Costa Rica our 10th Trip! Fiery Throated Hummingbirds...Resplendent Quetzal
Ahhhhhhhh! That’s how I feel when we arrive at our first lodge in beautiful Costa Rica, again.
This was my tenth trip to lead workshops here and every time that we go to this wonderfully diverse country I like it more than the last time. We unload the van to the sounds of soft rain on the forest leaves and the relaxing and melodious songs of the local bird welcoming committee. Everyone has an hour to get settled in and then we meet for dinner amongst the treetops in the beautiful dining room at Selve Verde lodge. After a great meal with some fresh, local juice we sit down to go over the itinerary for the next 3 days which includes a LOT of bird photography.
During our stay in the Sarapiqui region at this lodge we will visit a nature reserve full of spectacularly colored tanagers and hummingbirds and photograph all of them in beautiful, natural settings. We will also see Chestnut-mandibled Toucans and Collared Aracari’s before you can finish your morning coffee, heck, you can photograph them from the patio while having your morning coffee! And then there is the drive to a private farm where Scarlett and Great Green Macaws fly freely and land close enough to us to use a short zoom lens to photograph them. If you are not too tired from a full day of photography, we can head out in the early evening darkness to locate and photograph some of Costa Rica’s most beautiful and colorful tree frogs. And this is just our first stop on the trip!
We finish breakfast and then we are off to another eco destination for more great photography. The drive is about two and a half hours of beautiful scenery as we rise about 1000 meters more above sea level deeper into the rainforest. We arrive at our next destination, the lovely and hospitable Rancho Naturalista near Turriabla. Here we have a beautiful large deck all to ourselves to do our multi flash set up hummingbird photography. You will be amazed at the sheer number of hummingbirds flying about in and around the feeders on this deck. We will get amazing close up and detailed images of four to five different hummingbird species including the White-necked Jacobin, the Hermit, the Rufous-tailed and the Green-crowned Brilliant. We will set up some local flowers to attract the hummers to for some fantastic looking images. The food here is second to none and we can enjoy a nice wine or cold beer with dinner. If you are so inclined, the owner of the lodge, Lisa Erb, will take you for a horseback ride on the stunning mountain trails right from the back yard. After two nights here we are ready for another great breakfast, some fresh brewed coffee and then it is off to our next destination yet another 1500 meters higher into the rainforest.
One of the nicest things about this Costa Rica photo adventure is that we are never too far from our next destination. Our drive this morning takes about two and a half hours and we then arrive high in the mountains at the incomparable Savegre Hotel. On the way we will look for and hopefully photograph the unbelievably gorgeous male Resplendent Quetzel. This will be our base for the final three days of the workshop. The gardens here are beyond belief and we will see and photograph tanagers, hummingbirds and the comical Acorn Woodpecker. Two of the highlights of this tour come in the next two days. We will visit a special place where we will have up close opportunities to photograph one of the most stunning and vibrantly colored hummingbirds in the country, the Fiery Throated Hummingbird. You have to see this bird transform from dull to brilliant at the slightest turn of the chest into the light, amazing!
We will also hopefully see and photograph the rare and endemic Volcano hummingbird, what a little beauty, especially the male. All of this and a few more exotic tanagers and toucans and you have a trip that is beyond spectacular.
The people, the food and the accommodations in Costa Rica are all just wonderful. I think that my wife Jennifer and I will be spending a lot of time in this country in our retirement stage of life.
Be sure to reserve your spaces early for next year’s photo tour to Costa Rica as this one fills up quickly! By David Hemmings
