La vida silvestre

I’ve just completed day 5 at La Hesperia. It’s really a rather phenomenal place operated by some pretty admirable people. The philosophy behind it all is already up on the website, which I will be redesigning and rewriting at some point, so I won’t get into it here.

Instead I’m just going to show you some photos of some of the cool wildlife I’ve managed to capture with my new camera. I’m really digging this Panasonic Lumix.

Compared to Australia everything here in the cloud forest is rather benign. But I’m sure it wouldn’t be much fun to get stung by this scorpion we found on the bathroom floor last night.

A group of exchange students from Boston University came up with their ecology professor for the weekend and we managed to find a brain living in this sea shell.

And this mariposa crystal.

Of course I have to talk about some of the birds. They are spectacular and come in a kaleidoscope of different colors.

Not a great picture, but these aracari were right outside my room having some sort of jousting competition.

I expected to see all sorts of exotic colorful birds, but not this little plain thing. It’s a Swainson’ Thrush, which I see in my backyard in Durham every spring and fall migration. Small world.

So this post is a bit misleading as I’ve been doing quite a bit more than just hunt exotic wildlife. In a post coming soon to a computer screen near you there will be some pictures of the chicken pen I’ve been helping build and the yukka I’ve planted. I should also be getting around to introducing some of the cool people I’ve met. The BU students left today, but were replaced by a group of 15 from Toronto with whom I’ll be helping build a school this week. There are 7 longer-term volunteers here at the moment who collectively represent 5 countries. I’ll likely be spending a good whack of time trying to source more volunteer talent.

That’s all for now.

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