The South Country...

So over the last week I have been traveling along the Pacific side of Costa Rica. Heading south from Monteverde I spent a few days in far southern Costa Rica in Sierpe, a quaint little town. It maybe has about 800 people or so, is surrounded on 3 sides by the Sierpe River/Estuary, and that is where things get really interesting. As by definition (I think), an estuary can flow both ways… no Mom I have not figured out how to make water flow up hill. The river is affected by the tides so it flows upstream when the tide is coming in and downstream when it is going out. That happened every day when we were there and the first time I saw it I nearly flipped. Just the concept of a river flowing backwards is peculiar to think about.

So this town also had a roller skating rink… I know crazy… I thought that Costa Ricans were only into soccer. So after dinner we showed up at this rink to do some skating, thinking that we might be joined by a couple of Ticos. Oh my were we in for a surprise. When we got there I am pretty sure every youngster from town, 6-18 was there. So not only were there over 100 kids rolling around, but they were GOOD. We aren’t talking about Cedar Rapids “Super Skate” kids or people who go to the Ogden Roller Rink. These kids were speeding around on the pretty tight circle, doing spins, backwards tricks, jumps, slides and stuff I can’t even describe. They must be there every night that it is open practicing.

This roller rink made me think once again about home little people in the US appreciate the community resources that are available. We as a western society have too much, so we don’t care for, or even use what we have. The people of Sierpe loved their roller rink. It was all they had and it brings them, or at least the children together in a drug free, energetic, blood moving way. We need to realize this again.

Sierpe is located about an hour away from the coast, as the river goes. And the river goes very curvy most of the time, winding thought mangrove forest swamps. And this is why we arrived there… for the mangroves. Most likely you don’t even know what a mangrove forest is, but here is a good depiction of a “Tea Mangrove” swamp that we were in.

But why Mangroves you say? Well for the mussels of course. We went mussel hunting, and let me tell you it isn’t very easy. “Piangueros” is what they call mussel hunters because they hunt for “peanguas.” To hunt for these small shells you have to get down, sometimes on your hands and knees, and stick your fingers into the mud, between the roots of the mangroves, and down the strange holes that you find in the mud. Sometimes you are in up past your wrists in tight bundles of roots. All the time you are in a muddy mess. I must say that my toe-ed shoes were perfect for this task. Mud, water and the like don’t hurt them, and my feet were protected from the sharp, hard roots. Oh did I mention that the tide was coming in and was going to leave the land we were standing on over a meter deep in water? So it was quite an experience, and for the sake of my fingers and nails, I would choose not to do it again. But you should try for an hour if you get the chance.

After the collection, we cleaned up with a splish-splash in the estuary which was filling up with seawater and jumped into our enormous pontoon boat to count and measure each piangua. There are regulations on the size that you can take and that is no smaller than 4.7 cm wide, if I remember correctly. That is what the following picture is of.

For lunch we boated to the coast, and the small village of Boca Zacate. Let me tell you, the dining was second to none. This community, as with many of the communities along the coast, is disconnect, only reachable by boat, and actually is located within the protected mangrove zone (yes illegal, but nothing is done about it). They as a community have had some trouble recently though with drug trafficking. During multiple encounters, threats were made to the community members directly from these drug movers carrying large weapons, and at one point people were shot and injured. Although it is in justice, this community cannot do anything about it except move. The drug traders are most likely looking to this location for a relay point for drugs dropped off the coast from boats, and left tossed up on shore by the waves. This is very sad to hear, especially when many of the women who were born and raised in the community, said that they would not leave the village no matter what because of its significance. If possible, please pray for this strong individuals and their safety. They were so hospitable to make lunch for the 16+ of us that I wish I could do more than pray, but I know that prayer will be the most significant.

A panorama of one of the homes right next to the rising tide... it doesn't get much higher though, thank goodness.

This little guy lived on the beach with the people of Boca Zacate... isn't he cute.

We got back late from this adventure and most of us were pretty well sun burnt… I know I was… so we pretty much crashed at the hotel we were staying at along the Sierpe River after a bit of a lecture and discussion about the activities of the day.

Some other activities that I won’t go into detail about include visiting a hydroelectric development project in Buenos Aires, CR (not Argentina). This project was only in the design stage so there is not physical work being done, thus no pictures. I do want to say though that unless we as a civilization design better ways to dam rivers without disrupting fish and sediment movements, we should stop doing it and find other solutions to our energy problems. I was once a fan of hydroelectric at one point, but now all I can think of are design solutions to its many problems.

On the way out of Sierpe on Friday the 5^th we stopped by an African Oil Palm plantation for our Sustainability and the Environment class. This was a eye opening experience because we watched as people cut down these African oil palm fruits from 30ft tall trees. Oh yeah, since you don’t know what that is just imaging a 100+ pound mass of “hurt” with spines coming at you. It is a dangerous job, and that is just the start. Then they have to move these large fruits to pathways by hand, and then get each one up into a semi-truck bed. Thus by consequence there were some pretty muscular men working at this plantation. Now what is this palm fruit used for… everything from cosmetics to biodiesel of course. You would most likely recognize it the form of palm oil used for cooking.

Lastly, for those who went with me to CR in 2006… do you remember the alligators named George Bush and Saddam Hussein? Well I don’t think they are around anymore, or maybe they just changed their names, because no one knew when I asked. But yes we did stop to see the gators on our way north from Sierpe. Don’t we look like such Gringos in this picture!

These are some animals that I found throughout the week. The orange seed is a piece of the Oil Palm fruit too.














OH MY... ask me a about this tree, or should I say multiple trees and how amazing they were to climb. Not to mention how cool they look growing around this old bus stop looking concrete structure.

This is a Tico version of those tree faces that are found in the US. You know the ones with two eyes, a mouth and nose that you hang from trees. Can you see the eyes in this one?