It was my last morning at GUAYABO LODGE. After packing my bags, I went downstairs to have breakfast and settle my bill with Don Pedro as I still owed the lodge for two dinners. The dinners had been very tasty and healthfully prepared and included three courses - salad or soup, the main course and dessert. As I am vegetarian, the kitchen prepared special dishes for me – e.g. on the 2nd night, they gave me a vegetarian quiche. Don Pedro’s wife, Rossana, has trained the Costa Rican kitchen staff to be able to prepare gourmet European cuisine. I really didn’t know how much they were going to charge for me the dinners, but I caught a glance at the posted menu prices near the office on my 3rd day there - the fixed price for the three course dinner was listed at $17USD - a little steep for the vegetarian meals that I had, but not totally outrageous. As a result of these prices, I had my dinners in the town of Turrialba on my 3rd and 4th night there.

When I approached Don Pedro to pay my bill, I was resigned to the fact that I would have to pay him $34.00 (19,380 colones). Needless to say, I was pleasantly shocked when he told me “For two dinners, that will be $20USD - if you’re paying in colones, $10,000 would be fine.” When I confided in Don Pedro that I thought I would have to pay $17 per dinner, he smiled and said “Normally dinner includes a special meat entree, a chicken dish or a grilled trout and the cost is $17USD but for a vegetarian it is less of course. Our prices are very reasonable considering our meals are of a gourmet quality and not average restaurant fare.” I agreed with Don Pedro that the dinner tariff was indeed very reasonable. I told him, “Now that the issue of my dinner bill was cleared up, I really I have nothing really negative to say about Guayabo Lodge.” He smiled upon hearing this and said “We try as much as possible to be reasonable and fair to our guests.”

Don Pedro Ferreira is an extraordinary gentleman, a man of integrity as well as a very congenial host. He knows how to make his guests feel at ease.

On my last trip to Costa Rica, I had the pleasure of staying at Guayabo Lodge. One of the best eco-lodges/bed and breakfast hotels in Costa Rica, Guayabo Lodge is located near the small village of Santa Cruz about ½ hour from the city of Turrialba and 90 minutes from San José. Surrounded by pastures of a dairy farm, the lodge is perched on the slopes of the Turrialba Volcano about 1500 meters above sea level. Nearby is Guayabo National Monument, Costa Rica’s most important archaeological site.

With 25 guestrooms, Guayabo Lodge is the largest hotel in the Turrialba area. From the outside, the lodge looks a lot smaller than that. All the rooms are simply but tastefully decorated with paintings or watercolor prints from Costa Rica. With views of either the surrounding countryside, pasturelands or of Turrialba Volcano, most of the rooms are relatively large and airy - no two rooms are exactly alike.

The owners, Don Pedro Ferreira and his wife Rossana, are distinguished academicians and educators. They come from totally different backgrounds - Don Pedro, a native of Uruguay, has a PHD in Statistics, while Rossana is Dutch and is a Cultural Anthropologist, having received her doctorate in her native Holland. They met by chance in the late 1980’s while both were professors at nearby CATIE, the Tropical Agricultural Research and Higher Education Center located in nearby Turrialba. During their many years at CATIE, they developed a strong environmental ethos and an appreciation of natural history. After leaving CATIE, they seamlessly have made the transition from educators to small hoteliers. Their environmental ethos is reflected in their hotel management style - they’ve installed solar panels as an alternative energy source, compost waste food, recycle whenever possible and are active in promoting conservation and environmentally friendly practices in the community.

Rosanna has quite a passion for cooking, as evidenced in the tasty haute cuisine meals that are prepared by her staff. She also has quite an aptitude for home décor and design – sprinkled throughout the lodge are the many paintings, arts and crafts that Don Pedro has collected during his many years of travel throughout the Americas and Caribbean. The ambiance at the lodge is indeed quite cheery and tropical. When I was there, they were in the process of expanding the outdoor gardens. In addition, Rossana has plans to enlarge the kitchen to accommodate her hotel guests and visitors as well as opening up a cooking school onsite. What about Don Pedro? I found him to be an especially amiable host, and I enjoyed hearing his many travel stories.

There were rumors circulating that the world’s largest tree frog was recently discovered in the Highlands of Costa Rica. Measuring over 18 inches long and tipping the scales at over 2 pounds, this individual was identified by a foremost biologist as an aberration of the red-eyed tree frog (Agalychnis callidryas) which inhabit the rainforests of Central America. The giant tree frog was sighted living in the bromeliad garden at Hotel Bougainvillea, located in the suburbs of San Jose, Costa Rica’s Capital City. Normally individuals of this species of tree frogs are no more than 2 inches long.

