Costa Rica 2017: Days 1-3

Buenos Días from Costa Rica!

We’ve finally made it to our VA country and wow a lot has passed!

8/14/2017

Last night when we arrived in San Jose, we were greeted with Costa Rican “winter” weather: a constant downpour of rain… When I checked the Apple Weather app, it would apparently rain during our entire time here! Thankfully, the rainy weather only lasts from late afternoon to evening time.

We got up early in the morning to enjoy a wonderful breakfast made by our host, Vicky Ortega!

Then, we made our walk over to the Maximo Nivel institute for our orientation, enjoying the views of the city along the way!

During our orientation, our guide Nina (fun fact: Derek and Nina went to the same high school) gave us information about the country’s culture, safety tips, emergency contacts, and all that other exciting orientation information.

What truly got me pumped about this trip is the Arribadas: a rainy season that usually lasts three days in which literally thousands of sea turtles would come up on to the beach and lay their eggs! We were lucky enough to arrive at a time where there’s a good chance for this natural phenomenon would occur… fingers still crossed!

The day was still young after our orientation, so our group explored the city of San Jose, finding amazing sights and meeting interesting people!

When we were looking to buy mosquito nets, we met another traveler. He was a British middle-aged man who seemed pretty happy to talk to us! He stressed the importance of finding a moment to just be alone, take in your surroundings, and try to reach a moment of revelation…

We ended our day with a very fun and tiring Salsa dance class! Though after that, I guess my moment of revelation was that I am a very poor dancer!

8/15/2017

We got up even earlier today to take a bus to our mainstay for the trip: Ostional. This was a draining, crowded 7-hour bus ride, but I’d like to think our spirits were still undeterred.

We arrived to the small coastal town, lugging our bags down a beaten path to the conservation station. Nina introduced us to the project coordinator, Jairo. He will be scheduling shifts for us while we are here. We also met other volunteers: Maggie, Ben, and Tarek who are staying for a longer time.

Reed and I then met up with our host family’s mother to get settled in to our new home, 75 meters north of the station. Her name is Nery Para Reyes, an owner of a small hotel in which we will be staying in. She also has a three-month-old puppy named Osita who quickly found a place in my heart!

It was already late evening at that time, but Jairo organized a time for us to go see the turtles! Even more good news: the arribadas were occurring this week while we are here! You’ll have to take my word for it now until I can show y’all with a picture, but during that evening, there were hundreds of sea turtles out laying their eggs. There were so many that I had a hard time to not walk into one!

8/16/2017

Today we begin our first night shift of the trip! Before we do that, the group meets up at 2:00 to go over another general orientation, specifically about the turtles that we are working with. The majority of the turtles that we will encounter are Olive Ridleys, also called Loras!

There are seven stages to their egg laying process: 1. Arrival on the beach 2. Finding a spot to dig oneself into 3. Dig hole to lay the eggs 4. Lay eggs from anywhere from 50 to over a hundred eggs 5. Cover eggs with the sand 6. Camouflage the spot 7. Return back to the ocean. This process usually takes 45 minutes – 1 hour but can be longer.

Our job for our night patrol was to find turtles in stage 3, count how many eggs were laid, measure the turtle, and finally tag it if not tagged already.