Tag: Saga

Yes….. I am here on my own

Messing About On The Rivers of Costa Rica (2014)

If Costa Rica was a person, I would describe them as being  “Comfortable in their own skin”.  This is a country which displays artefacts from 1200 years of cultural history in its National Museum in San José, accessed by walking through a flurry of free-flying butterflies of every imaginable colour.  Not far away, in one of the town’s squares, there is a sculpture on a plinth celebrating the patriots who successfully defended the country in 1857 from annexation by the Texans, who were constantly trying to extend their borders.  Today Costa Rica is the most stable country in Central America, with one of the lowest poverty rates in Latin America, a long history of democracy, and with no standing army.  I learned this from our Tour Manager,  who was also a lecturer in ecology, when I managed to engage him in a conversation about politics while the other travelers were off shopping.

In the Butterfly House at the entrance to the National Museum in San Jose

 

 

 

Costa Rica’s Heroes!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another thing about Costa Rica is their commitment to the environment.  We had plenty of information about this from the Tour Manager, of course, and we learned to tell the difference between a natural forest and a managed forest, where trees had been replanted following eruptions from any of the country’s still-active volcanoes (there are 5 of them).

Costa Rica is certainly one of the most beautiful countries I have visited. It offers the traveler jungles, forest canopies, rivers, and two amazing coasts, the Caribbean and the Pacific, as well as the volcanoes, of course. Its wildlife, which is usually my reason for visiting a country, is magnificent. It is home to over 900 species of birds, including the scarlet macaw, which is actually blue and yellow as well as red and which will screech at intruders (like us) who swing up high into their home in the forest canopy.  More welcoming were the tiny birds of many colours who joined us every day at breakfast to feast on pieces of fruit put out for them by the staff.  There are four species of monkey, of which I saw spider monkeys, capuchins and howler monkeys, who reminded me of angry neighbours shouting at each other in the street. We came across one group trying to defend its territory and a huge battle of the voices had begun.  I would have given them all an asbo.  And then there were the monitor lizards and crocodiles!  It was the first time I have ever come across monitor lizards while wandering around the grounds of a hotel and it was the first time that I have stayed close to a river, just a few hundred yards from my room, which was home to crocodiles, who occasionally came out to bask – and eye us up as a tasty treat, perhaps! In fact, it seemed that you couldn’t drive alongside, cross over or sail on any river that wasn’t bursting with  crocodiles.

Those crocodiles!

 

…. And a Monitor Lizard

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Some of Our Sweet Breakfast Companions

One thing I always do at the start of a holiday is to sign up for all the available trips.  What is the point of visiting a country if you don’t visit the country?  This holiday was certainly action-packed, with walks through the jungle in Manuel Antonio National Park and across walkways suspended in the canopy, ascents up through the canopy in trains and gondolas and, for some brave souls (not me), a zip-wire descent afterwards, then boat trips on some of the country’s rivers. 

The first one, on the Rio Grande de Tarcoles, was a fairly sedate outing.  We sailed up the river in a sizeable boat, eventually visiting a large mangrove forest.  We saw a lot of different species of birds, and I was pleased to have my binoculars with me and to make them work for me.  I’m not the best with bins’ and other people have often moved on to look at something else before I have managed to focus on the first bird.  On this trip, I became aware that there were some very serious birders among us.  We had all been given sheets to keep a record of all the mammals, birds, insects and reptiles we had seen.  The birders, however, were also recording not just species but sub-species in their  serious looking journals. I enjoyed seeing the birds, of course, but was rather disappointed not to see any animals – other than the ubiquitous crocodiles.

