Lavender Tico House

One of the things I like about houses in Costa Rican villages is that even if the house is small, it is likely to be painted a cheerful color.

The people of Costa Rica are among the happiest people on earth, according to some surveys.  They express their mood in the color of their houses.

This week we are showing photos of the Wadi Rum Desert of Jordan on  our Viva la Voyage travel photo site.  If you saw the movie Lawrence of Arabia, you have seen this territory before.

A surfer, alone with her reflection

Low tide exposes the slope of Tamarindo beach that is so gradual that the water on the beach reflects this lone surfer.  Her refection has the quality of a painting.

Today is Sunday, so we have new photos posted on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site.  This week we are showing photos of the Wadi Rum Desert of Jordan, famous for its connection to Lawrence of Arabia.

Crystal Sands Swimming Pool

This is a view from an upper floor of the Crystal Sands condo looking down to the swimming pool.  This pool is unusual because it is on the opposite side of the building than the beach.  That is probably a benefit for the condos on lower floors that would not want the noise and people from the pool close to their units.  But having the pool next to the ocean is very pleasant for people using the pool.

News/Comment about the U.N.  This week most of the news from the U.N. General Assembly has focused on Syria and Iran, but President Laura Chinchilla of Costa Rica also gave an important speech.  She emphasized the need for there to be enforcement of the World Court's rulings.

Costa Rica several years ago filed a case against Nicaragua in the World Court about a border dispute over some uninhabited islands in a river.  The World Court ordered that both countries leave the islands alone and not do anything while it considered the case.

Nicaragua has violated the World Court Order for years by occupying the territory with its army and dredging the river, which is environmentally damaging.  Costa Rica abolished its army more than 60 years ago, placing reliance on institutions such as the U.N and World Court.  If we are to avoid military solutions, we need to find effective alternatives.  

This week we are showing photos of an old cemetery and ruins of an old Friary on the Hill of Slane, Ireland, on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site.

Young surfer

This boy was obviously and justifiably proud of himself for surfing a wave all the way into shore on Tamrindo beach.

This week we are showing photos of an old cemetery and ruins of an old Friary on the Hill of Slane, Ireland, on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site.

Diria Resort beachfront

This is part of Tamrindo Beach in front of the Diria Resort.  The resorts staff puts the lounge chairs and umbrellas out on the beach each morning and takes them in at night.

All beaches in Costa Rica are public property, so they have a system of bracelets that hotel and condo guests wear to make sure that the only people who use the chairs are people who are staying at the hotel rooms or or condo units that are part of the Diria resort.

The palm trees provide shade for people who prefer to say on the resort's lawn rather than using the lounge chairs on the beach.

This week we are showing photos of an old cemetery and ruins of an old Friary on the Hill of Slane, Ireland, on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site.

Yoga under a Night Club

At the end of the road that I showed yesterday, where the Langosta Road starts in Tamarindo, is this sign pointing the way to a yoga studio.  The yoga studio is located on the second floor of the Centro Commercial Plaza building in the background.

On the third floor, just above the yoga studio, is a night club, called Bar 1.  Its sushi banner is visible in the photo.  Fortunately, the yoga studio and the night club are open at different times, as the music from the night club would not be conducive to people doing yoga.

This week we are showing photos of an old cemetery and ruins of an old Friary on the Hill of Slane, Ireland, on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site.

The Langosta Road

Tamarindo is a small town, even though it is the leading beach resort town in Northwest Costa Rica.  In fact, the Washington Post travel editor recently recommended Tamarindo as the best beach to visit in Costa Rica.

This is the photo of the road that connects the main part of Tamarindo with Langosta, which is the most upscale residential neighborhood.  In Langosta there are million dollar homes, and condos ranging to more than half a million.  Yet the road is still not paved.

There has been discussion for years about paving the road for the final mile through the middle of Tamarindo and to Langosta.  One of these years the government in Santa Cruz will do it.  The problem is that nearly all the residents of Tamarindo are foreigners who can't vote, so the government of course gives a higher priority to the needs of Santa Cruz, where most of the voters live.