A nocturnal species, these tree frogs are characterized by large bulging eyes that enable them to see in the dark. As with all tree frogs, sticky pads on their toes help these small creatures hang onto slippery leaves and climb trees. During the day, they sleep on bright green leaves which afford them a certain degree of camouflage from potential predators. At night, the red-eyed tree frogs are prolific hunters of the rainforest where they feast on variety of small insects- grasshoppers, flies and moths are their favorite foods. I can imagine that this giant individual at the Bougainvillea gardens has a voracious appetite.

Intrigued by this new discovery, I stayed at Hotel Bougainvillea for 3 nights on my most recent visit to Costa Rica, hoping to catch a glimpse of this giant frog. It wasn’t until my last day there that I happened to stumble upon ‘The Giant’ while strolling through the hotel’s magnificent tropical gardens. The frog was lying quietly among the bromeliads getting ready for his daytime siesta. I affectionately named the frog, Federico as I took several pictures of him before leaving San Jose.

P.S. If you go inside the gift shop at Hotel Bougainvillea, you will find some of Federico’s cousins for sale. They make good pets and are very cuddly!

COSTA RICA here I come. One week from now, I will be returning to Costa Rica, a destination that I have already visited 7 times. Traveling far and wide, I have been very fortunate to explore most of this small mountainous country of only 19,700 square miles. Blessed with an abundance of natural beauty - from the lush tropical rainforests, wild jungles and towering volcanoes of the interior to beaches of every hue and color along both Costa Rica’s famed Pacific Coast and her less traveled (but more exotic) Caribbean Coast - Costa Rica is one of the premier travel destinations for natural history enthusiasts.

I admit that I am sort of traveler who avoids the tourist traps and the most commercialized resort areas. Every time I visit a destination (Costa Rica included), I make an effort to explore some new places-off the beaten track - which haven’t been overrun by the tourist crowd. On three of my trips, I have even rented a car so I could drive around the countryside at my own pace. That in itself is quite a feat considering the terrible condition of the roads of Costa Rica’s rural interior – many of the roads need resurfacing and often deteriorate into a rough-hewn dirt track. Of course, the roads in Costa Rica are world famous for her potholes of various sizes and shapes.

On my upcoming trip to Costa Rica, I will be traveling to three relatively untouristed locales – Turrialba Valley/Guayabo, Orosi Valley and Ostional Beach along Costa Rica’s North Pacific Coast. While these places receive their share of daytrippers and of travelers just passing through, they are still relatively off the beaten track - just the way I like it!

Turrialba and Orosi Valley are located about 90 minutes-2 hours southeast of San Jose. Turrialba is primarily known as the starting point for many of Costa Rica’s popular river rafting expeditions and Guayabo, which is located in Turrialba Valley, is Costa Rica’s largest archaeological site. Guayabo pales in comparison to the world class ruins of the Maya who flourished in Belize, Guatemala and Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula. Towering over the verdant green landscape is Turrialba Volcano.

The quiet village of Ostional is located about 5 miles north of Nosara, a popular beach resort in Costa Rica’s Nicoya Peninsula. The neighboring Ostional Wildlife Refuge is one of the most important nesting sites of the Olive Ridley Turtles

P.S. I will be blogging daily from Costa Rica, March 25-April 10. If you would like to follow my adventure, I suggest that you subscribe to my RSS feed.

COSTA RICA is one of my favorite travel destinations. After an absence of 4 years, I will be returning to COSTA RICA on March 25 for 2-½ weeks - it will be my eighth visit to COSTA RICA, which I have affectionately nicknamed PuraVida Land

I have rarely received any negative reports from any of my customers who I have sent to COSTA RICA. Not too long ago, a customer of mine from Switzerland submitted a critique of his travel arrangements on his November ‘08 trip to Costa Rica. I also asked him to list the highlights of his trip as well.

The customer was a volcano enthusiast and was interested in an itinerary which featured excursions to a variety of volcanoes - with a few minor adjustments, Calypso Island Tour’s Volcano Explorer package was exactly what the doctor ordered as it included excursions to two of the most important volcanoes in Costa Rica - Arenal Volcano and Rincon de La Vieja as well as a four day interval at Ocotal Beach, one of Costa Rica’s better Pacific Coast beaches. Not surprisingly, the customer had a wonderful experience and his satisfaction rating was very high! Here are some excerpts from his critique:

The Costa Rica trip was good to excellent, but actually a bit too easy for us!! (We are used to do a lot of organizing when we are traveling on our own).

Regarding the hotels - You wish that we make some comments about all the individual hotels. That’s not easy because they were all so wonderful. We therefore have only some really minor things hardly worth mentioning.

