2024 St Edward Costa Rica Conservation Expedition

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Blog 8: Bittersweet

By: Connor S.

Today was a little sad… it felt like our amazing experience was coming to an end. We started off our day at 6:00 with the classic beans and rice, with eggs and pancakes as well. After finishing breakfast, we loaded our bags on the bus and drove out to go zip lining. This zip lining was electric! We went on 10 separate zip lines that flew through the jungle. The longest one was 450 meters. We ended the activity with a 50 foot tall rope swing. After this, we had water and fruit that was provided by the zipline company.

We then took the bus again to El Wagon, a pizzeria. The pizza here was delicious! I personally ordered the Beefeater, which contained ingredients such as pepperonis, sausage, onions, and green peppers. After eating lunch, we got back on the bus until we got to the Tárcoles river bridge, a bridge that had many huge crocodiles underneath it. We then visited a shop to buy souvenirs for when we get back home. We then spent about 2 hours on the bus, listening to music, sleeping, and whatnot… It was much needed.

After some rest and relaxation on Ronnie’s bus, we stopped at our hotel for the night. We unloaded the luggage and found our rooms which had a personal bed for each person which was a relief. Right as we walked in, Tyler Gedeon actually cut himself with his pocket knife he bought only 2 hours before. While Gianluca repaired Tyler’s finger, everyone else chilled in their respective rooms. We then got to dinner at around 6:05 pm, where we had chicken/beef fajitas. We talked and reminisced about the trip over dinner. We ate and talked for about an hour and a half, and decided to stop for ice cream at a nearby market, where Gianluca and Ronnie treated us to some delectables. We enjoyed some ice cream outside of the shop, before heading back to the hotel. We got back to the hotel, and checked to see if the pool was nice. We quickly realized it was too cold for our liking, so we packed it in for the night and got ready to leave Costa Rica at 4:00 am.

Blog 7: Beach Day

By: Kaspar D.

After waking up and having a mini heart attack looking for our room key, we departed for the Whales Tail, which is a natural rocky formation that appears on the beach at Uvita when the tide goes out. After a couple songs on Spotify, we took a stop at a nearby supermarket. I bought some snacks and drinks for the travel ahead of us. After the short car ride, we ended up at Bahia Ballena National Park which is a huge beautiful beach. It was only about a 25 minute walk to the Whale’s Tail. We took pictures and the hiked to the place where our surf instructors were waiting. We got some surfing lessons and surfed for about 2 hours. While we were taking a break for some fresh fruit, one of the surf instructors noticed a two toed sloth in the tree right behind us! This kind sloth is rare and on the endangered species list.

From the beach, we got picked up and headed towards the hotel. On the way, we stopped for some authentic Mexican food at this nice restaurant. The food was amazing but it came in small portions so the snacks from the market came in handy. When we got to the hotel most people went to the pool, but I am already sunburnt enough so I stayed in the air conditioned hotel room. We ended up watching a movie while waiting for our dinner to be done. The dinner was great, and we ended up having a fun game of trivia after. Finally, Jhersson, Gianluca, and Ronnie said their thanks for having us. We gifted them by giving them our Costa Rica 24’ St Eds hats. Finally we ended the night by having a good night sleep and waking up early tomorrow for our final day in Costa Rica.

Blog 6: Community Outreach

By: Tyler G.

We started today with an early breakfast of eggs, rice and beans, cereal, and a fruit selection. Breakfast was served 45 minutes earlier than normal because a woman named Melissa organized for us to paint a classroom at a school called Vista de Terraba, in the near-by town of Tawal. We worked tirelessly for approximately 3 hours, with a break to eat watermelon slices, and finished in time for lunch and for afternoon activities.

Lunch today was mashed potatoes, grilled chicken, and stir fried vegetables. Then I went with a group of students to locate, evaluate, and tag bat tents; because of this, the group went off trail into the dense jungle brush. There were a lot of bugs but the group was successful in finding 6 bat tents with roughly 1-3 bats per tent. These tents were hard to spot, since they were usually leafs bent by the bats nibbling on it.

Over the course of these past two days, the 13 students on the trip organized and played out a ping-pong tournament with the equipment available at the Reserva Playa Tortuga. The tournament was organized into a world-cup style group stage and then a 8 person bracket, with the top two advancing from each group. The winner of the tournament was Luke Beals, who beat Daniel Origen by a score of 2 games to 0.

At dinner time, we were treated to a taste of home, having been served cheeseburgers and french fries. We then presented the results of our interviews. We had been assigned groups to interview someone at the Reserve about Costa Rican life, the reserve, and conservation. After the presentation, we were treated to ice cream while socializing in the mess.

Blog 5: First turtle find of the season!

By: Alexander B.