Tamarindo generates a lot of tax revenue for the local area, which will hopefully encourage the government to invest in additional infrastructure.  In addition to the tourist economy, Costa Rica a few years ago adopted a "luxury tax" on property.  Homes and condos that are valued above about $250,000 pay a higher rate.  That is fine with me.   Costa Rica is the most prosperous country in Central America, but it needs more public investment in roads and other public improvements.  

Tomorrow I will show a photo of what is at the end of this road in Tamarindo.

This week we are showing photos of an old cemetery and ruins of an old Friary on the Hill of Slane, Ireland, on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site.

Acrobatic Olngo

This olingo has figured out how to climb  down a wire and reach down for a drink from a hummingbird feeder.  Olingos like to eat fruit and drink nectar, so the sugary water in a hummingbird feeder is a treat for the olingo.

The largest of the four species of olingos is the northern olingo.  Their range is from Nicaragua to Panama, with Costa Rica in the middle.  They are typically 15 to 19 inches (37 - 47 cm), plus a tail that is about the length of their body.

This week we are showing photos of an old cemetery and ruins of an old Friary on the Hill of Slane, Ireland, on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site.

Sloth

Most views of sloths are like this one.  A brown ball high in a tree.  It is rare to see a sloth doing anything else because they spend almost their entire lives sleeping in trees.  They are so lazy that some mother sloths will not even climb down a tree to help a one of their children who has fallen from the tree.  It just takes too much energy for them.

They have very little energy because their diet is so poor, consisting of leaves with little nutritional value.

If you enlarge the photo, you might notice a green hue to the fur of the sloth.  That is common, but not natural.  It is created by the entire ecosystem of stuff that lives in their fur.

The best sloth photo I have seen is can be seen at this link.  JM, a very talented photographer and world traveler, experienced a sloth climbing out of the jungle right next to him.

The Costa Rican tourism authorities think that sloths are cute and they feature a cartoon sloth on the advertisements for people to come visit Costa Rica.  Whatever sells.

Today is Sunday, so we have new photos posted on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site.  This week we are showing photos of an old cemetery and the ruins of a Friary on the Hill of Slane, Ireland..

Blue bird

Our guidebook describes Costa Rica as "Nirvana for bird watcher."  We have more species of birds than the USA and Canada combined, and we are the size of West Virginia or Switzerland.

I think this is a blue tanager.  I am not a birder, but I enjoy watching our colorful and plentiful birds.

We have new photos of the colonial architecture of Grenada, Nicaragua posted on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Poison dart frog

One of the benefits of taking a wildlife tour with a local guide is that  they can spot animals that an untrained person would never see.  Also, if there is a poison dart frog, they will pick them up for photographs, assuming that they don't have any cuts on their hands.

We have new photos of the colonial architecture of Grenada, Nicaragua posted on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Giant Green Iguana

You are probably thinking I am color blind because I have called this a green iguana, and it is orange, not green.

The reason is that when green iguanas are in mating season, they turn orange or rust color.  The coloration is especially strong in males, and particularly so in alpha males.  Iguanas will change their coloration months in advance of mating, and the color may linger for months.

We have new photos of the colonial architecture of Grenada, Nicaragua posted on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Howler Monkey

The highlight of our river float trip was a great view of a howler monkey.  Usually trying to photograph howler monkeys presents the problem of shooting up into the treetops with the dark monkeys silhouetted against a light sky.  Nothing could be worse for a photograph.

Fortunately, this howler monkey was part of a group that had come down to some low hanging trees on the side of the river, with only leaves in the background, not the sky.   He was apparently not threatened by our presence in a raft, so he stayed there as we floated past.

We have new photos of the colonial architecture of Grenada, Nicaragua posted on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

It's a Jungle Out There

During the next few days, please join me on a little raft float trip on the Penas Blancas River near Arenal Volcano, several hours inland from Tamarindo.