In San Jose …The Grano de Oro is special indeed, as all guidebooks say. Just the breakfast there is rather for people who are on a diet. The Bougainvillea (in Heredia) is a must because of its splendid garden, despite the fact that the location is not really convenient. They seem to have abandoned their shuttle service into downtown San Jose.

The Arenal Observatory Lodge is definitely a good location, provided the
weather is good, and it’s primarily for people who like to do some hikes on
their own. We walked up to Cerro Chato, a good hike, but only for people
used to do some “work”.

The Hacienda Guachipilin (near Rincon de La Vieja National Park) is a good place as well, just a bit too far away from the park for those without their own vehicle.

The Ocotal Beach Resort is superb. Less so their restaurant, they have too many items on the menu that we would call fancy things, and which were not very filling. Other guests must have felt the same, because the restaurant was virtually empty in the evenings. But the breakfast is excellent there, the terrace is wonderful and so is the wildlife around the hotel!

Highlights? Certainly the Rio Celeste Park, but also the sunsets at Ocotal Resort, the garden of the Bougainvillea hotel and the flight in the little airplane from Liberia to San Jose. And there are two further things which should not be forgotten, despite that they are not part of the original trip: The Jade museum in San Jose and the La Paz Waterfall and Gardens near Poas Volcano

PURA VIDA

I have taken numerous trips to foreign countries over the years. Approximately 90% of the time, I have traveled solo (without any excess baggage) that’s the way I prefer it to be.

There are advantages and disadvantages of traveling solo – the obvious disadvantage is that it can get awfully lonely at times; as a result you’re forced to find ways to entertain yourself and occupy the time. Eating breakfast and dinner all alone is probably the worst, but in time you get used to it. Let’s face it, most people travel with at least one other person (a friend or a love interest); solo travelers are definitely a minority. In my humble opinion, the fear of loneliness is probably the #1 reason, why most people do not travel alone. Besides the companionship factor, sharing certain travel expenses – taxis, ground transportation and dinners - is another advantage of traveling with a friend. If I travel with a friend however, I make it point to get separate rooms. I value my privacy and I don’t mind paying extra money for a single supplement.

However traveling solo has many advantages. The biggest is FREEDOM - you’re free to do what you want, when you want. Sometimes when you’re traveling with a friend, you find yourself always making too many compromises; also some friends can be too demanding and you can end up becoming a babysitter if they are uncomfortable being alone. Call this the excess baggage factor! In addition, traveling on the road with somebody for an extended period of time is fraught with pitfalls - you know the expression, travel brings out the worst in us. I have heard of many friendships and relationships disintegrating during a long vacation.

Another advantage of traveling alone is that you’ll meet a lot more people - both fellow travelers and locals. From my experience, traveling solo forces me to be more outgoing and gregarious than I am at home. When people are on vacation, they tend to be more sociable and receptive to meeting other people as well. Travelers love to share their travel stories and talk about themselves with fellow travelers. Take a man away from his home environment and he’s less territorial - that is the nature of the beast.

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Circa February 1980 I had just spent two weeks in Mexico - this was just the first leg of my travel adventure. From Mexico, I flew to JAMAICA in the Caribbean where I would stay for an additional 6 weeks. I know what you’re thinking – that I went to Jamaica to smoke copious amounts of ganja, grow some dreadlocks and listen to reggae 24/7? Totally untrue as I abhorred marijuana and dreadlocks was a phase I went through during my hippie years at UC Berkeley, however I admit to becoming a real reggae enthusiast after seeing the cult movie “The Harder They Come” in 1974. Professionally speaking, my plan was to become familiar with Jamaica so I could effectively market it as a travel destination.

My travel plans hit a minor bump in the road when Mexicana Airlines notified me that they were discontinuing their direct flight from Mexico City to Kingston. As a result, the airlines rerouted me through Miami. Upon getting off the plane in Kingston Airport, I was immediately greeted by the humid tropical heat that Kingston is famous for. Stepping into a waiting taxi, I could hear the strains of Toots and the Maytals famous song “Funky Kingston” in my head as my taxi driver took me to the Mayfair Hotel located in the hills of New Kingston.

During my 6 weeks in Jamaica, I visited the major tourist resorts on the North Coast - Montego Bay, Negril, Ocho Rios and Port Antonio - and also explored the rugged Cockpit Country, staying mostly in small (cheap) guesthouses and in the homes of Jamaican families. I guess you could say that I really sewed my wild oats as a traveler - I had some good times (and some bad times) as I traveled around the island, but overall it was a very rewarding trip.