When we had moved on to the second part of the holiday, in the centre of the country and close to the Arenal Volcano, two trips were particularly notable for very different reasons.  About ten minutes from our resort was the San Carlos River and, on a day when I had already been on a crocodile hunt and then, by contrast, had an amazing reflexology treatment, we arrived at the river bank by coach in the afternoon.  There were several large dinghies waiting for us and we were issued with lifejackets.  We swept down the river through a series of small rapids and sometimes we got stuck in shallow areas.  There was much banter among the oarsmen when this happened and a jolly atmosphere everywhere.  I was happy to see both birds and howler monkeys, while enjoying the scenery on the riverbank and the eye-catching sculpture of old tree trunks where they had been caught as they washed down the river.  I thought that the birders were missing something as they seemed to spend their time ticking off bird sightings and some began to complain that they were not seeing all the species they had expected to see.

Swirling Down the River (I should have known it wouldn’t end well!)

We were heading for an eco-farm established over 60 years ago by two brothers.  Sadly, the last brother had died only two weeks before at the age of 101.  However, his family had asked that we still visit.  The dinghies arrived one by one at a small pier and everyone climbed out. Mine was the last dinghy to arrive and, as I took my turn, my legs suddenly went from under me, the dinghy shot backwards across the water and I fell in the river up to my chest, taking with me the two men who were trying to help me!  My camera went in too.  We eventually made it out of the river, luckily there were no crocodiles in our vicinity and, dripping with water I climbed the steps to Don Pedro’s house, where there was a welcome cup of coffee and some tasty treats waiting for us.  The family seemed to be touched by our condolences and spoke to us about the work of their farm, most of which I must say went over my head as by now I was very aware that everyone knew what had happened to me and I was concerned about the opacity, or otherwise, of my wet clothing.  It was a relief to get back in the dinghy and climb out safely to get on the coach, where I had to sit on a carrier bag in order to protect the seat. Arriving back at my room, I threw my dirty clothes on the floor and headed for the shower.  To cheer myself up and try to regain some dignity, I dressed in my best outfit, and I had a couple of large pina coladas at the bar.  Some of my fellow travelers told me about saving my camera by burying it in grains of rice and I managed to beg a small amount from the kitchen. And it worked! Not for a couple of days but it was a great relief when it eventually turned on, and I was snapping away again before the end of the holiday.

After that, it might seem rather foolhardy to opt for another river trip but I am nothing if not adventurous when on holiday and so it was that, a couple of days later, I set foot in a rather larger boat to head up a tributary of the San Juan river.  We saw the usual bird, primate and reptilian suspects, although the monsters were, on this occasion, not crocodiles but cayman.  We came to a rather abrupt halt and were told that we had crossed the invisible and rather porous border between Costa Rica and Nicaragua.  We pulled into the river bank and landed, back on Costa Rican soil, where we were directed to a small gap in the border fence and told that we could slip through and photograph ourselves standing quite safely, if illegally, in
Nicaragua.  As I filmed myself stepping back through the gap, I was greeted by our smiling Tour Manager who said, “Welcome to Costa Rica Madam.  You have just entered the country illegally, and I must ask you to accompany me to the police station”. 

Would I ever go back to Costa Rica?  Well, I survived my first viewing of “Frozen” and a hectic three-hour transfer through Miami airport on the way there.  I survived a trek through the heat and humidity of the Manuel Antonio National Park. I survived my river dunking and I survived the inevitable embarrassment when someone decided after all to tell me that, yes, my clothes were almost transparent after my dip. I survived being arrested by our tour manager after my moment of anarchy. These were only a handful of the adventures we had.  More than anything, I survived a holiday soon after finishing 3 weeks of daily radiotherapy, so I felt invincible! Altogether, I saw some amazing sights and some beautiful animals and birds, I learned something about Central America and I laughed a lot. Unlike some of my earlier holidays, I never had to eat alone and I made two special and lasting friendships.  And so, yes, I would go back again, in a heartbeat!