Some of the river raft trips near Arenal are thrilling white water adventures with rapids.  I took a leisurely float trip so I would have more opportunities to photograph some wildlife.

We have new photos of the colonial architecture of Grenada, Nicaragua posted on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Giant Moth

The last few days I have posted photos of colorful, attractive butterflies, so I will  offset those with this photo of an ugly moth.  This would look like a leaf except for the fact that it is brown while the leaves in the area are green, and it is hanging from a leaf with its tiny legs.

Yesterday was Independence Day in Costa Rica and three other Central American countries.  Spain relinquished its rule over Central America on September 15, 1821, about 6 months after Mexico gained its independence.

It was not until October 13, 1821 that Costa Rica knew it was no longer being ruled by Spain, as that is when a messenger from Guatemala reached the Costa Rican colonial capitol in Cartago with the news of independence.

There was no war of independence, as Spain was willing to give up ruling Central America because it was not making money from the region. Costa Rica formed its own country, splitting from the rest of Central America, in the late 1830's.

We have new photos of the colonial architecture of Grenada, Nicaragua posted on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Monarch Butterfly

I may be prejudiced, but I prefer the classic orange coloration of monarch butterflies to butterflies such as the one I showed yesterday.

We should all strive to be egalitarian in our views of all shades of people, even if we have preferences in butterflies.

Today is Sunday, so we have new photos posted on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site.  This week we are showing photos of the colonial architecture of Grenada, Nicaragua.

Butterfly

There are usually butterflies flittering about the tropical flowers in the gardens around out Langosta condo.

We have new photos of Gibraltar on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

The Moon

Clear Costa Rican skies offer an ideal place for star gazing, or admiring the moon.  This photo of the moon captures the craters, seas, and other features on the moon's surface.  This is a daytime photo of the moon, so there was less contrast between the bright moon and the sky.  That also enabled the shutter speed to be faster, as I took this photo without a tripod, bracing the camera on a patio table.

Remarkably, I took this photo with the same camera and lens as the macro photos of the fern leaf and the orchid flowers that I have shown the last few days.  What a wide range of capability, and it is not even one of our DSLR cameras.  It is a Nikon CoolPix P510, which has a 42X telephoto, and the range of a 24 - 1,000 mm conventional lens.

Today is my wife's birthday, so I am showing this photo as a birthday greeting for Julie.

We have new photos of Gibraltar on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Macro study of a fern leaf

This macro photo of a palm leaf is a good study in depth of field, as the eye is carried from the forground into the background.

Conventional wisdom is to focus on the foreground and sacrifice clarity in the background, rather than having the discordant effect of an out-of-focus foreground.

Tomorrow's photo will be a startling contrast to today's macro photo, as it is decidedly not a macro subject, yet it was taken with the same camera and lens.

We have new photos of Gibraltar on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Fuscia orchid

This concludes my little series of orchid photos.  My timing is a little off.  I probably should have saved this photo for the day after tomorrow, as that will be Julie's birthday, and this would have been a suitable photo to commemorate that occasion.

But yesterday I said I would conclude this orchid series today, so I will keep my commitment to my readers and come up with a different selection for the day after tomorrow.  I think I have another, special photo in my inventory that would be a good choice.

We have new photos of Gibraltar on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Spotted Orchid

Here is another orchid photo, with a very different coloration from the orange orchid I showed yesterday.

I will show one more orchid in this series tomorrow.

We have new photos of Gibraltar on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Orange Orchid

The tropical flowers in Costa Rica are delightful splashes of color in the jungle, such as this orchid.

Our area of Costa Rica along the Northwest Pacific coast has a dry season for half the year, so orchids do not grow wild.  The central valley around San Jose has several botanical gardens that make it very easy to see specimen orchids such as this.

