Rancho Naturalista

We arrived at Rancho Naturalista around noon on our third full day in Costa Rica. We would stay two nights.  Rachel and I were both singles so we lucked out and got great rooms in the main lodge.  We each had a large glass door that opened onto a second-floor balcony where everyone gathered for coffee and hummingbirds. 

We were the only ones with WiFi in our rooms because we were in the main lodge, not in distant cabins. 

Meals were not from a menu or a buffet.  We were served what they had to offer, and sometimes we dished our plates family style from the center of the table. This was my first lunch at this wonderful resort.

After lunch I photographed near the lodge.  The Yellow-faced Grassquit looks a bit like a sparrow, but it is a tanager.  Seems many of the birds in Costa Rica are tanagers.

It was easy to photograph White-necked Jacobin hummingbirds from the balcony just outside my room.

Down in the yard just outside the open-air dining room, I photographed more birds, flowers, and mammals:

 

 

 

 

We met a guide who works for the lodge and took a short walk partway down the long entrance road.

We soon saw a Rufous Motmot along a short side road.

In a clearing on the edge of a drop-off with a beautiful view was the lodge owners’ house, or maybe one of their houses.

There I got my first good looks at Montezuma Oropendola, an oriole on steroids. 

We also found several Gray-headed Chachalaca.

There were several species of hummingbirds working the flowers and shrubs that seemed to grow wild along the edge of the drop-off:

The Violet-headed Hummingbird.

The Stripe-throated Hermit hummingbird.

But my favorite was the tiny Snowcap hummingbird.

All the meals at Rancho Naturalista were excellent.  It is a wonderful lodge.

I woke at 2:40 a.m. and took a one-minute long exposure of the scene from the balcony just outside my glass doors.

I photographed near the lodge before breakfast:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I had been sending Jann many photos each day, and she asked for a photo of our good friends Martha and Stephen.  They obliged and posed for a photo before our morning adventure.

Near the lodge was a Great Kiskadee.

We again walked down the road to the yard of the owners’ house.

I photographed a Clay-colored Thrush and a Violet-headed Hummingbird.

We did not linger because our goal for the morning was to find some Sunbittern in a river along the main road far below.  We walked farther to a second, larger house that I believe is also owned by the same people who own the lodge. I took photos as we walked.

 

 

 

This is a photo from the side yard of the house.

There was a Cinnamon Becard in the yard.

And a Great Kiskadee.

Then I spotted one of my favorite birds from Brazil and Costa Rica, a beautiful tiny Common Tody-flycatcher. 

The Common Tody-Flycatcher builds its nest typically suspended from a branch or vine.  Both male and female birds participate in the construction, which can take over a month.  Here they are working on their nest.

While others were resting in the shade, I spent some time trying to get action photos near the nest.

The bus arrived and we headed down the road.  Although we had crossed a bridge on the way up and would cross it again twice, Gil was concerned about its strength so we got out and walked across. The next morning it would carry us and our luggage, but we crossed it fully loaded without a problem.

Once down on the main road we stopped at a side road that had a bridge jammed with photographers with long lenses.  I struggled but managed to squeeze in between their tripods.  Although I brought a lightweight tripod to Costa Rica, I was shooting handheld. I got a few photos looking far upstream at a Sunbittern that had a small piece of food.

But the real find was a bit downstream where we observed a tiny juvenile Sunbittern without other photographers nearby.

The parent searched up and down the stream for food.

It finally found something to feed its chick.

Here is a sequence of the juvenile Sunbittern getting fed.

Although the Sunbittern is a rather plain bird when standing, it is spectacular when in flight.  Here are two photos of Sunbittern taken in Brazil.

When we returned to Rancho Naturalista for lunch there was an amazing line of leafcutter ants working their way up the front walk. Jann and I really enjoyed these industrious insects on our previous trip to Costa Rica in 1992, and she was anxious to see photos of them which I dutifully sent.

Shortly before lunch I took a few photos from just outside my room.

 

 

 

 

After lunch our guide took us up hill to some forest and fields above the lodge. We saw few birds, and I did not get any decent photos of the distant ones we saw.  I did get photos of a Variegated Squirrel.

And a few insects.

 

We also spotted a bird nest near a wasp nest.  Perhaps a symbiotic relationship.  

We got some rain and found a small shelter to wait it out.  I took this photo on the way down after the rain.

Back at the lodge I took a few photos of White-necked Jacobin hummingbirds before dinner.

The next morning, our last at Rancho Naturalista, I took this photo from the porch.

It was over an hour before breakfast so I wandered downhill to the nice lookout taking photos as I went and when I got there. 

It seemed to be too early for hummingbirds, but I did get some Montezuma Oropendola.

Back at the lodge I photographed a few more birds and a butterfly.

 

 

 

 

Our bus/van had a slight problem, but it got solved.  We had another wonderful breakfast, and we were on our way up to almost 12,000 ft.