Aeropuerto

Have a few minutes for a short little blog entry here at the airport outside of San Jose. For some reason Costa Ricans have really caught onto the free WiFi all over the place unlike the US. Had a super nice ride into the city yesterday with Dr. Chazdon. Took a taxi over to the hotel I stayed in the first time here and luckily they had one available room.

Did some shopping with the rest of my day and then enjoyed the cable TV in the room later on. Got up in the morning, called a taxi to the airport and here I am. Oh, and yesterday I found a Cinnabon in Costa Rica. Gotta go spend some left over colones while I’m still here. I’ll be home in 10 hours!

BP

Doce

,(L to R) Susan, Benjamíncito, Charlie, Dr. Chazdon, Amanda

What a weekend. Feels really odd to be leaving La Selva tomorrow morning; I’ve been so in the groove here for so long that the day I leave was never realized until now. Been working on some lists lately. A few of the highlights are things to bring to La Selva next summer, things to do at home, and research things to do with my data.

As with my time at La Selva, the blog is probably drawing to a close here pretty soon, it’s been quite an experience and one I hope everyone enjoyed, especially through all the repetitive days of fieldwork, showers and coffee breaks. Glad that this entry is bound to be full of good experiences and stories; sure is shaping up to be a long one.

Saturday morning I was up early and very jumpy to be setting out on my final (!) day of work. Breakfasted (wow, a real word) quickly and biked all the way out to LEP Primary. A bike ride I’m sure to miss out through the tree plantation. Lots of big open areas and clearings that give way to beautiful vistas of the forest and the sky.

Dr. Chazdon & Charlie were out in the plot early working on Charlie’s bird presence/absence project taking recordings and spotting birds. I still don’t understand why people tend to have a fascination with birds, and especially tropical birds. For one, they’re (birders) always super-excited to see super-rare birds and often dread seeing the same birds all the time. From an ecological standpoint, I’d be more interested in studying/seeing the really common birds. They have the biology that enables them to be a dominant species in an ecosystem that supports high levels of diversity. Whatever…

Had sixteen trees to look at out in this plot. Got them finished up in a little over an hour; Dr. Chazdon gave me a hand with the last four once they finished bird recordings. Hiked out with them to the bikes and biked myself back down to STR 3800 to meet Amanda & Debra for some more of the same out there. Waited until 10:20am (planned time=10:00am) before heading into the plot by myself.

A few minutes after getting started, Amanda showed up and sped up the process a ton. A little later Debra joined us and data collection was going along at a breakneck pace. I had as many trees to do in this plot as the other two combined so having some help was golden. Two people continuously searching and me running around with the tape and compass was awesome.

Took the last data point of my 2007 Summer at 12:30pm. Amanda was there for my first field day (you can probably revisit that in the blog, if you so choose) and my last and also wrote my first and last data points. SuperChops from now on. Spent my afternoon drinking coffee and being tired and achy from pushing myself out there for four straight days.

Dr. Chazdon took us all out to dinner (Susan, Amanda, Debra, Charlie, Me) at Rana Roja, a Mexican-y place 11km up the road. We all rode in the Rav4 Dr. Chazdon rented for her trip. Had patacones (I’m dying to make some at home) and a great chicken burrito. Enjoyed brownies and coffee afterwards. Great dinner, good time.

Amanda (disappointed): Agh, too well-signed...

Up this morning to get stuff ready to go. We had over easy eggs for breakfast and a good cake to accompany it. Started cleaning the cabina and office and doing some laundry. Washed my hat and backpack so they no longer smell as they did. Cleaned all the equipment I used from the project and returned it all. Had a great lunch; Dr. Chazdon was very shutter-happy so we have some choice photography from the last couple days.

After lunch, I paid my bill for the five days in August and didn’t do too much in the way of packing. Took a later trip across with Choppers. Gift-shopped for a few and bought an Mmmmio ice cream. Had tons of extra postcard stamps so gave them all way except three which I used to send a couple more cards. Amanda, Debra, Dr. Chazdon, & Charlie are all out batting at Lindero Sur tonight.

Remember that one time when my boots were stolen and I had to special order a new pair for $15 in town? Ever since then I’ve periodically checked all the boot racks just hoping they would return. After returning from my afternoon gift shop adventure, I decided to just take one more shot at it. Sure enough there they were; after being gone for a whole month, they just mysteriously reappear on my last day here. Weird, but quite relieving (now I just need more space to pack them!).

Still have to actually pack tonight. Riding in style to the city tomorrow with Dr. Chazdon in the Rav4. Free transportation to the station, free transportation on my way out, awesome (plus it totally justifies changing my flight). Ah, life is good. Time to pack! 8/7/07;11:49pm; Flight 1424 from Atlanta to Hartford!

BP

Noticias

Updates galore. First off, and most important is that on Thursday Bernal & I worked our butts off for 5 ½ hours in the plot and measured 141 trees. To put this in perspective, my first goal of this project was to do 150 trees over two weeks, which amounted to four separate field day. Let’s just say the process sped up through the last 12 weeks (wow, 12 weeks today).

Last few days I’ve been pretty tired in the afternoons, trying to drink more coffee, my super duper cup developed a hairline fracture somewhere and now makes a nice ring of coffee everywhere I put it. It only has to last me three more days, which brings me to the next good news.

This morning I called Delta and got my flight bumped up to Tuesday the 7th as opposed to the 9th. Super excited to get home, I sure can taste it. After taking care of the airplane thing hit the trail to Lindero Sur to measure some inclined tree coordinates. Work was boring and hot, got it done though and put myself one field day away from being really finished.

I’ve been really focused on work and data lately making sure I’m not missing anything. Next couple days will be comprised of the field, the data, and packing. Tomorrow morning I’m heading out early once again to measure the offsets of 16 trees in LEP Primary, then meeting Amanda & Debra at LEP Secondary to measure offsets of 44 trees there. Then it’s donezies.

That’s about all for now. Connecticut in a mere four days from right now, oh boy!

BP

Agosto

Wowzers, August already; it’s the fourth different month I’ve been in Costa Rica. Definitely have the itching to be home really soon. And on to the last couple of days. Tuesday (yesterday) was a non-field-day, so I made a list of three things to do and I did two of them. Batting .667 on the day.

First, I entered all of the data in LEP Primary I had taken up to that point which (as I mentioned yesterday) amounted to about 1,000 numbers. Then I spent my afternoon writing the saga of LaserMan and DataDude. In a blander sense, I wrote all the final notes on the methods I used this summer for my reference and future use.

After dinner, we had a researchers meeting with free beer and cookies. We also got some issues taken care of. Still in amazement about how much people complain about/criticize the food. You’re literally paying $25 a day for lab services, lodging, and three meals, you should be happy you have something warm.

Went to hit the sack early to prepare for a solid day in the plot. Didn’t actually get sleep in until midnight or so. That was a real pain. Got up and after a few bike repair and assorted delays, hit the trail with Bernal to the plot. Looked really cloudy and rainy-like as we left the station, but soon enough it cleared up and we had perfect weather the whole day.

Not quite fitting the perfect weather was my tiredness and a solid group of big difficult trees. Pretty sure we did just 90 today, leaving 141. One hundred and forty one! Entered the data directly after showering along with eating field lunch. Learned a lesson about manbearpig from Mr. Al Gore.

After taking a crack at this writing thing I’m trying to finish, Dr. Chazdon and her 16-year-old son Charlie showed up at the office. Chit-chatted about various things for a while. Spent my half hour before dinner waiting patiently for home run #500. Barbecue for dinner, early bed time tonight. No more than a week to go tomorrow. 7 days/141 trees. Peace.

BP

Mojado

Our first really wet day here at La Selva in a week or so. We had good eggs for breakfast and there were a total of four people at breakfast including myself. Felt a lot like another weekend day since most of the project assistants are taking a long weekend. Goofed around the office for a little bit, got together the things and started downloading last night’s Entourage.

Hit the trail with PG at 7:30 and made it out there in good time. Incorporating a brief rain delay we worked for about 3 hours in a pretty tough area of the plots. Tons of vines and spiders and humongous downed trees to hop over. It was awesome to get an unplanned hunk of 43 trees done this morning, putting my finish date of Thursday well within reach.

Got back to the station early enough to squeeze in a shower before lunch. Again, one of my top favorite meals in spaghetti & meat sauce, green beans, and super special bread. Followed lunch by starting to watch Entourage, reading the news and eventually taking a trip for coffee and to pay my whopping bill at reception.