Prior to breakfast, Sara led the entire group on a beach cleanup tour. Our journey led us through two different waterways up to a beautiful cliffside rock formation. This location was said to have a lot of trash, but was fortunately quite empty. On our way back, Sara noticed a disturbed circle of sand, which could indicate a turtle nest. Our group moved back to the Reserva Playa Tortuga to eat breakfast, while Sara and two other volunteers went to investigate.

As it would turn out, it WAS turtle nest with 124 turtle eggs! This is large quantity of eggs, but is not the most uncommon occurrence. These were Olive Ridley Turtles (smallest species on the reserva). These eggs typically hatch 52 days after making contact with the sand. These new eggs were predicted to be about 6 hours old given the 1:30am high tide. At this age, the turtle’ embryos have started to form, which can be seen a circle-shaped white line on the base of the egg. At this stage, it’s important to not shake the egg. If the embryo detaches from the egg, the turtle will die. For reference, these eggs look like ping pong balls (perfect spherical shape). The interns carefully scooped the eggs out of the nest and nestled them in sand in a backpack to carry back to the hatchery. In the hatchery, Oscar, the director of RPT, dug a hole and the interns carefully transferred the eggs one by one. In the hatchery there are already 2 sets of eggs from Playa Hermosa; but the eggs we found today were the first from Playa Tortuga.

After this unique event, we sorted through the trash we collected on the beach. This is important as to make relocating and recording what was found especially easy. We had collected around 200 pieces of trash! Cleaning up this rubbish is integral to the safety of the ecosystem as a whole because it puts the lives of animals at risk.

At approximately 1:30pm, Javier led a group of students to water the mangroves. Not any water will do, the mangroves need brackish water (a mix of fresh and salt water) to survive and grow. Therefore, we headed out to the shore during high tide to collect our water. In addition to being endangered, the preservation of mangroves is needed to make habitats for many creatures. The day culminated with a bat talk by Frank. Over 500 species of plants rely on the surrounding population of bats alone. To research which species of bats live around the reserva, researchers used mist nets to catch them. They would sit in complete darkness and silence. Since the net isn’t detectable by echolocation, the bats fly in and get their wings stuck. They are then collected in a bag before having their species assessed. This process would repeat 6 times a session, with each bat taking around 15 minutes before its release. In total, they found 11 species and 75 bats total in 7 weeks. In the end, Frank recommended a canopy net (higher up in the air) to find more species of bug-eating bats.

Blog 4: Butterflies, Bats and Caimans

By: Matthew W.

Today started out early as the second round of guys headed out to the beach nearby to go on turtle patrol. The others, including myself, got to sleep in a little bit until breakfast which was a very refreshing experience. Breakfast was delicious pancakes and bananas. After breakfast me and around 4 other people went across the street with Sara to the butterfly hatchery. Before we left though, we had to learn about the four species of butterflies on the reservation. We got to enter the butterfly green house first and got to see the beautiful blue morpho amongst others. Then we got to handle larvae and move newly hatched butterflies from the pupae den to the butterfly garden. I had a great group to do this and we had a bunch of fun learning to handle butterflies.

After butterflies we had nothing for a few minutes. I got to relax and get my sweaty clothes off and reapply bug spray for the day. At 10 am we had a fun dancing class in which we learned three different Costa Rican dances, bachata, salsa, and Criollo swing. To be honest, this dance class was the most tiring thing we had done that day but it was an enjoyable and fun environment. After dancing class we had some down time until our 1:30 activities. Today I had bat patrol, we set out with Birgit and Frank to a thick part of the jungle in hopes to discover new tents of bats and check on the use of older bat tents. While we walked Frank was giving a bunch of very interesting information about the complexity of the nature of bats. We searched till the very last second and found 2 new tents with bats inside.

For dinner we had some amazing spaghetti with a meat sauce. We all devoured our meal and then after dinner me and 4 others guys got ready for our nighttime crocodile and caiman patrol. We all got our rubber boots on and set off with Javier and Jhersson, for about an hour and a half we had nothing, and we made a decision to not give up hope and keep searching for at least one croc or caiman. We looked in the large river next to the Reserva and in no time we had found a caiman. He was rather large being about 153 cm and he was quite feisty in being caught. After we caught him we took measurements and took turns holding the head of the caiman for educational purposes. After releasing we were all so happy to have found a caiman and a very large one at that. It was a pretty quick walk back to the reserve and we called it a night after a quick shower and change of clothes.

Blog 3: Reserva Playa Tortuga

By: Sean S.

On Tuesday I got the opportunity to go on a turtle walk in the morning. I was super excited to go on this, as I have never been anywhere that turtles lay their eggs. I didn’t know what to expect going into the walk, but I was ready to go. I had my pack, my sandals, and a pair of rubber boots that the Reserva gave me.

When we headed out, we walked along the road for probably a mile or so, and then veered off into the rainforest. We walked along a sandy path for another half mile or so. This path had some puddles that we needed to cross do to heavy rain the night before. The rubber boots were a great help with these crossings, but I unfortunately discovered that I had a hole in my left boot. We kept trudging forward through the sand and mud, and eventually reached the beach. It was surreal. The tide was low, so we could see all the crabs and sand dollars on the beach.

