Sharing the road...

Leaving Zancudo Beach, Costa Rica to return to Panama. I love the small dirt roads and the ranchers you find herding their livestock. Something you don't see in the states.
He was just too cute, had to get a closeup. I think he was making eye-contact, don't you?

some sights in Botanical Gardens

When I first arrived here at Wilson's Botanical Gardens in Costa Rica, I walked through my room and onto the deck overlooking the gorgous gardens and trees. I was wondering how long would it take for me to see something really cool. I am staring into the trees and right in front of me, kind of hidden inside the tree was this beautiful long tailed bird. I had only been there less than 5 minutes!! I looked it up and its a Blue Crowned MotMot. A good sized bird with a beautiful long tail. And my stay here was only just beginning!
In front of my balcony I could see these Agouti running around. I think a family of them lived under the large tree because every once in awhile a mom would come out with her twin babies. Too cute for words. They Agoutis here are very happy as their favorite food is the palm nut and this botanical garden has one of the largest collections of palms in the world.
Always one of my favorite flowers. Passion Flower. I had these growing at my home in Cambria California when I lived there. One of these days I will plant them at my new home (where ever that will be!)

Coatimundi and me

I was walking in the door and I happened to look over to my right and there was this animal, long and kinda big, sniffing around the side yard around 10 feet away. An animal I have never seen before. I hurried through the door (needless to say) and grabbed my camera. Seems this fella is a common visitor in the neighborhood. When he saw me he stood up on his back paws like he was begging. Reminded me of a VERY LARGE raccoon. Quite a cutie, and I guess nothing to be fearful of, although I would not hand feed him. ha. He has a snozzola sort of like a pig.
Everyday is an adventure here!

Lots to tell!!

I have been in Panama now for 1 whole week and have not had time to blog till now. So much has been happening.

I will start this first post with my first 3 days in Panama City. After an 11 hour plane trip I went to a "casual" hotel in the city. Hotel La Estancia was enjoyable, but my room was more like a hostel as I had to go across the hall to get to the bathroom. And that meant there was no air conditioning in the Bano!! and no window, so it was more like a steam room while putting my clothes back on to go back across the hall to my room!  No complaining here, I am a sport!!! OK, I did do some complaining while in the john, but returned to all smiles when going back to my air-conditioned room.

High points while there, was the hotel advertised having sightings of sloths and monkeys in the trees from the guests. I thought this would be great, but then thought when I arrived (not wanting to be tooo disappointed) that it was probably all an advertising line. But, hold on, whats that big dark thing in the tree. Right outside my private balcony was a sloth hanging maybe 15' away!!! Unbelievable!! That was my first sloth sighting ever. Wow, they really did mean what they said! It was very cool and it actually moved faster than I thought they could. Not fast by any means, but definitely quicker than a crawl.

And then the next day, I discovered 2 monkeys swinging on the hanging bananas right across from the balcony. Little Capachin(sp) monkeys, their faces were about the size of a ping pong ball. The birds did not like them eating their bananas and I kid you not, they dove into the monkeys actually hitting them hard, I really think I could hear it, until after a bit the monkeys left. The birds were much smaller than the monkeys, thats what made it so striking.(no pun intended).