With the errands completed I didn’t do too much until making another coffee run before a talk at 4:30. One of the REUs Natalie gave her final talk on a project testing the effect of pesticides on red-eyed tree frog tadpoles. All the tadpoles died; somebody called that one, I think. After the talk we had a short snack break and I stuck around for a little awards show put on by the REUs.

Currently, I’m typing the blog entry and watching baseball on ESPN, something I hope to be doing in Bristol in a week’s time. Of course, we’ll see about that. Probably going to spend tomorrow entering the thousand or so data points I have waiting for me and doing a couple short write-ups for my project.

Just as excited about everything involved with flying home. Two hundred and twenty nine trees to go, oh joy! Until tomorrow…

BP

Fiera

Well, it’s been a wild week in the jungle. Felt bad about not posting all week, but on the other hand it was nice to free myself of the commitment. Now, with all things on the up and up I can afford a nice entertaining post for y’all. Just for the record, I’ll begin it off with some summarization so my experiences are not lost for all eternity (we have double negatives, would that be called a double infinite?).

With the team back on Sunday, I decided to join them on seedling mapping on Monday. A beautiful day in the forest, a trend that persisted all week. Felt great to get back out there and to eating field lunches. Left the plot with only five 10x10m plots for the girls to finish on Tuesday. I spent my Tuesday emailing and pondering various things.

Dr. Chazdon decided to have one of the Bosques project assistants help me finish up the fieldwork in Tinny’s absence. Set that up on Wednesday with Jeanette. Thursday and Friday were easily the most productive days I’ve had all summer. Besides hitting an unparalleled pace of 24 trees an hour, Bernal (the assistant working with me to finish) is a walking encyclopedia on the trees out there.

Instead of looking around for tree tags, Bernal notes the species of the next tree, looks straight up and walks right over to the tree. Do realize that this is no New England forest with the simple suite of a dozen or so species per stand. There are over 80 species represented in the 464 I’m measuring for the current plot.

At one point on Friday Bernal couldn’t find one of the trees listed for a moment. Of course the species was marked wrong and he proceeded to take a leaf down from the tree for identification by chucking big sticks up there. Later that afternoon he stopped by the office with all the good info. It’s also a very worthwhile Spanish boot camp out there every day, especially when we run into a problem.

When my first two days back in the field in two weeks were said and done, we had finished 192 trees in nine hours of work. Just above my ideal (ideal, hence, never before reached) pace of 20/hour. Also measured the tallest tree of the summer at 44m, it was a whopper. To sum up the fieldwork end of things, PG (an undergrad from BSC) (she’s actually rated PG-13) volunteered to help me out for a couple hours tomorrow. That worked out perfect because Amanda decided to cancel our outing today due to a sore throat.

Aiming to do about 60 tomorrow in 3+ hours and then have 200 remaining for two more super productive days with Bernal on Wednesday & Thursday. Dr. Chazdon gets in on Wednesday, and I’m tentatively scheduled to bounce a week from then, but plans could and are likely to change.

In other news, Karen left this morning. I now have to endure my last week and a half without someone to talk on and on endlessly about sports and other cool stuff. Also made me realize how much I want to get home and start having a classic summertime experience. Had my favorite lunch for lunch today.

I’ll try to be good and keep on posting through the next week as my excitement builds for being finished and being home. People who complain about the food they eat really rub me the wrong way. It seems to me that when you don’t have an option you ought to attempt to enjoy it; just an observation from tonight’s dinner.

I’m really excited to develop a project this fall for next summer that won’t rely on having an assistant in the field. Excited for this fall in general, excited to get back to the family, excited to return my car, ipod & cell. Ten or fewer days tomorrow, oh boy.

BP

Regresa

My team is back! Started out the final day of this long week with a couple of primo eggs. Spent the morning goofing around, reading a lot of news and cleaning up the office. Went coffeebreaking at 11:00am and soon after Amanda returned from Mexico and I got to hear epic tales of famous scientists.

Since we now have the menu posted at the comedor it was nice to look forward to a day of quesadillas and pizza for dinner. The afternoon was devoted to catching up with Amanda and Debra, who arrived shortly thereafter. Coffeebreaked again at 4:00pm and led that up to shortly before dinner.

Time to interject this blog with a great quote from this afternoon. “I saw a scarlet macaw…but it was in someone’s backyard in a cage.” That was the highlight of Debra describing her weeklong trip through the backwoods of the big Nic. Gamecasted the Yanks’ rout of the D’Rays and afterwards giddily watched the highlight reel about three times.

After a mosquito-y and pizza-fueled dinner Karen and I watched the Victoria Beckham: Coming to America special on NBC. Probably the best reality TV I’ve watched in a long time, but then again I haven’t seen Shaq’s Big Challenge. Needless to say the show was major.

Heading out to the field with Team Baby Trees in the morning to do the seedling mapping; only two more days left of that. Hopefully I can get in the good share of my remaining fieldwork sometime in the next seven days. Looking forward to the Red Sox on ESPN tomorrow along with the CNN/YouTube Democratic Debate. Until tomorrow…

BP

Cerro

Getting over the hill of my week here. Probably should have planned another vacation-thingy for at least of this week. Too bad everything fell together all of a sudden and I didn’t plan for anything but work all week. Well, since not too much has been going on, I’ll be succinct.

I’ve done a lot of work with maps and data and whatnot. Took the time to watch a couple of movies. School for Scoundrels was boring and predictable and the only thing that saved Zodiac was the basing on actual events. We had a toad race last night, which was definitely the only thing to get a solid turnout on station since I’ve been here.

Watered some baby trees for Chops this morning and watched the first part of the soccer final here in the afternoon. Couple more days, then my team returns and station life will return to its classic awesomeness. Discovered PostSecret. Very cool stuff, amazing the ideas people have, can’t wait to check out the books.

Excited to get back in the field full time. Cabin fever, ah! Maybe some more to write about tomorrow, talk to you then.

“You can’t be a nonconformist if you don’t drink coffee”

BP

Mejor

Everything’s better. Yea, it’s still slow and unexciting, but I’m okay with it for now. Things fell into place today and I heard the loudest thunderclap of my life before lunch. Bone-rattlin’ stuff, you should have seen this storm, indescribable (well, except for the bone-rattlin’ part).

Spent a good amount of time reading and a greater deal at the computer cranking out a series of calculations. One of the things I’m doing makes the Dells at La Selva really stressed. The first time I’ve legitimately waited for a computer to do something in a long time. The kind of waiting that you fear moving the mouse or touching the keyboard as that might make it even slower or have an application not respond (!!).

Received many words of encouragement from a variety sources over the last 24 hours (thanks). Today’s menu at the comedor was posted on a white board in the morning, which was a welcome surprise to all. Had the coolest lunch too. Sat with basically the “higher-ups” intellectually and organizationally.

Lunch conversation revolved around creationism, religion, evolution, ants, toads, and lots of other pseudo-hippie issues. Pretty much never opened my mouth, learned a load nonetheless. Played with my little numbers after lunch, had a good dinner and went to a talk by Johel in preparation for an animal behavior conference.

I don’t feel like elaboration too much, the Yanks are in extras thanks to a stolen third base and a balk. Man baseball is the man. Also learned that in LA at Dodger Stadium there is an all-you-can-eat section with unlimited Dodger dogs, nachos, soda, popcorn and other goodies. Sound amazing and might be worth visiting the west coast sometime (not to mention going to school there). Until tomorrow…

BP

Aburrido

Simply a boring couple of days. Going kind of crazy from being around the lab/office so much. Sort of brought it on myself, but the situation of everybody being gone isn’t helping at all. Basically have to get myself around to asking people to help me with the project or trade help for help.

I’m unnecessarily putting it off, and it’s pissing me off. Karen says I “shouldn’t hesitate” asking other folks for a hand. As the week gets going again here, I’m definitely coming off the sourest weekend of my time down here. I also probably shouldn’t be wasting my time (which I now all of a sudden have tons of) and yours writing about all this in the blog.

Among other things I’m worried that Dr. Chazdon’s opinion of me or something I did changed after Tinny left. I definitely do not feel that I did anything wrong or bad at any point, but of course I also feel that conclusions could be drawn. Amanda has been quite critical of my project and relationship with Tinny over the last few weeks, and who knows how much of that has gotten back to the states.

Over the last 4-5 days I’ve sent Dr. Chazdon three emails, two based on data, one about fieldwork/Tinny. Over the same time, I’ve received one email in return where I was cc’d on her reply to Tinny’s email about leaving. For someone who has enthusiastically responded within 24 hours of any email I’ve sent in the last 20 months, it has me a touch worried.

