Around the Arenal volcano and on to Santa Elena: Macadamia nuts and nighttime nature

We left La Fortuna and had a long scenic drive, circling the Arenal volcano and its lake, to Santa Elena, our home for the next two nights. Along the way we saw a sloth. Yes, he or she is that blob in the centre of the tree.

Stopped for coffee and cake at a place where the ground was littered with macadamia shells. I had a most delicious macadamia nut muffin as well as part of a cinnamon roll, the latter in memory of my father. The green specks atop these macadamia nut shells are bits of leaves carried by leafcutter ants.

The view from the cafe:

Another sloth!

We arrived at our Santa Elena lodgings at lunchtime, and had most of the afternoon free. Saw this sign on the way into town; never got a chance to see if it was true...

We headed toward the Ranario, the Frog Pond, but we did not go in because we were told the amphibians were all asleep! The place is open till 8:30 and it's best to go in the late afternoon or evening, so our timing was not right. So I just took some photos of Luke outside.

We heard some rustling in the bushes when we were passing someone's house, and it turned out to be a coatimundi, stealing a couple of bananas from a huge bunch the people had sitting next to their porch. These photos are by Luke; I couldn't get my camera out quickly enough. This is the most we saw of the thief's face...

Outside an ice cream shop (yes, macadamia nut ice cream!) we met Gigi's Costa Rican cousin. He was very friendly.

At 5:30 pm, we went on a night hike in the cloud forest. Most of my photos are just a psychedelic greenish blur, as we often could not use flash.

Luke's long lens worked better in the dark; the next three photos are his:

However, the leafcutter ants did not seem to mind a flashlight shone upon them. I should have taken a photo of the "Ant Crossing" sign next to the path.

A leaf with legs; yes, it is a bug!

No photos or videos of what were the two most exciting sightings for me; first, an olingo frolicking about at the top of a tree. You can see what I'm talking about here. And here's a photo of a baby olingo, just because you can probably never see enough photos of baby olingos.

Then, some long-nosed fruit bats drinking from a hummingbird feeder. They would not come if there was any light, but you could see their outline in half light; they hovered at the feeder almost like hummers do.

Here's a photo of what we saw:

 (This is from http://www.mammalwatching.com/Neotropical/neotropiccostarica.html  which has some really great photos and information on Costa Rican mammals. Interestingly enough, the guy who did that web site - full of great bat photos - failed to see an olingo, although he saw my other favorite, a kinkajou!)