At the Arenal Volcano

 

 

Yes….. I am here on my own

A very special visit – Borneo 2005

I have always had a list of animals that I really wanted to see for myself, in their own habitat.  Since this trip in 2005, I am pleased to say that I have seen quite a lot of them, although there are still a few that I haven’t seen.  I have always had a special place in my heart for Orang-Utans, as usual it’s down to the wonderful David Attenborough and his TV series’ stretching back almost 70 years to the days of Zoo Quest.  I had never thought I would get to see them living free lives in the jungle but, after the success of my trip to New England in 2004, I decided to let my ambitions run wild and decided that my next holiday should be in Borneo.

I arrived in Malaysian Borneo a few days before the “very special visit”, via Dubai airport and Bandar Seri Begawan (the capital of Brunei) airport and in the safe hands of Saga Travel.  I had had a tour of the capital, Kota Kinabalu, including the main mosque, a Chinese temple and the city museum.  I had thrown some pottery, visited a batik factory and explored the lower slopes of Mount Kinabalu, where I saw a huge variety of plants, including many species of orchid.  Some were similar to the orchids we see at home, some were so tiny you could hardly see them and one (and it was visible only from behind tall railings) was worth, so we were told, $10,000. 

I had settled in to an enormous room, which had a large patio with a view of a small stream from which, one day, an large monitor lizard emerged and looked me straight in the eye.  I had also done battle with a cockroach which refused to succumb to being sprayed by deodorant or hairspray but finally fell to my blows with a waste bin.  I had been so horrified that I couldn’t bring myself to pick up the remains and left it in my bathroom while I went for dinner.  Imagine my horror when I returned, to see that it had disappeared.  Had something else even bigger come along to devour it? It was a while before I calmed down and realized that my bed had been turned down and that the person who had done that must have been brave enough to do what I daren’t.  Looking back at my diary, I also seemed to have consumed a very wide range of coctails, with ridiculous names. 

Finally, although everyone had been very friendly when we were out and about, no-one had invited me to join them for dinner at the hotel.  I had learned the year before to be prepared for this and had a supply of books with me so that I would not feel uncomfortable and they came in very useful when I dined alone. This was only my second solo trip and it was, in fact, the last time that I didn’t share all my meals with fellow travellers. I think I got more confident and found it easier to ask “Do you mind if I join you?” It works! People are on holiday are kind, by and large so, if you find would prefer not to dine alone, give it a try.

Anyway, back to the visit…..

On the day of the trip I was up at 4am, ready for my flight to Sandakan.

In the Plane
What a relief! I’d been expecting a tiny plane, which worried me a bit but here I was, sitting in the middle of a half empty cabin of at least a hundred seats. I was on the 7:00am flight from Kota Kinabalu to Sandakan, hoping to fulfill one of my long-held dreams. Around me there was a rustling of paper and foil and a pleasant spicy smell started to emerge as some of the other passengers unpacked their breakfast, and I was rather envious. Of course, a forty-five-minute flight doesn’t come with a meal, just a tiny packet of nuts, so the smell reminded me that I had already eaten most of my breakfast, provided by the hotel, while I was still sitting in the airport at silly o’clock. That is, except for the hard-boiled egg! Why does every hotel, wherever it is in the world, think that a hard-boiled egg is a mandatory component of a packed breakfast or lunch? Mine had gone in the bin, so I was beginning to feel peckish!

The other passengers appeared to be people travelling for work or travelling home, perhaps after a shopping trip to the capital, judging by the bulging bags and parcels they carried with them onto the plane. And, of course, the passengers included my companions for the day, a couple who were staying at the same hotel as me and our guide.

In this half-empty plane, I had taken a window seat. We were flying over some of the densest jungle in the world and I had to see it. The trees couldn’t all have been the same  height, but the canopy looked flat from the plane, like countless heads of broccoli. It undulated up and down hills, a luscious dark green. Then it happened. Of course, I had read about this, I had seen the TV programmes, but it still came as a shock when, suddenly, the trees stopped and were replaced by bare, brown earth. Bare, brown earth punctuated by rows and rows of stubby palm oil plants. And so it went on, mile after mile until we reached Sandakan. There were odd glimpses of forest here and there and I was able to see how different the trees were. Some must have been more than 100ft tall, while others nestled below them, perhaps stunted by the lack of sunlight. This awful destruction was the reason I had come on this holiday and taken the flight.