At least the prospect of not finishing my fieldwork doesn’t exist and therefore I have one less thing to worry about. On top of all this and being cooped up here there’s been amazing weather the whole time. Seriously, not a drop of rain all day today, not to mention, a slight breeze (do recall that breezes are the best thing ever when measuring tree heights).

To avoid going completely nuts, I’m just going to go to the plot (LEP Primary) tomorrow, with the stupid justification of dropping the tripod off. Sorry for wasting everybody’s time, I guess this one’s more just for my record. Long week ahead, and only I can improve it, so it’s probably about time to do that. Gosh, maybe I’ll post tomorrow if something advantageous happens.

BP

Ido

Where to start… Had my first casually late breakfast in a while, stocked up on eggs and got ready for the day that, frankly, didn’t have much going for it. No Amanda, no Debra, no Tinny, just me. Did the computer thing all morning, and as much as I enjoy doing it and producing something from the data I’ve taken, it doesn’t hold a candle to being in the forest every morning.

Briefly coffeebreaked before lunch, I can’t even remember what we had. Oh yea, so before lunch and during my coffee break Tinny showed up at the comedor to tell me that she’s leaving La Selva for good. Didn’t bother trying to talk her out of anything and saw her off after lunch. She’ll spend the rest of her internship in San Jose.

Hung around the comedor for an hour or so chatting with Karen and then returned to the boring things I was occupying myself with. Resolved that I wasn’t going to do the same tomorrow. I’m taking off on a hike to explore La Selva, close to the field, but not quite. Through the rest of the week, I’m going to see what kind of field help I can get, as much as I hate asking people for help…

That’s pretty much my day, not as exciting as yesterday and arguably a little more depressing. I figure the plot I have left can take me as little as five full field (ah, alliteration) days, so every time I’m out there, it’s on. Might try to make next summer’s project a little less dependent on an assistant.

Completely ready for bed, looking forward to some solo adventuring tomorrow, ought to cheer me up. Sorry for being so down…dealing with crap takes a lot out of me. Hasta luego.

BP

Momento

You know when you have an experience that is completely unique you’d swear that nobody has ever had that happen before? It’s those moments that make life such a fascinating trip. Two random events coinciding so perfectly that it amazes. Of course we’ll get to this…

Called off the field day in the face of amazing weather to let Tinny put in a solid day of practice on the bike (our commute to the next plot starts and ends with 5.4km of cycling). As Tinny was out there working I took on the analysis that has been toying around in my mind for months now. It turned out awesome for only a few hours of rough work. Planning to get back to it tomorrow with a more structured effort.

Tinny retired from some successful practice (still not all the way there) around 11:00am. Played with the GIS software until lunch, got in a little bit of reading. Science is cool, but the people who make all of the landmark discoveries are the coolest. It’s turning out to be a book for people who don’t like science, but like to learn. Funny and enjoyable read nonetheless.

After lunch I was feeling all schvitzy and dirty so it was time for a shower. The basic breakdown of the shower situation is that the one in my room cranks out no hot water while the one in the common area does. Today was a hot shower day so I kicked off the shoes and got the shower tote. My face wash wasn’t in the right location (in the tote) so I had to retrieve it from the bathroom.

In breaking routine for that brief moment I forgot to throw the ever-important keys in the tote and walked right out to the shower. It only took me 0.000087 seconds to realize what I had done. Stood there for a couple minutes and pondered. Should I just take a shower?; that’d cheer me up…

Take a moment to picture this too. Standing there with no shoes, no glasses, no shirt, no keys, and greasy hair! I decide that since I saw the cleaning lady walk into cabina 5 on my way over I could walk down there (50 or so meters) and have her come key me in. So I start walking over, as I leave I realize my lack of footwear. Since it is the rain forest, I should probably wear kicks, even for such a short errand.

In this instance I was prepared in that my hiking boots were taking a vacation on the porch-thingy. Prepare to add untied, muddy, worn boots to your mental picture. Zip over to cabina 5 quickly and quietly snoop around for the cleaning lady. Told her all about my predicament and she was more than happy to come let me in.

Problems solved, we started walking back up the trail. As soon as we set off I spotted Tinny walking the opposite direction on the cabina trail. I’ll try to summarize the rest of these events with an abridged play:

Tinny (walking and talking with determination): Ben, I need to talk to you.

Ben (recall from above story) (trailing cleaning lady who also is walking with determination): Walk with me Tin.

Tinny: I’m going to San Jose.

Ben: That’s fine Tinny.

Tinny: Yea, but it’s why I need to go to San Jose I need to talk you about.

Tinny (key quotes from the rest of the conversation include the following): For a night or two…to talk the coordinator…decide if I want to leave or come back to La Selva…

Ben (thought bubble): Man, I’m ******.

Ben (deep in awe of this moment): You gotta do what you gotta do Tin.

There’s your moment. The cleaning lady then keyed me into to the room and I couldn’t have been more thankful. Shower didn’t turn out to be as enjoyable as it could have been as a result of the afternoon’s events. Filed my current thoughts away and got back to the pretty maps I spent my morning preparing.

Amanda & Debra returned from the field around 4:00pm. We coffeebreaked (next verb to be added to Webster’s right there) from about then until 5:30pm with Mauricio, who is kind of the man these days. Had full blown peccary for dinner, the best I’ve had all summer. Afterwards I watched my Yanks lose an ugly one via ESPN Gamecast.

With Amanda & Debra both leaving in the morning, we walked (and partly taxied) out to La Machaca, the closest bar to La Selva. After being there for about 20 minutes a Britney Spears video came on. This immediately reminded me of the days of watching TRL after school. Then came just about every Britney video ever (Lucky, Oops!...I Did it Again, Stronger, ...Baby One More Time, Toxic, & Crazy). Just about the coolest thing ever. After the Britney Spears marathon (that used to say marathong, good thing I caught that) (comment on your definition of the word marathong), we kicked back with Mauricio and talked for a little while before returning to the station to get some solid sleeping done. So, yea, that was a pretty up and down day, who knows what tomorrow holds…

BP

Primario

Interestingly enough, it’s another good day for the number two. Finished my second hectare of height measurements this afternoon in the Lindero Sur plot. Tinny got an early start this morning after being suggested to ride the bike down the STR on the way to the plot. I joined her 40-45 minutes later a kilometer down the trail.

Spent another hour doing the bike thing before putting it aside and continuing on to the plot. Got to work at 11:00am and all went very smoothly thanks to our flagging the day before. Confident in my data and dreading carrying the tripod back to the lab we left the plot at 2:00pm. Got back and did typical afternoon things.

The book I’m reading has gotten to a chapter on Einstein and I realized how much I really do love physics and how good it is that I chose it as a major. In my little world it was a very welcome reassurance since the decision to do physics was sort of arbitrary.

Tonight’s dinner ranked right up there with the weirdest of my summer. Essentially the entire comedor smelled like barbecue sauce on a grill when we walked in. From here I knew I would be disappointed, just not how much. Turned out to be a flavorless combination of chickpeas and hunks of ham. Just plain odd, and, did I mention, tasteless.

Strained the brain thinking about this cool analysis I want to do involving tree recruitment. At one point my plan would have called for 2.16 million points in a plot. Realized it was time to be less ambitious. Trying something out tomorrow.

Oh, and hence the title of the blog our next plot is in primary forest near the back of the property. Started with a 35 year-old forest, then a 20-year old one and now a “virgin” forest although that’s probably not true. Also worked on my write up of my methods today, didn’t realize it would take 3-plus pages of type and figures to explain what exactly I do out there.

Here for 27 days more at the most, need to be in the field 9 of those days. We’ll see what we can do. Talk to you tomorrow!

BP

Dos

It’s officially my two-month-iversary at La Selva. Early morning today, up at 6:10am and hitting the trail an hour after that. Got to the plot 40 or 50 minutes before Tinny so I began to flag the subset of trees we were doing as a recheck. This proved to be an effective strategy and after finishing the first half we did the same for the second half in preparation for tomorrow.

With the dream of finishing the whole thing today, we soon realized that not enough time in our day remained to finish so we called it kind of early to leave 2-2.5 hours of work for tomorrow. Spent the last half hour of our field day solving the mystery of the giant tree-fall. Tinny wasn’t as into the clue-searching and mystery-solving as you might expect.

My Scooby-dooing cut a list of five “¿muerto?” trees to a list of four “muerto” trees and a half-dead one. Quite successful in that respect. Got to wear my new boots (really miss my boots) today, just about the most uncomfortable things going. Added about ten minutes to my commute back.

Among other ponderings in the field today I had the strangest craving for Dunkin Donuts (not that it’s strange to crave Dunkin). I think it was at a point where I was getting kind of thirsty and it really felt like I was getting in the car (ah, the car) and driving on down there. Hard to describe, but a weird feeling nonetheless.