Our guide showed us what to look for, which was turtle tracks in the sand. If we saw some, we were supposed to look where they led and check for eggs in the holes. Our guide then took us to a cool cave carved out of the rock by the waves. We cooled off in the cave, and then got to work. We walked back towards the Reserva along the beach. The sand was so wet that our boots kept sinking almost knee deep in it, which made the going very slow. We made it to the edge of the rainforest, and we could see a path leading into the foliage. We took that path, and for the next mile and a half we wound through the dense undergrowth, crossing rivers with water coming up as high as our thighs at places.

We made it back to the Reserva in about two and a half hours, soaking wet and tired. While it was a difficult journey, it was the most fulfilling thing I’d done through the trip. I got to really experience the extent to which turtles are protected and how valuable they are to the world. I got to be in and among the rainforest, and our group saw a number of super interesting wildlife, from toucans to tiny crabs scurrying across the sand.

Blog 2: Escalera al cielo

Author: Evan M.

After a night of charades we woke up around 5 am and began rotations for showering. At 7 am we enjoyed a breakfast which included eggs, rice, beans, mangos, watermelon, bananas, and coffee from Café Florida. From there, we packed into the beds of two pickup trucks in order to transport us to the trailhead that led us to the waterfall. At the trailhead, we played games such as ping pong, pool, and keep it up with a soccer ball. Around halfway down the trail, our guide, and owner of “The Land of Dreams” farm named Roy, had us stop temporarily so that he could kill a snake with his bamboo hiking stick. He said that this type of snake would cause death if it bit you. After this pit stop, we continued on down the mountain to reach the waterfall. We swam in the river that came from the waterfall and saw some people do flips and dives off the edge with a drop of at least 30 feet. We continued our hike after this to a scenic view of the upper part of the waterfall and had lunch. The lunches included an apple, chicken burritos, and Chiky chocolate wafer bars. After a brief remission and continuing to soak in the rainforest environment, we started our trek back. The way back up was very exhausting especially after such a long time swimming. The countless steps and steep inclines combined with the heat and humidity made us all look like we had taken showers with our clothes on. When we returned to the trailhead we were all sopping wet and exhausted. Our guides helped us out though by taking us to a small shop where they had a great assortment of delicious ice creams.

From there, we drove to the research center. There was a big storm that knocked out power temporarily when we arrived but it didn’t stop us from settling in and getting comfortable. While waiting for power to return I layed out in a hammock and listened to music on a speaker. Later that night we went through orientation on what we would be doing this week and had dinner. After that some of us played poker for a little bit. All in all it was a very eventful day.

Blog 1: El mejor café del mundo

Authors: Aiden S. and Daniel O.

This morning we woke up in the Hotel Rosas de America in San Jose Costa Rica after landing last night. We had breakfast with an amazing fruit punch and some classic rice and beans (called “casado”-what we would be eating for most of the trip. We left the hotel on a bus headed for the farm called Sueños de Vida. The trip would take around 4hrs

On the road was where most of the day was spent but we had many “adventures“ along the way

Our first stop was to a mountain hike above the Cerro de la Muerte mountain range at 11,000 feet above sea level. This was our first true run-in with the absolute breathtaking beauty of Costa Rica the altitude sickness, definitely was apparent, but that didn’t stop us from scaling the whole mountain when we reach the peak it was just utter beauty

We saw many plant species, toucans, lizards, and a lot of wildlife.

One thing I wanted to note was that my favorite part of this experience so far was the communication with the people of Costa Rica. The locals are extremely friendly and welcoming the culture is most definitely contagious.

My favorite part so far is trying to communicate with the locals. Communication is very difficult with the language barrier…but it’s an interesting experience and very humanizing to try and communicate with someone who does not speak your language trying to figure out a problem. It’s really really cool so far.

Another very interesting thing is how diverse the plant life is. I know that’s like a no brainer but it is way more impressive than you would think

The farm was not what I was expecting. While it was nothing like I was expecting it was also everything I had expected? I don’t know. It was a weird way to describe it, but that’s just how I feel.

We made enchiladas and had one of the best cups of coffee I have ever had (it’s important to note that this farm is coffee farm)

We then got to Roy’s farm after some travel struggles and learned all about his tree species and animals. He let us in his chicken coop and we held the chickens, guinea pigs, and rabbit. Roy was super nice and we learned how to make empanadas with his wife Graciela. We all had a great time throughout and then finally all had dinner together. To end the night we set out for our cabins, the one I was in with the juniors was super nice and we can’t wait for the waterfall tomorrow.

We had a very profound talk with our guides Jhersson and Gianluca about what the trip is about living in the moment and why it is important to write down your feelings. We planned our things for the next day and then we are all off to sleep in our cabins.