In
Colorful Costa Rica, Life Never
Seems Black and White
By Chris Welsch, STAR TRIBUNE
(MINNEAPOLIS)
ARENAL NATIONAL PARK, Costa Rica
-- A crown of streaming clouds
flowed off the cone of Costa
Rica's Arenal volcano. A sound
like thunder shook the air.
Standing in a lava field about 2
miles from the mountainside, I
watched boulders the size of
sport-utility vehicles fly out
of the clouds and tumble down
the gray and black slope.
Oddly, the volcano's audience
treated the spectacle with
casual curiosity. A dozen Dutch
and German tourists sat or
leaned on black pumice boulders,
chatting while they watched the
geological show with binoculars.
"Doesn't this make you a little
nervous?" I asked my guide,
Alexander Araya.
"A little. See that lake?" he
pointed to a body of water a
couple of miles behind us. "The
old town of Arenal is under
there. It was destroyed when the
volcano blew up in 1968. This
thing has been active every day
since. It can throw a boulder 5
or 6 kilometers" -- more than 3
miles.
During a four-day excursion
across Costa Rica's interior, I
often had the feeling that I was
watching a movie laden with
special effects: the saturated
colors of the equatorial
tropics, the exploding volcano,
the cloud forest, a flock of
iridescent hummingbirds. All
seemed too extravagant to be
true.
At the juncture between North
and South America and between
the Pacific Ocean and Caribbean
Sea, Costa Rica compresses an
intense amount of geography and
wildlife into a very small
country (about the size of West
Virginia).
The character of the people who
live amid all these phenomena is
interestingly relaxed.
That tendency seems
representative of an
affectionate and nonviolent
outlook on life.
Araya proudly told me that the
country hasn't had a standing
army since 1948, and that the
money is better spent on
schools.
"Tourism is the No. 1 industry,"
Araya said, "but high-tech is
No. 2. And that's because
everyone here can get an
education."
The people -- who call
themselves Ticos -- are
nonviolent, but the landscape
isn't. More than 100 volcanoes
exist in Costa Rica, and at
least five are active. Arenal,
reliably rumbly, has become a
hub of tourism.
We spent a morning hiking in
Arenal National Park, a
rain-forest preserve at the base
of the volcano. There, stark
evidence of the Earth's
potential for destruction was
brightened by its wonders of
creation: Orchids sprouted from
crevices in lava, from trees,
from the damp forest floor. An
orchestra of insects, frogs and
birds made the air vibrate.
The next day, Araya and I spent
several hours hiking in the
mountain town of Monteverde's
main attraction: the Monteverde
Cloud Forest Reserve.
At 4,000 to 5,000 feet high and
straddling the country's
continental divide, the reserve
shelters more than 3,000 kinds
of plants, 500 bird species and
120 mammals.
For bird-watchers, the ultimate
aim is to spot the rare
resplendent quetzal, a
spectrum-defying bird with a
3-foot train of luminous
feathers that might make a
peacock jealous.
We hiked for miles. At times,
the trail disappeared in thick
fog. The moss-covered trees
dripped. When the clouds parted
momentarily, I could see we were
walking along a ridge, with deep
valleys on either side of the
path.
Every available surface
supported life. In the cups of
pineapple-topped bromeliads,
poison-dart frogs sang. Along
the trail, leaf-cutter ants
carried their harvest to the
colony. Araya shined his
flashlight in a hole to
illuminate a tarantula, as broad
as my palm, lying in wait for a
meal.
Periodically, Araya blew a short
double whistle, hoping to hear
the "wikka-wikka" call of the
quetzal in response.
"When people see it, they cry,"
he said. "There is something
about them, a special energy.
When one flies by, it's like the
colors stay in the air behind
it. I can see why the Maya
thought it was a god."
Finally, a bird returned Araya's
call. He set up his spotting
scope and in short order
identified a female, not quite
as resplendent as her male
counterpart, sitting quietly in
a tree about 150 feet from the
trail.
Through the scope, I saw a bird
about the size of a crow, but
radiating colors -- iridescent
green and gold across the back,
a glimmer of red near the tail,
and checkered black-and-white
tail feathers. It was like a
living, breathing fragment of
rainbow.
A minute later, the quetzal flew
away, vanishing into the clouds. |
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