Coffee-breaked at 4:30pm. Did some solid reading after entering data and realizing the internet bit the dust at some point in the afternoon. Chops (the big DF) & Debra (the big Nic) leave on Saturday for weeklong trips away from La Selva. Hopefully this old project will be summing up upon their return, but that’s contingent on a million or so things.

After dinner I sat their slurping an iced coffee and munching on a filled cookie thing, maybe my DD dream came Tico-true… Little bit of work tomorrow that I’m officially two thirds done with data collection and have 8-10 field days remaining with 3.5 weeks to squeeze them in to. Summer is whipping by, wow.

BP

Estrella

Woke up to some cloudy skies, which turned to rainy skies, which turned to calling off the day in the field. That was a tough call. After a morning shower and taking care of the computer, I coffee-breaked for an hour or so before lunch. Got into Bryson’s book, it’s super dumbed-down as far as science goes, but still entertaining.

Halfway through this break, Debra, Amanda and Debra’s sister Heather (visiting for a couple days) returned from a trip to town and joined in the coffee break. Chops had a blast picking on me and soon enough it was lunchtime. Which turned out to be my third meal of the day, omelet sandwiches can’t sit on the desk too long in front of me.

Dilly-dallied and got around to watching Sunday’s Entourage with Debra. Continues to impress and cause me to jump up and down with laughter. Registered the Outing Club as a club for the fall and also for the Involvement Fair where I predict I sign up 1,289 new members. School’s going to be awesome, can’t wait.

Tinny and I resolved to get a really early start tomorrow to make up for our iffy call on the rain. Took another (!) coffee break around 5:00pm until dinner and followed dinner with the 2007 MLB All-Star Game. Great game, late game. Really wish Alfonso were still a Yankee.

After that, at 10:00pm or so I watched Entourage again just for fun. Spattered in between all this laziness I did do plenty of work with data and maps and other important science-y things, so don’t worry. Might have enough time to finish the plot tomorrow, that would be great for everyone. Yup, that’s the day!

BP

Cuadrangular

Blue skies this morning, like, all blue skies. Ran the same play as yesterday and started knocking some trees off the list by 9:30am. Got bored waiting for Tinny on our commute there so I ate my plantain chips, bad call. Good thing I had extra omelet-y sandwiches today. Pretty sure my per diem egg consumption is at a lifetime high down here.

At least eggs made the cut of a Men’s Health article that listed seven foods that grow muscle. Got to see Amanda for a brief moment this morning after a long stint of conflicting schedules. Had to really do a solid search for clean socks this morning, luckily, I was successful and added ‘do laundry’ to the afternoon to-dos.

Finished our 72 trees a little after 2:00pm and just as we felt our first rain drops; good timing. Other good news about today is that those 72 complete my second (out of three) hectare of measurements. A bullet ant got me on the shoulder today, under my t-shirt, that killed for about four hours. A little bit of rechecking in the next two days and then only 464 to go in a primary forest plot! I can taste it.

Lately I’ve have crazy travel plans running through my mind for early August including how kick butt it would be to go to Panama City/Canal. Set another record today by getting back to the lab in 27:40 a solid improvement over yesterday (digital watch stop watches are handy). Got together the laundry and waited about six hours for a free washer, just got it in at 8:30pm.

Good thing I have a fresh episode of Entourage I can watch four times until it’s time to fold the clothes (jk) (well, maybe three times). Took my own solo coffee break at 5:00pm to fuel up and finish End of Poverty. This book ended with the best RFK quote ever, pretty inspiring stuff. Planning to read White Man’s Burden, the response to Sachs when I get back to CT. Next book is A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson (also of Walk in the Woods).

Watched some of the Home Run Derby before the lounge got commandeered for music night (mandolins, violas, guitars, violas galore). Wow, All-Star uniforms are ugly again, when can we go back to wearing team unis? Looks like I’ll get to bed by 10:00pm or so, lots of data to get ready for tomorrow. Later dudes!

BP

Récord

Woke up nice and early to perfect weather and got really excited for the field. After a good breakfast, Tinny set out 30 minutes or so earlier that usual so we could get a good jump on things. The bugs were surprisingly tame and we never felt a drop of rain.

Around 3:00pm we finished our high-end goal of 86 trees (a new record, and at a great point), partly facilitated by a gianormous tree fall gap that took a handful of friends down with it. It felt awesome to get back out there after a five-day break (the completely unplanned one) and after my 29.5 minute commute back, I entered the data the same day!

With 72 trees remaining in the plot, I got the data book ready to go, checked a fortunate Yankees score and might have watched an episode of South Park. Before long it was dinnertime and we had some amazing chicken soup quality chicken. Didn’t do much of anything after dinner and got myself to bed at a decent hour.

Hope the good weather continues tomorrow and we work one more step closer to completion; I can taste the end of the month. Home Run Derby and All Star Game on deck, psyched for that. Sorry for short and boring posts, that’s how it goes.

BP

Reloj

Rained out. Yet one more day where the rain just didn’t stop until noon or so and we had to call off our day in the field. The result of this was some time for Tinny to practice on the bike (still!) and me to catch some giggles with South Park. Couldn’t manage to go back to sleep, although Amanda & Debra sure did.

After a nice long, relaxing lunch I decided to join Amanda and Debra on a trip to town to get their hair did. Transportation couldn’t have been better. Walked out to the highway and hopped into a big minivan taxi that was just leaving the bus stop. Filled ‘er up with seven people so it only cost 200 colones each. The trip back was only another 215 on the bus, score.

I walked down to the Colono (Tico Home Depot) to see if my boots were in as promised. Of course, they weren’t and I have a new promise (I think) for Monday afternoon. From there, made a stop at the ATM where there wasn’t a line (first time ever) and got some dough. Stopped in a little watch store and bought a $12 digital watch because I was fed up with pulling my Swatch out of my pocket every time.

Hung around the hair place for a little bit as the girls finished up their $2 haircut. Got pressured into getting a little trim myself, but resisted. From the stylist we walked up to the supermarket for Chops to buy paper towels. Grabbed an Eskimo Churchill, this time with strawberry ice cream and hopped the bus to La Selva.

A semi-successful trip and another pre-planned for Monday or Tuesday. Messed around with my data and tried learning some statistics through the afternoon and evening. Hit the hay around 10:00am and started dreaming of good weather. Talk to you tomorrow. Just tipped the scale at 30,000 words.

BP

Ratón

Pretty uneventful day, not much at all to say. Nice rhyme. Okay, well, Tinny decided to rest the ankle for one more day so I volunteered to help Amanda, Debra, & Tommy Jones from Jones, Oklahoma in the field today. Had a little late start but got plenty of seedling mapping done. Finished 11 subplots before 3:00pm. Had beautiful weather the whole time and it only rained sporadically in the afternoon.

Early on, Tommy found a baby something poisonous snake that we stuck flag next to and later spotted a little nocturnal arboreal mouse. It was quite precious with its big black eyes and furry furry-ness. Upon returning from the field we took a coffee break up at the comedor and followed that up with some goofing around on the computer.

Had spaghetti for dinner, another favorite meal. Got ready for going to the field tomorrow afterwards and went to bed sometime after nine. Yup, it was that boring. It started raining late in the day, which probably doesn’t bode well for the morning, but we’ll see. Tinny’s good to go to the field so the project can get going again after going 9 days for 54 trees.

Maybe I’ll have something exciting to talk about tomorrow, or I’ll just make up a story, you’ll never know. Might get to come home to Connecticut four weeks from today, or at most a little longer that, depends on this stinking rain mostly. Hasta manaña!

BP

Inundacion

Woke up to bone-shaking thunder sometime after 5:00am and continued on sleeping until seven. Got over to breakfast to learn that the forest was closed (they can totally do that) due to intense flooding along lots of the trails. The river had risen a decent 6-8 meters since yesterday morning and it rained all through breakfast.

With any hope of going to the field today, snow day (flood day) protocol was put into effect. Back at the office for a little while before going on a 9:00am coffee break with Chops and D. Heard all about floods and evacuations and various other emergency things.

The most entertaining part of the whole morning was reflective vests and custom hardhats for all the people who work tours/reception/administration on the other side of the river. We decided that the project employees were far more fit to handle SAR than the people who don’t go in the forest at all. At least they were prepared.

Took a morning shower and generally goofed off for a good long while before lunch. One of my favorite lunches today; fried rice, refried beans, and French fries (nice & healthy). Despite not being in the field, I was in a pretty good mood all day although found myself frequently bored. Read a lot of stories on ESPN.com, did some coloring with my new crayons.

