Will you be my Valentine?

Riding on the open air boat from Tortuguero to the Tortuga Lodge

Valentine's Day and the next four nights of our trip were spent in the small town of Tortuguero - a small town in the rainforest near the Caribbean. Tortuguero National Park includes over 20 miles of Caribbean coastline that was set up to protect the green sea turtle nesting habitat as well as nearly 80,000 acres of rainforest along the Tortuguero River that is home to over 375 species of birds, at least 35 documents jaguars, 30 fish species, three types of monkeys (howler, spider and white-faced capuchin), three-toed sloths, caiman, manatees, Basilisk lizard (which can walk on water) and so much more! The area gets nearly 250 inches of rain per year but fortunately for us it was the dry season. This is an El Niño year so it was particularly hot and very very dry! The weather everyday was "hot, hot, hot, hot and more hot" as Theo put it. He begged us to take him back home and said that Duluth summers are as hot as he likes it and he would rather be home sledding (spoken like a true Minnesotan). The rainforest here is constantly threatened by deforestation for agriculture, as well as siltation as a result of the massive banana and pineapple plantations nearby. Historically, illegal poaching of turtle eggs by outside agencies but now that ecotourism is the major source of employment, and with massive international efforts to protect this area, the tortugas are thriving and this place is an incredible place to visit to see diversity and animals in their natural habitat.

The Tortuga lodge was located across the river from the air strip where our tiny 12 passenger plane landed (technically there isn't even an "airport" there). On one side you could walk across the air strip to the pristine Caribbean beach and play in the waves and on the other side was the river and a sunken dock. A private boat from the lodge was there to greet us and take our luggage to the lodge. There are no roads to the airport or lodge; they are only accessible by boat and everything must be brought in by plane or barge. One night, we went out to lunch in the town but the restaurant was out of a number of ingredients, including Coca Cola, as the town was waiting on the weekly barge to bring these items in.

Walking along the beach

Day 1 started with a quick trip back across the Tortuguero River to the thin peninsula where the air strip was to check out the beach. Turtle nesting happens between June and October so we had the beach to ourselves. Despite our attempt to apply SPF 50 everywhere, we all burned to a crisp after only two hours on in the sun (guess the bottle was right when it says it only lasts 80 minutes). From then on, we wore sun shirts and sun hats and tried to hide in the shade!

Every morning at 5A.M., we were greeted by the alpha male howler monkey calling out to warn the other males to stay away from his troop of lady howlers. Next, the family of black and yellow oropendolas yelped as they flew in and out of their hanging nests above the lodge. The toucans and aracaris would yell to each other from the tree tops around the lodge. This was followed by a cacophony of different birds and animals ready to start their day. At 6A.M. and 3P.M. daily, the lodge organized a nature walk with a naturalist and we learned about the vegetation and searched for speckled caiman, poisonous dart frogs, green iguanas and beautiful birds, like anhingas, egrets, blue and green herons, kingfishers, toucans, tanagers, kiskadees, woodpeckers and long-nosed bats. While cooling off in the pool in the afternoon, we enjoyed watching the giant green iguanas basking in the sun and showing off their orange colors to try to attract a mate. We swung in the hammocks reading our books listening to the many sounds of the rainforest (while the kids would play inside out of the sun). Each evening, we would hear the squawking of the endangered great green macaws as they flew over us on their way to feast on large beach almond trees across the river. These were some of the only trees that were not logged in the 1950 and 60s prior to this area becoming a national park due to the fact the trees sink in the river. Since they didn't have any roads, they were unable to transport these beautiful trees to the sawmills and now the local macaw population is flourishing here.

Great green macaws

The first nature tour we did was a night hike. We all wore tall rubber boots as we were told it would help get through the mud as well as protect our legs from the bite of a poisonous snake that are terrestrial and live on the ground (apparently the non-poisonous variety, like boas, live in trees and strangle their prey rather than use poison). The temp was over 80F and the humidity was near 100% and the mosquitoes were hungry! We wore long shirts and pants and covered ourselves in bug spray but within five minutes we were drenched in sweat and had all been bitten! Marit was hungry, tired, hot and despite instructions to be very quiet, she kept crying that she was "itchy" and "too hot"! We took terns carrying her and tried our best not to get upset with her when really we all felt the same way. Theo was uninterested and overheated at first but then enjoyed helping our guide spot lots of spiders, tree frogs and bull frogs, stick bugs, leaf bugs, and sleeping butterflies.

"I'm hot!" "I'm hungry!"

The second tour was of the national park. We work up early to get breakfast and boarded the boat at 7:30A.M. The sun was up and we were exposed with little breeze. As we trolled the river shore looking for birds, monkeys, sloths and caiman, the kids were miserable, hot, hungry and kept asking when it would be over so they could go in the pool. (They were spoiled by the up close and personal experience with the animals at La Paz.) Three hours later we finally returned to the lodge and enjoyed a nice cold Green Tortuga specialty cocktail and two strawberry smoothies before taking a dip in the pool to cool off. The tour was a success in that we saw a troop of howler monkeys (very very high up in the trees) as well as white-face capuchin and spider monkeys climbing from tree to tree in search of fruit. We saw two sloths (also sleeping very high in a tree), a dozen caiman, a few Basilisk "Jesus Christ" lizards that can walk on water, and many birds. The next two days we relaxed by the pool and took hikes in the private reserve by the lodge. We saw more toucans, monkeys, frogs and another sloth! We were pretty proud of how quickly we tuned into our senses to hear their unique sounds and help spot these animals amongst a sea of green in the wild!