The main thing I wanted to see during the Costa Rica stop of my Panama Canal Cruise was animals & fun birds. Unfortunately due to my knees and back, all the more adventurous excursions like hiking in the Cloud Forest were out. Also, there was that whole snake thing.
So I ended up booking this excursion that took us out on boats to look for crocodiles and birds. It was low-key, not much walking, and leaned heavily on the bird watching part. Which, now that I’m in my 50s, I’ve hit my bird watching era, so yay! Plus throw in some crocodiles, and seeing the countryside, and it seemed perfect.
We started off with a 30 min or so drive to this store / butterfly farm / tourist mashup where we saw butterflies, had a chance to try exotic fruit like mango – ooooh – and of course have a chance to buy stuff. I naturally bought nothing.
The butterflies were cool, but it was so packed in there you could barely move. My pictures came out blurry as they wouldn’t stop flying around. 🙂
After more driving, we arrived at the Jungle Crocodile Safari, boarded our boat, and headed out on the Tárcoles River. We were given a bird guide and the guide would call out the type of bird which was super helpful. Sadly we didn’t see any scarlet macaws, but did see: Anhinga, Roseate Spoonbill, Great Blue Heron, Tiger Heron, Little Blue Heron, Tricolor Heron, Snowy Egret, Cattle Egret, Great Egret, Bare Throated Tiger Heron, Osprey, and lots of other little birds he never called out.
Very quickly, we also spotted some crocodiles. There were smaller ones out of the water, various ones in the water, and later a ginormous one we got really close to.
We also saw Iguanas and Jesus Christ Lizards (Common basilisk). And later a turtle, and horses!?
We also tooled around the river and went out to where the river meets the Pacific Ocean.
And that was about it. Unfortunately we didn’t see any sloths or spider monkeys, but that was quite alright. All in all a good excursion and I was over the moon I got out animal watching in Costa Rica!