A good story I forgot to add earlier. So the four of us were standing around our office door, which has the “Come Home Wanchope!" sign on it. Johel (my roommate, Ph.D. student from CR) comes walking over and goes, “He used to me my brother-in-law.” Looks of awe on all faces followed by, “Really?!?,” in unison.

Apparently the man, the myth, the legend was married to Johel’s sister and didn’t like their dog. Just about the coolest thing ever. Almost as cool as when my Spanish 1 & 3 teacher Mr. Garcia told us about how he used to frequent Ricky Martin’s house in Puerto Rico. Famous-people connections are pretty sweet.

After 5:00pm, Debra & I broke the rules and walked down the STR to see the flooding people were talking about. By then it had went down and the trail was passable. As I write, the rain has picked up to a solid clip, but I have my fingers crossed that the forest can be open tomorrow (there’s work that needs to get done!).

Al Gore’s son = laughing out loud. The day off also provided a good chance to stay hip on my current events, pop culture, and other happenings. That’s all for now, maybe a flood picture soon.

BP

Independencia

Actually felt the most patriotic today despite being out of the country on it’s most important holiday. Couldn’t find a firework or sparkler all weekend long, so I’ll have to go without. Tinny’s ankle was getting worse yesterday so the team made some switcharoos.

Amanda went with Tinny to the clinic in town as translator (I would have gone, but wasn’t feeling to confident with my Spanish in a medical setting). I joined Debra and Tommy Jones from Jones, Oklahoma in the LEP plot for some ‘boot camp’ seedling mapping.

Seedling mapping is a rough project lots of messing around on the forest floor and lots of getting cut up by all the spiky things that live down there. I definitely prefer shooting infrared lasers at my trees. As TJ and D shouted out species and coordinates I furiously wrote down every single one.

Rained the whole time except for a couple of hours around lunch. Finished a record 10 plots (1/10 ha) by around 3:00pm. As we were nearing completion, Amanda showed up after a successful trip to town with Tinny. A tape measure went missing (Amanda’s) and we’re pretty convinced the Bosques crew is having a blast messing with us.

In the field we saw two snakes including what we think was a baby Fer-de-Lance. Also saw a metallic bug that looked like it belonged in the insect museum from Friday. Other wildlife encounters included a spider that was built like a tank (the armored kind).

Tinny got a solid injection of some anti-inflammatory and some pills for the next few days. The shot made her fell better almost instantly and after a couple days of rest (and me writing down seedling data) we’ll be back out to Lindero Sur and hopefully right back on schedule. Amanda also tracked down boots for me in town that’ll be in on Friday. Good to put that behind me.

Crazy go nuts downpour the whole commute back. Threw on my jeans and goofed off in the office before walking to the comedor in pouring rain for our coffee break. Pretty sure this has been the rainiest day of my summer; welcome to the wet season. Among other realizations today, I though it would be awesome to work in a 3-week research trip here in intersession this January. It would also permit a trip to Costa Rica’s tallest peak.

Fourth of July was on my mind all day long and many other people seemed to have forgotten until I reminded them. Amanda brought gifts for us from Panama, which included a Panama shot glass and fun little bag. Sat and talked at dinner for a long time with Tinny, Karen, and Debra. Feel very jet-laggy right now and looking to hit the sack early.

Out with Team Baby Trees in the morning, hopefully a little less rain and definitely a nicer part of the plot to work in. A picture today because good hair is so essential to being fly. Ideally, less than a month to go, talk to y’all tomorrow.

BP

Botas

Part excited and part reluctant (growing up I always thought that word meant the opposite of what it really does) to get back to the field this morning. It really couldn’t have started out much worse. Sorry for complaining, but my boots disappeared over the weekend. Really couldn’t have many other things stolen that would bother me this much.

Pumped and ready to get out to the plot and I take a look at the boot rack and they just weren’t there. It was also kind of rainy most of the morning. Went with plan B for footwear involving gaiters and my hiking boots that have about 300 too many miles on them. Depressed and late I biked off.

Got to the plot with the task of finding another half hectare tucked away somewhere at the back of the property. Luckily, the Bosques crew began their census out there today and I got some quick directions and found it within a few minutes. Discovered that the plot begins just off the Lindero Sur about 200m from our typical entrance.

Took it kind of slow and finished with 54 or so trees out of the total half-hectare of 219, nice and tiny. Headed back to the lab at 2:45pm and enjoyed a nice hot shower and a thick layer of aloe gel. Forgot about the whole boots thing for a while to get through the rest of the day. Watched Sunday night’s Entourage with Debra, happy that Medellin is good (or at least has a good trailer), we think.

Spent a lot of time working on the vacation blog entry to get that up tonight and watched the first part of the Yanks’ shutout. After dinner we had a talk by Erin from U. Miami on big seeds, peccaries, and agoutis (glorified tropical squirrels). Beforehand, I dropped some laundry in and got back to switch machines.

Stayed up until 10:00pm finishing the laundry and blogging. Pretty uneventful day with a minor downside to be sorted out tomorrow (our great country’s 231st birthday).

BP

Vacaciones

So, sitting in the hostel in San Jose Thursday night, I couldn’t bring myself to waste precious vacation time and sit at the slow hostel computers and ensure all my readers of my well-being. Of course, I apologize for this, but you wouldn’t want to blog either. Rather than back track and provide y’all with a post each day, it’s all going to happen right here in a post that might take me a while, I’m bound to miss a few things. Enjoy.

Day 1 – Pizza (6/28/07)

Began the day getting haggled to join the baby trees people in the field to hold measuring tapes and stuff. Decided that the time would be best spent finishing the LEP data table and sending an update to Dr. Chazdon. Worked on all that up until noon then had a fine lunch. Packed up my weekend stuff in record time.

Around 1:20pm Amanda, Debra, Tinny, & I all hiked out the scorching kilometer out to the bus stop. Very efficient trip into the capital, straight 90 minutes. At the bus stop, stocked up on some colones and grabbed a taxi.

Exciting story #1. So, I have the directions down to this hostel as far as streets, nearby locations, and Tico directions. Hop in the taxi and schpeel some directions and the driver nods and then continues to ask me the name of the place for the next five minutes. Told him the hostel was 250m north of this park in San Jose and he seemed to be all set now.

A few more minutes of navigating San Jose’s genius one-way street system and the car stops. Driver says something to the effect, “It’s around here, no?” I respond with a “Well, what street are we on?” “7th” “But, señor, there’s a sign right there that says 5th street” “Oh” “I’m gonna hop out here”

Only a 100m or so to the hostel called Tranquilo Backpackers (my kind of place of course). Also happens to be right next to Bakea, the fancy restaurant we dined at my last time in the capital. Backing up, I only picked this hostel because they have free pancakes (over the one that charges a dollar for breakfast).

Grabbed a dorm room bed for $9/night in the basement, dropped my back and hopped on the horse up to 7th street books for a rendezvous. Only a 6-7 minute walk south in the part of San Jose I know pretty well (where to get a La Nacion, coffee, etc.). Met back up with the three girls and eventually Melqui.

Snap, I never introduced Melqui. Melqui has the coolest name if you hadn’t noticed (also “Melky” Cabrera). Amanda knows Melqui from the bat course she took here in February. Originally from Colombia, now San Jose, and moving to Monte Verde, Melqui has a job as a biologist in Monte Verde.

Thinking like a true sports fan, Melqui suggested we find a place for dinner where the Copa America was on. Good call, Paraguay/Colombia. Taxied from the center out to San Pedro to a restaurant called Il Pomodoro, which supposedly has the best pizza in San Pedro, if not the Metro area. Definitely lived up to the reputation.

The five of us got through a large veggie, a large cheese and a few brews. Some really good tomato sauce definitely made the pizza. Paraguay embarrassed Colombia. Afterwards, Tinny & Debra took a bus to the Wellesley apartment on the other side of town. I split a taxi with Amanda and Melqui to the center were Amanda was grabbing a bus to the airport.

Wished Amanda a good trip and decided to walk on back to the hostel. Interesting walk through the most interesting parts of town. McDonald’s on Avenida Central couldn’t have been busier. By the way, the most amazing weather ever in town. Constant breeze, mid seventies, mountain vistas.

At the hostel I watched the Argentina/USA game in the Copa America with a few people on the chill TV set up they have. Got a little sleepy after the long day, but decided to do some reading outside. Shot out to some hammocks on the front porch. Read for a little bit before dozing off. A little later the light on the porch went out.