It was on the final leg of my itinerary that I had one of my most memorable experiences. I had just returned to Kingston - at my guesthouse, I met a young dreadlocks who did some work for the famous reggae superstar, Bob Marley. I had met Mr. Marley for the first time in San Francisco circa 1975, when Bob Marley and the Wailers were on their inaugural concert tour in America. When the bloke told me that Bob Marley was scheduled to arrive the next day in Jamaica from Zimbabwe (Africa), I asked him to hook me up with Bob. So here I was in the backyard of Bob Marley’s rambling estate on Old Hope Road; he had just arrived that morning and was kicking a soccer ball with his buddies. Bob, acknowledging my presence, says to me in a very thick patois “Welcum to mi yard, Rasta. Jah Rastafari, Haile Selassie I!”

Fast forward to the next day - I was at the Kingston airport, getting ready to board my return flight to the USA when I happened to see poster advertising Reggae Sunsplash, Jamaica’s International Music Festival. Little did I know at the time, but Reggae Sunsplash would play a pivotal role in my career as a travel agent (and as a traveler).

I had my taste of travel on a 3-week adventure to Mexico in January 1974. Back at home, I found myself drifting into a career in travel – not only did I become a travel agent/entrepreneur, I had become a traveler. However another six years elapsed before I commenced my 2nd adventure – it was in February 1980 that I flew to La Paz, the capital of Mexico’s Baja California. From there, I took the bus to Cabo San Lucas, the new ‘chic’ beach resort located at the very tip of the Baja Peninsula. As Cabo was in “its infancy” as a beach resort, there were only a handful of hotels in the resort area. From Cabo, I took the car ferry overnight to Puerto Vallarta. Upon arriving at the ferry terminal in PV the following morning, I caught the bus to my next destination – San Blas, a relatively small obscure beach town that had become a favorite port-of-call with birdwatchers.

Although San Blas was located only 100 miles up the coast from Puerto Vallarta, the journey would take a good 5 hours or so because there was no coastal road at the time. As a result, the route went inland into the mountains thru Tepic, the capital city of Nayarit , where I had to overnight before completing the journey the next day. The ride on the local bus from Tepic to San Blas (a good 40 miles) was a most scenic drive – descending from the mountains to the coast on a very winding switchback road, we passed by lush coconut and banana plantations.

I have some wonderful memories of my first visit to historic San Blas, a sleepy hole-in-the wall surrounded by mangroves and some very lush tropical vegetation. Back in the late 17th century, San Blas used to be an important Spanish stronghold and port city – located on a hill overlooking town are the crumbling ruins of a large Spanish military fort. Except for the jejenes (sea gnats) - which come out en mass sometime before dusk - San Blas was my concept of paradise. The pace was slow, the ambiance special and the tropical setting just heavenly. While I was there, I befriended the head immigration officer in San Blas who took me on a memorable birding expedition in the mountains some distance away from town. As a bonus, my stay coincided with the celebration of the annual Carnival. Next the journey continues to JAMAICA.

If you have ever walked through a tropical rainforest - whether it be in Costa Rica, the Amazon, Southeast Asia or Africa - I’m sure you have come across the Giant. I know what you’re thinking - no, it is not a tropical version of the Bigfoot but the Giant I am referring to is one of the largest and most spectacular trees in the rainforest - the Kapok tree (Ceiba pentandra).

Native to Tropical America, the kapok can reach a height of over 200 feet. Also known as Ceiba among the indigenous people of the Americas, the kapok is considered to be sacred and is often associated with the supernatural. To the Mayans in particular, the kapok was considered to be a very holy tree and has a special place in their mythology. The kapok has many medicinal uses among native people and it is harvested for a variety of purposes – fertilizer, fuel, down filling for mattresses and pillows etc.

One of the highlights of my trip to Peru was encountering a giant kapok tree in the Amazon basin. I took a group photograph of members in my small tour group against this giant to show how enormously wide the buttressed root system is

Speaking of butterflies…while perusing the internet yesterday, I came across this interesting news story how biologists are trying to save one of the largest butterflies in the Western hemisphere from extinction.

ScienceDaily (2007-08-15) — The Homerus swallowtail is the Western Hemisphere’s largest butterfly, but researchers say its numbers are so small that conservation and captive breeding efforts are needed to save the insect, found only in two parts of Jamaica. Full story …..

The story hits home as I have been a frequent visitor to JAMAICA over the years. While I have traveled into the mountains - Blue Mountains and the Cockpit Country - where this rare butterfly currently lives, unfortunately I have never encountered one of these beauties. In my opinion, the establishment of a national park or biological refuge in the Cockpit region as well as private butterfly gardens in Jamaica will go a long way towards ensuring the survival of this swallowtail species