In the Classroom
Along with my companions from Kinabalu and a local guide, I had arrived at the Sepilok Visitor Centre, where we were shown past the inevitable (if small) gift shop to a room rather like a classroom.

We joined a number of people who must have been waiting for us to arrive.  It was extremely hot and the noisy ceiling fans did little to cool it down.  Around the walls were photographs of some of Sepilok’s residents past and present. We were not allowed to visit the little ones who lived on the premises in case we brought them our germs, and this was why we were sitting in this room waiting to hear about them instead.

We heard the terrible details of how many of the babies were found, often clinging to their  dead mothers and barely alive themselves. And we heard about the work of the rescue centre, its wonderful staff who are surrogate mums, and the many satisfying outcomes when orangs were eventually released back into the forest.

Although we had all tried to avoid sitting too close to each other, I was getting pretty hot in this airless room. I’m sure everyone else was too so it came as a relief when it was announced that it was time to go out into the reserve and, hopefully, see what we had come to see – orangutans swinging through the trees.

In the jungle
It was even hotter as I stood with my video camera on the edge of Sepilok Forest Reserve. But not the dry heat of the room we had left, it was jungle hot and damp. The forest was no longer the flat canopy that I had seen from the air but trees of different species and heights,  trees with enormous wide trunks stretching up as far as I could see, dark green leaves blocking out the sky; some with shorter, spindly trunks, more like the trees we are used to at home with paler leaves. Many had creepers hanging down or tying them to their neighbours. The smell was of the damp earth, as if it never quite dried up after a downpour. In front of us was a wooden platform built around the base of two trees and on it were two small orangs rolling about it in play like a large red hairy sphere that occasionally broke into two and then re-joined. They must have been aware of the men coming towards them carrying buckets of bananas and long sticks of sugar cane because they broke off from their  play and were soon helping themselves to bananas before the men even had a chance to climb onto the platform.

They kept everyone entertained for a time as the two men ruffled the youngsters’ hair and handed them more bananas and sugar cane but suddenly, a movement caught someone’s eye, there was pointing and there were voices saying “Look. Look over there!”  No-one shouted but everyone seemed to have heard and soon we were all looking towards the distance where we could see trees were bending and waving.

The anticipation was growing. This was something that had not been promised but we had all hoped would happen, after all the orangs are free to roam in the forest and whether they choose to visit the food bonanza is up to them. The shaking amongst the treetops got closer and closer and at last we saw a young orangutan swinging towards us until it joined the little ones on the feeding platform and helped itself to sugar cane. And they kept coming, sometimes announcing their arrival by the vibration of a rope snaking between the trees. If they noticed us, they didn’t care. The bananas and sugar cane were all that mattered. Some ate them on the ground, some ate them swinging upside down and hanging by their feet. Some stayed to play on the platform and others took their bounty and disappeared back into the forest. And finally, a fine maturing male with a long, thick red coat and a broad, flat face with those characteristic flanges on his cheeks, moved slowly towards us between the bowing trees. He paused in front of me and lazily performed some acrobatics in one of the trees before moving towards the platform. All the others, acknowledging his presence, moved out of his way and, totally ignoring them, he swung towards the food. He grabbed two long pieces of sugar cane and, holding them between his toes, he disappeared  back into the forest as quickly as he had arrived.

It seemed the right time for us to disappear too. An hour had passed while we stood there and I was noticing  large wet patches appearing on t-shirts everywhere, including mine and sweat was running down many faces. Our guide suggested that we should move on and, reluctantly, I turned to go. Shortly afterwards and without the slightest hint of irony, the four of us were sitting, eating fish and chips, bread and butter, with a cup of tea at the nearby “English Tea Room and Restaurant” (a relic of pre-independence days) and swapping our new memories.