will inaugurate eight new bridges, as well as the Costanera itself, this week, in the closing moments of his administration.  Hopefully the solid progress in Costa Rican infrastructure will continue with the next administration.

Link to Article in La Nacion

I can remember hearing about this new “superhighway” from San Jose to Puntarenas from the very first time I set foot on Costa Rican soil.  Well the ticos have been hearing the same thing for the last 32 years.  It is not surprising that in the last few years folks grew a bit skeptical about the whole thing.  Well now all that is history because the road is completed AND, believe it or not, five months ahead of the scheduled June 2010 deadline.  While it may not be quite the caliber of the Florida Turnpike, the new highway will be pretty super compared to most now receiving traffic in Costa Rica.  So super in fact that the government has stuck its neck out and ”guaranteed” 45 minutes savings on the drive time between San Jose and Caldera. It should also cut the drive time to Jaco and beaches further south along the Costanera by an equal amount.  The average speed is estimated to be between 80 and 100 kph…and that is traveling pretty fast when it comes to Costa Rican roads (the old route had an average speed of around 30 kph).  All this comes at a pretty steep cost, about $250,000 million to be exact.  To recoup that there will be five tolls that will cost the typical car (a so-called “vehiculo liviano”) just under $3.50 using today’s exchange rate.  But one thing’s for sure, the drive to Jaco will be a lot safer than the old Monte de Aguacate route with its narrow lanes, hairpin turns and stomach churning precipices.  Probably won’t be nearly as scenic though…of course, gawking at the “scenery” is what almost got me killed several times traversing that old stretch of road.

Link to Article in La Nacion

Link to Diagram of Route

To understand the rich history of Costa Rica, one needs to know a little about the development of the railway system, mainly obsolete today, but in its time ushered in both prosperity and hardship.  A new book entitled El Correo Ferroviario de Costa Rica, by educator and philatelist Alvaro Castro-Harrigan, chronicles the advent of the railway as a means of mail transportation.  In 1857, the only way folks could expect to receive mail to make it from tiny pueblo to others parts of the country was via horse, burro or by foot, a process that could take months, if it ever arrived at all.  But in 1871 Minor Keith decided to change all that by obtaining the contract to build a railway from Alejuela to Limon, which was completed in 1890.  In 1897 work began to extend the railway to the Pacific Ocean and approximately 100 years ago in July of 1910 that work was completed to give Costa Rica a coast to coast railway system.  The advent of the railway as the major mode of commercial transportation ushered in a boom in the banana plantations and imperialist aspirations of the United Fruit Company.  The recent administrations of both Pacheco and Arias have sought to revive some of that old-time magic by restoring sections of the old railway.  Folks can now catch a free train ride from central San Jose to Heredia or Pavas.  There is also a tourist attraction ride that will take you from San Jose to Puntarenas.  But these days the railway is more of a novelty than a central part of Costa Rican life as it once was.  The book by Castro-Harrigan brings a little of that history back to life.

Link to Article in La Nacion

Much is written about Costa Rica’s biodiversity of plants and animals.  One of the primary examples is the variety of orchid species one can find in the county.  The orchid is the largest family of flowering plants with as many as 25,000 different species.  In Costa Rica 1,500 of those can be found.  Well that list continues to increase as botanists from the University of Costa Rica have recently discovered three new species in Parque Nacional Tapanti located in Paraiso de Cartago.  The species were found at high altitudes (2,500 meters or more) and are of the family Lepanthes, which contain miniature orchid varieties.  The first is the Lepanthes graciosa with translucent yellowish petals.  The second is the Lepanthes machogaffensis, which has a reddish flower that blooms throughout the year, but only for periods lasting three day.  The third is the Lepanthes pelvis, which has the largest flower of the three and which the scientists described as having no similar apparent relative except in the high Andes mountains of South America.

Link to Article in La Nacion

Since the 1800’s the Costa Rican boyero has come to represent the hard work, patience and love of nature that exemplifies the tico life.  While originally used to bring coffee down from steep mountain roads to the port for shipment to North America and Europe, these days the old-fashioned boyero with his ornamentaly painted “carreta” and prized “bueyes” is more of a Costa Rican novelty of history than a real functional part of everyday life.  Well, actually that’s not the case for everyone.  There are still a few real life boyeros (around 5,000 according to La Nacion estimate) out there and they are determined to keep the tradition alive, a tradition that for them has stood the test of time and technology and has been declared since 2005 as “Patrimonio de la Humanidad” according to Unesco (United Nations Organization for Education, Science and Culture).  The oldest active factory that still produces and paints the carretas (or, oxcarts) is the Chaverri Oxcart Factory located in Sarchi.  Founded in 1903 this factory has become a main tourist attraction for day trips from San Jose and is a place where you can buy a little piece of Costa Rican culture and history in the form of a miniature painted oxcart (however, the real ones are crafted there as well).  Just in case you wanted to know a little more about this time honored tradition, click on the link below to find a full colored graphic that explains in detail (and in Spanish), everything you ever would like to know about the Costa Rican Boyero.

Link to Recent Article in Proa Section of La Nacion (click ELEMENTOS RELACIONADOS for Boyero Graphic .pdf)