Around 11:30pm, I decided it was a good time to hit the hay. Got up to the door to discover it locked. Ay! So at this point I’m trapped between a 10 foot wall and the hostel. Before seriously considering just climbing over the wall out to the street and then reentering the hostel, I did some knocking on the door to no avail.

As I’m about to just forget and climb over, a guy walks up and he offered to go inside to the desk and get somebody to save me from sure peril. So that was a little ten minute ordeal that worked out all right. This hostel was especially fond of playing loud music in the lobby until midnight or later, so it was tough to get to sleep right away.

And to think, that’s just one day!

Day 2 – Compras (6/29/07)

Had plans to meet Debra downtown for some goofing around at 11:00am, so I had some time to kill after waking up. Kicked it off by making myself a couple pancakes, super yum. Checked the old email quickly and set out into the city.

Grabbed a La Nacion (the big newspaper) and had a couple coffees at a nearby coffee shop. Took my time walking over to 1st & 6th since it was still early. This short Mexican dude walked up to me a little before 11:00am and gave me this great story (in English) about how he got in trouble trying to buy some pot the night before and he was here visiting his Dad.

Mildly entertained, I gave him a thousand colones and continued on to meet Debra. We took a quick walk through the Mercado Central and then on to the cool department store with the really good toy department. Here I found a Little Tikes wiffle ball set (with two balls!) and crayons (check and check).

From there Debra and I decided to walk to San Pedro. Turned out to be a long-ish walk, but we took pit stops at a small market (bought Imperial playing cards) and Bagelmen’s to read guidebooks and enjoy a big coffee. The check card was back to its usually moodiness and I’ve learned it ends up working if you ask people to try every credit card machine they have.

Our next stop was Mall San Pedro, where we did all the floors (4) and stopped in a few places. Interestingly enough, this mall as a food court on not just one floor, but three of them. Every fast food place imaginable, including the Quiznasty. Checked out their prices, not that much better than the states.

After the hour or so in the mall, we made the call to go see the campus of UCR (Universidad de Costa Rica). Since their academic year runs March-December, the campus was pretty lively. All the buildings look like they were built in the mid-80’s, which is probably true. Reading through the Lonely Planet, Debra suggested we visit the insect museum on campus.

Asked a few people for directions and then found a guy who was going near there. In the basement of the music building (where Debra didn’t think the people playing music should be going to college for music) we found a crazy grad student type who let us in. The Lonely Planet distinguishes this museum as the largest collection of insects in Central America.

Turned out to be about an 800 square foot room jam-packed with bugs. We saw butterflies and beetles and ants and wasps and lots of other cool insects. They were mostly organized into “bigger pictures.” Like a bunch a little bugs were organized so that the display case looked like a bigger bug. After touring the entire museum and seeing a picture of elephantiasis we booked it out of the museum.

Tried to use the ATM, but it didn’t feel like cooperating. Debra and I grabbed a bus back to the center were we used healthier ATMs, bought phone cards (once we sorted them out from lottery tickets) and went fly-shirt-shopping. Found a solid Hollister rip-off for 14 bucks. Dropped off my new belongings and changed quickly at the hostel.

Raced on back to 7th street books to meet Tinny and Katie (fellow Wellesley intern in San Jose) for dinner. We waited for about 30 minutes, then Debra went to call while I kept a lookout. Ten minutes later a cab pulled up with Tinny & Katie and we went to find Debra. Once reunited we decided to eat at Nuestra Tierra, Lonely Planet’s budget choice for the city.

Used my exceptional sense of direction (and map) to guide us to the restaurant. (I really didn’t think blogging this vacation would take so long) Looking over the menu, I found an option I couldn’t say no to. How the pizza the night before filled my American cravings, this meal filled my Tico cravings.

Quarter chicken (done to perfection), generous helpings of rice & beans, fried platanos, steamed veggies, salad, and an egg (yay!). All for seven bucks. Needless to say, I went to town on this casado campesino (country meal). Following dinner we scrapped plans to go to Moravia to see live music and decided to walk to Centro Comercial El Pueblo, more like Centro pub crawling.

Kicked around for a little while, went into a couple places. In this one, Café Arte Boruca, there was a guy on guitar who really liked playing the Rolling Stones. Soon after, called it an early night (12:00am) so that Debra could grab an early bus to the coast, and we were pretty tired. A quick walk back to the hostel were I went straight to bed.

Oh, and Tinny got her visa, so we’re good to go for the home stretch.

Day 3 – Viajar (6/30/07)

I doubt this could get any shorter, but I sure do enjoy writing all this down. Slept in as much as I could bring myself to and washed up quick. Grabbed a quick breakfast and coffee at a little café on my way over to the El Caribe bus stop. Aiming to catch the 10am to the southern Caribbean, I was told it was full and settled for a ticket on the 12.

With about 3 hours to kill, I decided to fudge it and take a taxi back to Avenida Central. Found a sweet department store where I bought jeans (yippideedooda), an Imperial t-shirt, and, of course, a $6 Green Bay Packers towel (gotta support my boy Brett Favre). With jeans checked off the list I was feeling pretty confident.

Also found some flip flops at a beachy, surfy shop for cheap and grabbed another taxi back to the bus stop (how lazy, but the backpack was getting heavy by now). Seating was assigned on the bus to Puerto Viejo de Talamanca (reputed as the hoppingest town on the shore). I actually got the best possible seat, the one right at the front with mad leg room.

Met Elena from Mt. Holyoke who was sitting next to me. She’s in the country for an education volunteery thing but is visiting PV de T for the week. Also found out we were planning to stay at the same place in town (Rocking J’s). Probably a 4.5 hour bus ride down to Puerto Viejo, but well worth the $6 and constant ocean views for the last 90 minutes.

Like after any long bus trip, felt all dirty and icky and tired. Walking the 800m to Rocking J’s with Elena, Karen came running towards us. Made some meeting up for dinner plans and continued on. I actually chose Rocking J’s for a less superfluous reason than the last one. Hammocks on the beach for $5/night.

Sequestered most of my belongings in the locker and had an amazing shower with newly purchased Garnier Fructis shampoo & conditioner (oops, that was a part of the jeans/flops/coffee adventure) (got pretty overcharged to, but my hair deserves it). Brushed the grillz and threw on my new jeans.

Now all this with the ocean smells and sound coupled with perfect (slightly warmer than San Jose) weather. Had a few to chill, so it was naptime (hmm…one word) in the hammock. Realized I really need to invest in a hammock, discover how to set it up in South C without getting busted, and enjoy the good life more often.

After a little confusion and searching, Elena & I found Karen on the main drag and we shot over to Stanford’s (motto=Si Conoces Stanford’s, Conoces el Caribe). Paid a little to much for a mediocre red snapper, but the atmosphere was chill and overlooked the ocean. Karen decided to retire early to her accommodations and Elena & I headed back to the hostel.

The moon was really bright this weekend so it was especially nice chilling on the beach and watching waves for a couple hours with Elena. Got pretty creeped out by loose dogs sneaking up behind me, even though I love dogs (ha). Now here comes the best sleep of my summer. 10:00pm quiet hours which everyone in the “hammock hotel” was cooperating with, sounds of the ocean, breeze, and of course, the hammock.

Never even caught myself trying to go to sleep, it was instant.

Day 4 – Uva (7/1/07)

People started getting there day on around 6:00am, but I stuck it out until 8:00am or so. Showered up and got ready for a full day of enjoyment. I had originally planned to travel on back to La Selva today and actually told Tinny that we would work Monday (oops). I just couldn’t bring myself to travel all that distance two days in a row, especially because I now found myself on a coast at 10 degrees latitude.

Got together my stuff and rendezvoused with Karen at 9:00am in the center of town. Grabbed an apple for breakfast from a street vendor and looked around for open internet places (no luck). Rented bikes (the super chill beach town kind with pedaling backwards as the brakes) from the first place we came to for $2 for 6 hours. Mine was big and yellow and Karen got a pink one, needless to say we were super styling.

Started our biking south down the coast. Later realized that we were only about 20km from Panama in Puerto Viejo and could have easily biked there, oh well. Other Panama news includes an old Survivor set on Bocas del Toro (an archipelago maybe 40-50km from Puerto Viejo). We ended up biking 7km to Punta Uva, supposedly the best swimming on the coast.

Parked the bikes and set out to work on my killer sunburn. At one point along our beach walk, Karen & I had about a whole kilometer of beach that we didn’t see a soul on. That was awesome, especially since the beach was completely postcard (picture on the way later this week).

Came to a chill spot and took a solid swim in the ocean. Absolutely perfect temperature and fun waves. Never really thought sunscreen was a genius idea at any point, but the sunburn has a sort of refreshing feeling to it. Also realized how cool it is on the shore, that you can so easily place yourself on a globe, right where the green meets the blue.

