Wednesday, February 11, 2015

In The Rain Forest

Tenorio Rain Forest 2015-02-10 1

Long day trip yesterday with the superb 3 Monkies tour company, the best in Guanacaste Province. We have used them on all of our trips to Tamarindo. This time the itinerary was the rain forest on the Pacific side of the Tenorio volcano (lots of those here) and the Llanas de Cortez waterfall.

We drove from the provincial capital of Liberia down the Panamerican Highway, up a secondary road to the town of Rio Naranjo (Orange River), then up five miles - at least - of really bad road to the Heliconias Lodge in the rain forest. It's dry season here but the woodland is still lush. Our guide took us on a strenuous walk up and down the mountainside, through the canopy and over four suspension foot bridges.

Along the trail our guide spotted this brilliant millipede. These are after-and-before pictures. It was wandering down the trail, happy as can be, but quite vulnerable to predatory birds. Our guide explained that some birds can suck them down like a piece of spaghetti. The sound of our feet made it curl up into a pinwheel, too wide for a bird's throat.

Mrs. C wonders if millipedes were the inspiration for the Slinky.                              

Tenorio Rain Forest 2015-02-10 2

5 comments:

Olivier said...

je viens de trouver ce que c'etait "Slinky", en effet c'est un bonne question ;o))

s.c said...

In the first photo you see where the fossils come from. In the blue belgium hard stone what is often in use here in the Netherlands you find these pinwheels everywhere. Wonderful that it still survives after who knows so much million years.

PerthDailyPhoto said...

Just one of the many strange creatures you'll see on your trip I bet Bob.

William Kendall said...

Quite a critter. I'd wondered what it might be.

Jack said...

I hate to tell you, Bob, but the brown version of those things continually sneak inside the Naples house. After the first week, one gets used to them.