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Limón, Costa Rica

Today we were in Costa Rica. Our ship came in to the city of Limon and we headed south to Puerto Viejo. We had a local guide again, named Mario, who found us an eagle and sloth on the way. We went to a wildlife rehabilitation center called the Jaguar Rescue Center. It was started by a couple of biologists about a decade ago. They take in wildlife with the goal of returning all that they possibly can back to the wild.

Walking into the center, we were greeted by a toucan. He was friendly and let us get quite close. Our tour through the center started with a caiman and central American venomous snakes. They had parrots, hawks, owls, another toucan, and a blue-gray tanager that kept landing on people and hanging out for a while. The tanager has been there since it was very small and apparently really likes people. The center is not covered and any of the birds that are able to fly could leave at any time. We also saw some red-eyed tree frogs.

The center has quite a few sloths. We got to learn how to tell the difference between two-toed and three-toed sloths outside of counting their toes (the two-toed sloths have more bulbous pink noses). A couple of them were active, in a sloth sense, and we got to watch them climb around and eat. In with the sloths were a couple of cassowary.

The Jaguar Rescue Center does not currently have any jaguars or other large cats. They do, however, have a smaller cat called a Margay. It’s probably about 30 lbs and spotted. He was beautiful! His name is little devil in Spanish and we were told that he lives up to the name and can be difficult to handle. They have released him 3 times already, but we were told that within 3 days he shows up back at their front gate. Apparently he appreciates the easy life.

The grand finale of the tour was spending time in an enclosure with young primates, mostly howler monkeys. We weren’t allowed to pick them up, but we could touch them and if they came up to us to be held or wrapped their prehensile tails around us we were allowed to hold them. First off, their prehensile tails were interesting. Since they use them to hang and swing the bottom of the tip of the tail is flat and, instead of fur, is covered in thick skin. They’re perfectly happy to hang by their tails and, in fact, I got to hold one this way. Secondly, they’re quite mischievous animals. We couldn’t take anything in with us as they will take and likely destroy anything they can get their hands on. This includes hats, glasses, jewelry, and cameras. For a while I literally had a monkey on my back, hanging out. Another one was using a rope to swing across the enclosure. They were definitely entertaining.

We strongly recommend going on a tour at the Jaguar Rescue Center if you make it to this area of Costa Rica. They clearly are knowledgeable and take good care of the animals plus it is fun to see these critters up close.

After we left the rescue center, we returned to Limon for some lunch. We also had some important must-do-in-Costa-Rica errands. One was to go to a grocery store to pick up Emily’s favorite Costa Rican candy, Yipy bars. The other was to head to Pops, a local ice cream chain. It’s the only place that I can get guanabana ice cream, plus their chocolate is excellent as well.

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