After our swim, we started walking back to the bikes. About halfway back we stopped for a juice break at one of the resort/hotel thingies scattered along the coast. Following our little break we were back to the bikes and feeling a little hungry. Biked back into town at a leisurely pace and hit up the supermarket for some serious hydration.

Ended up replacing lunch with two liters of mango juice (nutrition-wise, I don’t know where that falls). Returned the bikes around 1:30pm and went to find a shady spot on the beach in town. Did a little people-watching, a lot of beach-napping. Karen left to go for a run, I needed to get some sand off of me and we set dinner plans.

Had yet another amazing shower and continued my nap in the hammock until 6:20pm or so. Met back up with Karen and we found a 700 colones slice of pizza place. Few things about the pizza place. Must have been the best place in town since it always had people coming in and out. It was called Pizzeria Boruca and had an interior advertisement for Café Arte Boruca in El Pueblo (some kind of crazy connection there).

Took our pizza outside and got to bum the neighboring bar’s projection screen and watch Costa Rica play Nigeria in the U-20 World Cup. The U-20 World Cup was oddly enough being held in Victoria, British Columbia. Costa Rica got pretty embarrassed on the offensive side of the ball, but had a really good goalie that kept them in it. Lost it 1-0, not sure how the thousands of Canadian fans felt about that one.

It was probably a bit after 8:00pm now and we decided to walk through town and eventually just sat on the beach for three or four hours talking and watching awesome lightning off at sea. Also got a papaya ice cream cone. Made a four-legged friend who actually followed me through a walk through down and most of the way back to the hostel later on (dogs must like me).

Sometime after midnight I hit the hammock and had more amazing sleep. Quite a successful day without a doubt. Passed up the best weed in town, twice. Fell asleep dreading the next day.

Day 5 – Exploradores (7/2/07)

Travel day, boo. Think I got up around 6:30am and got to packing up my belongings, which grew substantially from the beginning of my trip. Checked out of the hostel (four nights of lodging= $28), and walked back up to the bus stop and waited for the ticket office to open. Found out the next bus wasn’t until 9:00am.

Went to get some coffee and pass the time. A little later on ran into Kelsey and a couple of her friends who were on their way from Puerto Viejo to Bocas in Panama. Kind of feeling a trip to Panama these days. After impatiently waiting for the bus, finally hopped on the departure for Limón, the major port on the Caribbean.

In Limón, had to walk across town (a city I would describe as completely devoid of gringos, or foreigners for that matter) to the other bus terminal. The city gets a terrible treatment from all of the guidebooks, even though it has the first baseball stadium I’ve seen in the whole country. Grabbed a nice little fried chicken combo for lunch and hopped on the 12:00pm express to Guapiles.

About a 2 hour ride to Guapiles where I had to wait almost another two hours for the bus to Puerto Viejo (de Sarapiqui). Luckily, I got to meet Costa Rican Boy Scouts on their way back from a weekend trip in the bus stop. That was cool, it’s nice being a part of an international organization.

Nice crammed bus to PV, it was place to go this day and this was the second bus for the time. Got off in front of La Selva and jumped right back into rain forest living. Showered and cleaned up the junk mail. Watched the Rocket pitch a gem on ESPN and was happy to be back to La Selva’s food.

Found Debra in the office, she had just gotten back. Called it an early night and hit the aloe gel and bed. Sleep did not compare to the hammock. And that was that, probably my longest getaway of my summer unless I convince myself to do something crazy in August, who knows…

BP

Carne

Felt like a piece of meat out in the field today, mad flies. Including these gold ones with beady green eyes that love to bite. At one point I had two chilling on my shoulder and I looked over. It was a deep stare; they were looking like they were ready to bite. Then, SLAP! It was a total two-fer, knocked them both down dizzy.

In addition to this fly problem I also kept on pissing off this big 1.5 inch spider by walking into his web. Basically he was pissed and I felt bad, but it was a solid web, so no damage was sustained. In other exciting news we finished 1.5 hectares today out of my total workload of 3 hectares. Pretty killer accomplishment, especially so since it cam 4 days ahead of schedule.

Out in the field until 3:00pm yesterday, back around lab around 3:35pm. Cleaned up, entered data, took a ‘Forrest Gump + coffee’ coffee break. Carried that right up until dinner. My Yankees are taking a serious beating on this road trip, just going to have to cheer more. After dinner, I finished all the data entry I had to do and went straight to bed because I still find myself yawning every morning in the field.

So being four days ahead of schedule and being half done, of course calls for a vacation. Leaving tomorrow afternoon on the 1:30pm, finding a cheap place to stay in San Jose, goofing around Friday, then who knows. It’d be a crime to plan more than two days ahead of time. Definitely choosing a place with internet, so don’t expect a lack of blogging.

Going to go to some toy stores and find a kickball, crayons, and wiffleball stuff. Summer will kick butt after that. That’s all I’m going to say for now, gotta crazy 24 hours ahead of me. Hasta!

BP

Lleno

Nothing like a good full day to feel back in the groove after two days without my trees. Amazingly reassuring to wake up to good weather and eggs! Checked the effectiveness of my treasure hunt (100% success). Also received a sweet thank you message on the computer to greet me.

Got on my turtle of a bike a few after 8:00 in a nice sunny drizzle. Once both Tinny & I got to the plot, we tore it up. Twenty trees in the first hour, then a half hour waiting out the rain. Reached our today-goal of 74 (I think) by 2:05pm with minimal problems or anything. Felt like going for the half hour trip back again but the legs just weren’t too fresh today (no more rainy days!!!).

Post-field stuff then spent an hour or so throwing around the squidgie (no relation to the cheese) (ca. Philmont 2006) with Tom (Grad at MSU) & Kelsey (Assistant on frog project) on the muddy soccer field. Got some dirt worked into the Salomons and worked up a schvitz. My hair was already being perfect today, so I didn’t bother to shower at this point.

Killed an hour before dinner in the office, eating an omelet sandwich, playing with batteries, normal stuff. Missed having a coffee break today, definitely seems to have an effect on my energy stock, yet I’m still going strong at 9:30pm today. For dinner, had what could only be described as if you put eggs and ketchup on top it would be the perfect breakfast (nothing treasure hunt worthy this time).

Check some scores after food and then went to a lecture by Chip (Grad from UGA) about streams, stream ecology, and biogeochemistry. That about sums it up, I’m a couple days behind on data entry. Looks like the whole team (Amanda (to Panama), Debra, Tinny, & Me (???)) will be out of here for a few days beginning Thursday. More news tomorrow, perhaps.

Regarding the picture comments. I’ve been doing this thing called work, so not too many pics have been snapped. And, yes the camera does have a boo boo, but it is operational. Tomorrow I’ll get on the picture thing, maybe, ha.

Karen & I have brainstormed a celebration for the 4th which doesn’t really celebrate Independence, just our culture. Ideally it will include kickball, wiffle ball home run derby, apple pie, and sparklers (materials for this is a good reason to hop into the city Thursday) (along with jeans, dang I miss jeans) (and the inspiration continues with today’s picture of chicken and real cheese on a bagel).

Good night all! (maybe I can make a post where there are more words in parentheses than paragraphs)

BP

Problemas

In two words, rough morning. So there’s this thing, go out batting and get nice and wet and cold too. Get back to the cabina, shower, but still have that little chill. Throw on a fleece and snooze the night away. Since I’m so warm and cozy, the morning bite of cold doesn’t wake me up on time. Slept until 7:10am and then franticly began my rough morning.

This, my 45th day at La Selva, I have only missed breakfast a total of one times. All 43 of those other breakfasts had some form of eggs, today, however only had loads of fried squeedgie cheese. Squeedgie cheese, you ask, I answer, you don’t really want to know. So there’s the first dinger to the routine morning.

Didn’t see Tinny over there so got ready and headed to the office, oh, yea, meanwhile it starts pouring. Hi wet season. Tinny left me a note saying that she took off at 7:35am, time now = 7:50am. And of course the point where I was about to call off the field day for the crappy weather that showed no signs of stopping.

Rushed to prep the data book and switch the backpack (which is getting some serious wear down here, finally it will stick out from the rest of the North Facers on campus) from bat stuff to tree stuff (tree stuff is way cooler by the way). All this is intermixed with the bikes being locked and one of us over the weekend losing the key.

Took a pretty solid chunk of time to sort through that when Jeanette (Bosques assistant) offered her bike for me to go find Tinny in the rain and for real call it off (still pouring). Biked away like a bear was chasing fresh salmon in my pack (what a bad simile). Found Tinny out at SJ 1200 or so, and that was that. Came back to the lab looking just like I do after a full day out there, so, of course, I showered (and ate an omelet sandwich, can’t break routine).