We have new photos of Gibraltar on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Pre-Columbian Jaguar Metate

This is a side view of the 1,500 year old jaguar metate from the Nicoya Peninsula in Costa Rica's Guanacaste province, where Tamarindo is located.

Although this is from the Bowers Museum in Orange County, California, I will in the future show some photos form the pre-Columbian Museum in San Jose, Costa Rica.

Speaking of San Jose, the big news in Costa Rica this weekend is that at the main soccer stadium in San Jose, built just a couple of years ago as a gift of the Chinese, the Costa Rican national team beat the USA to overtake the USA to be in first place for qualifying for the World Cup next year in Brazil.

This was a revenge match because the USA beat Costa Rica earlier this year in a match played in Denver during a blizzard.  Costa Rica protested, unsuccessfully, that the game should have been postponed due to the weather.  Most of the Costa Ricans had probably never seen snow before, and certainly would have been unfamiliar with how to play soccer in snow.  Three teams from North America, Central America and the Caribbean will qualify for the World Cup, and a fourth team could qualify if it wins a playoff with New Zealand.  Surprisingly, the favored Mexican team is in danger of not qualifying.

Today is Sunday, so we have new photos posted on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site.  This week we are showing photos from Gibraltar, a very unusual place.

Pre-Columbian Jaguar Metate

When we are in museums that include Pre-Columbian artifacts, we always look for items from Costa Rica.  This is a remarkable work of art in the Bowers Museum in Orange County, California.  It is a metate in the shape of a jaguar from between 300 and 700 A.D.

This came from our part of Costa Rica, the Nicoya peninsula of Guanacaste province, which is the source of most of the early, pre-Columbian pottery in Costa Rica.

Below is a photo of the information about this piece in the museum.

It always amazes me how ancient people, who must have struggled with basic survival, nevertheless took the time and trouble to be artistic in crafting everyday, practical items, such as a metate.

My wife and I love the Bowers Museum.  It features Asian, Pre-Columbian, and California art.  It has amazing special exhibitions.

We have new photos of the wildlife and people of Tanzania our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Baby iguana

This piece of driftwood on the beach provided a nice perch for a baby iguana.  The vegetation that lines Langosta Beach provides habitat for birds and iguanas.  At night we regularly see a few raccoons, and an occasional coati.

We have new photos of the wildlife and people of Tanzania our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Water wings highlighting a gray day

I may be stretching my days of expanding upon the "pink" theme for the September 1, but as I skimmed through my photos looking for a picture to choose for the "pink" theme, I came across this photo of a solitary parent and child on Playa Langosta.

The child's water wings are the only splash of color on an otherwise cloudy day.

We have new photos of the wildlife and people of Tanzania our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Man walking his dog on the beach

Because I showed a woman surfer yesterday, I thought I would balance things out by showing a photo of a guy walking his dog.  This also continues the "pink" theme from the August 1 Theme Day.

We have new photos of the wildlife and people of Tanzania our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Beginning surfer

I am continuing the pink theme a few more days, although this is a little on the orangish side of pink.  I wonder if someone told her that the tag on her swimsuit was sticking up.  Not me.  I would not notice such things.

I will even things up with a photo posted tomorrow for gender equality.

We have new photos of the wildlife and people of Tanzania our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Surfers heading out to sea

This is another photo I considered posting for the September 1 theme of "pink."

I did not go out and take any new photos trying to find a pink subject.  Instead, I was pleased to find that I already had a fair number of photos from the beach in my computer that had a splash of pink color.

We have new photos of the wildlife and people of Tanzania our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.

Theme Day: Pink

Today's worldwide Daily Photo theme is "Pink."  Yesterday I showed some traffic on Tamarindo's main street, so today for the theme I decided to show some traffic with a splash of pink on one of the surfboards being towed by a bicycle trailer.

Today is Sunday, so we have new photos posted on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site.  This week we are showing photos of Tanzania, including both wildlife and people.

To see how other City Daily Photo bloggers have interpreted the theme of "Pink," please click on this link.