Got to a little bit of data entry and thought before being swept away on a three-hour coffee break with team baby trees (including lunch). This has to be the most I’ve ever talked about my pre-noon activities, too bad they weren’t too exciting. Lunch got followed by some office/porching/laundry-ness.

Also watched last night’s episode of Entourage with Debra, seriously haven’t laughed that much in the longest time. Too bad some of my favorite quotes wouldn’t pass the PG rating we maintain here at the blog. Amanda & Debra shot off for off-site batting, I kicked some data’s butt. I always feel so behind my work, even though I’m not, such a school feeling.

Tinny got in some bike practice before dinner, I decided a rainy day off definitely called for some Monday night baseball. Panicked slightly when I lost ESPN, all good in the end, got to watch a 13 inning thriller at Shea. Karen dropped in after dinner. Kelsey, Tom, & Isabel were having a special pasta dinner in the lounge. They had left over food, and I got served a full plate of alfredo on the couch. Now there’s something that hasn’t happened in a long time.

This post is actually going up Tuesday, but don’t tell anybody, extra innings just took the fight out of me. Backing it up just a little bit, we had quesadillas for dinner (with peccary!!!). I live with a simple theory that people should not miss out on quesadillas, so I smuggled two back for the faithful batters.

Being my creative self, I couldn’t just leave quesadillas for them to eat, that’d be way too easy. Decided to play the treasure hunt card; used a different joke about bats on each landmark. The hunt led to the fridge where I left the yummy goodness. That made me feel pretty good about myself after a tumultuous (for the tropics) day. Bedzies (good old zees).

BP

Musculo

Free day, which definitely called for reading and lots of coffee. Slept in to about 8:00am and hopped over to the comedor after cleaning up. Made some killer iced coffees for myself and enjoyed the wonderful weather on the outdoor couches. Amanda rolled up a couple hours later and I walked out to the guard station for an errand.

She was also meeting this dude at the highway at 10:00am and brought me along as her muscle (made me feel all tough and stuff, haha). Guy never showed. Walked on back to the comedor and continued the coffee break right up until lunch. We had these awesome freshly fried tortilla chips with a rice concoction, yum.

A quote from the way back to the station: Amanda (as we are about to jump over a runoff ditch-thingy): “I need to start jumping over more of these things so I get braver.”

Spent the early part of the afternoon chilling in and around the office with Debra & Amanda. Got myself all ready to head off to Lindero Sur for batting tonight. Rain or shine this time, unfortunately, rain. And everybody knows that cats don’t like to come out in the rain, so no super exciting sightings tonight.

Had a couple of solid slip and falls on the trips there and back. Including one as I was hiking along thinking about how I only take spills on fairly easy sections of trail and not the more difficult ones (Smack!). More puddle-hopping that actually hiking on the way back, amazing bike ride back in the dark; only fell off the pavement twice.

Got greeted at the office by the news that my Yankees lost again and Beckett out dueled Peavy (would have loved to see that one). All in all a really great day, including a nice nap under my jacket during the heaviest of the rains. Oh, good news, we did catch two bats, which is actually two more than they caught the last time at that plot. At 10:00pm is was coming down pretty good and Amanda made the call to pack up. Got to bed at 12:30pm. Hasta.

BP

Cerro

Just realized I’m getting over the hump here; been here six weeks, one day and ideally will only stay another six weeks. It really feels like quite a long time and this alternate summer is beginning to grow on me. Lately I’ve savored routine and that keeps me going through most days.

Funny enough, all I tend to write about these days is routine. After an amazing sleep, from which I didn’t wake until 7:00am, I was chilled by the pitter patter of rain on the roof. It seems that nothing gets me more down these days than rain. This might turn into an issue considering it is the rainforest.

My walk over to breakfast, of course, contained the period of heaviest rain and I got a little damp. All in all today was a great day; everything fell into place quite well. Tinny expressed her desire for the rain to continue, I duly shunned that desire. Cleared on up around 8:00am and that got us started on a wonderful field day.

Probably started work some time before 10:00am with a light load of 57 trees on the top part of the hill. Starting to notice the effect of microtopography on the canopy structure. Trees on hillsides are not as tall as the trees in the lowest parts. They just don’t need to be since the hill gives them so much height. Dr. Chazdon is also interested in this effect so that’s pretty sweet.

Enough science tidbit for one day. With six trees to go, the batteries in the rangefinder bit the dust. Left the plot at 1:35pm and made it back to the station at 2:05pm, quite solid for a muddy mile hike and 3.8km bike ride. Got harassed by team baby trees for a little while and settled down for an omelet sandwich. Realized today, that I might be getting sick of eggs, ouch.

First good coffee break in a long time. I made my best coffees yet; threw in a little extra love this time. Tinny joined us a short while later and we got to wish exotic meats man Steve a farewell as he left for Little Rock (nice name for a city). The average coolness of researchers at La Selva just took a serious plunge, good thing I’m sticking around.

Yanks lost a nail-biter in the 13th do my despair. Karen made brownies with sprinkles this afternoon, which nicely coincided with ice-cream-for-dessert night at the comedor. Smushing a nice soft brownie into liquidy ice cream was quite a treat. Way to go Karen. Did some table-hopping to talk with some more cool kids. Forgot to drink coffee again, bad Ben bad.

Threw on kicks and pants and hit the mean streets of PV with Debra & Amanda for some Saturday night cultural exposure. Met some pretty interesting people, saw some familiar faces, all in all a decent outing. Didn’t get to bed until after 3:00am, time to start sleeping more. Tomorrow will hopefully include lots of coffee and batting in cat country (finally!, maybe, sort of weather dependent). 19-5/6 years tomorrow, whoopideedooda!

BP

Cansado

After hitting the hay at 2:00am or so after batting last night, got up at 6:30 to go hit the field. Lack of sleep combined with a sober coffee day had me deep in the yawnzies. Got started on measurements in Lindero Sur, our youngest forest plot at the back of the property.

By 2:30pm Tinny and I finished a little less than 70 trees on a rough hillside that begins the plot, good thing it looks a lot flatter for the rest of it. I saw a little snake that didn’t look too happy to see me, and some baby frogs. Tinny saw a little black cat scamper through the woods. Hopped on my horse on the way back to supposedly do “data entry.” Upon arriving back, I was dragged across the bridge in my field stench and moistness to watch a bunch of 25-year-olds destroy a piñata, good times.

Really didn’t have the energy for typing numbers for a half hour so I joined some other lazy folks on the porch, chatted it up, read some book. Had an eventful dinner with grumpy German bat dude who has it out for Amanda. Solid conversation revolving around themed bars in Berlin (Germany).

Enjoyed some office chill time and dropped some laundry. By 9:10pm I was 100% ready for bed than remembered my stupid laundry that was keeping me awake. At 9:40pm I rushed over to the machines, threw it all in a bag, carried it over to the cabina and passed out. Boring boring boring post, I know, might try to kick it up a notch in the coming weeks so I don’t lose readers (what a tragedy that would be).

Pledged that I will get back to drinking coffee tomorrow and lined up another solid field day in cat country. Amanda leaves Thursday for a mini-vacation to Panama City, Tinny also goes to San Jose later this week for some visa business. Got to pack in as much field work as possible these days. Hasta luego.

BP

Termino

Done! With one hectare anyway, I’ve been dying to finish up all week and it finally happened today, only one day ahead of time. Jumping right into the next plot tomorrow morning. Experienced our first bicycle crisis that involved me renting a bike and a blown tube 2k out. Somehow we’ll make do.

Finished rechecking 45 trees today, found 6 or 7 that needed to be done for the first time including a freshly dead one (yay!, mortality). Hopped out of the plot for the last time in a while around 1:10pm and got back to the lab by 1:29pm, the real commute starts tomorrow. Hurried up the cleansing process to make the 2:00pm coffee break.

Sat through a ferocious rain storm at the comedor and slurped down 4 coffees. Chops made the call to forego Lindero Sur for tonight due to sketch weather, probably a good call. Instead I convinced myself it’d be a good idea just to tag along to the Finca el Bejuco to bat. Began with a scrumptious omelet sandwich and a solid 90 minutes of sitting in the rain.

Got the nets opened and caught a whopping two bats before 10:00pm when we packed things up. To make up for the dull night of batting I broke a dead tree and fell smack on the ground and got bitten up by some angry ants. Fell about 3-4 more times on the way back to the car. Saw a paca on last leg of our drive back. That’s gonna be a night y’all.

BP