Wet Season Begins

Wet season is supposed to hit its peak in September around here, rain some more in October, and be done by mid February. This year, however, the rain decided to start in November with only a little bit of rain in October (I was not here in September, but hear it was relatively dry). When I say rain, I am not talking your Seattle drizzle, but more your hurricane weather with weaker wind. Let me put it this way, I was on the beach for six hours during the first night of rain and could not see the bright lights of Tamarindo and the power was not out. Also, Jim and I were sitting in the middle of the beach taking our break when a leatherback came up not even 8ft from us. We neither heard nor saw it, only felt a few thumps which I thought was Jim finally sitting down instead of standing. Needless to say, by the time we saw her she was well into her nest chamber. This ninja turtle was done in under an hour, the whole nesting process usually takes about 2hrs, and we almost missed her because of the rain.

Eggs sticking out of a scarp due to high tides from the storm (fortunately these hatched)

That first night of rain we also had some professors from Cornell College (Iowa) come to the beach for patrols. The two ladies dipped out during the first run because of the rain, one of the ladies had a stroke a couple years ago and struggled to make it up and down the beach at night holding my arm the whole time, I think she might have left more frustrated than annoyed by all the rain. She however, was a trooper the first run. With the ladies not wanting to patrol, Jim had to come patrol the North end with me because you can not patrol alone, and it happened to put us in perfect position to be where the leatherback came up during our break over 40min late. Otherwise, there is a high possibility the turtle would have been missed.

Bats inside of the house that is being built across the street

The rain just let up today, but began last Sunday morning. They are having all kinds of problems in the Central Valley with roads washing out, flooding, and have even had quite a few casualties. We have a friend down in Ostional (arribada beach to the south) who can't get supplies because 5 rivers have opened up in the city and you can't get in or out. That, however, did not stop the arribada from occuring. A "real mall" though there wasn't many stores in it....or people.

Kimmy being called to see Harry Potter!

I haven't had fast food in a long time...enjoying it a little too much

Other than that, we have another Earthwatch group which just came into town. The married couple Ed and Cathy made us all dinner last night and will make us another meal tonight. Their trip here was difficult because the airport in Tamarindo was flooded, and eventually the airport in San Jose closed due to high winds and one volunteer had to bus here. I waited for her at the airport in Liberia for 2 hrs, with Kim and Matt (the person studying iguanas).  Fortunatly, we were able to go to the city and have Burger King, ice cream, purchase the rest of my supplies, find the mall with movie theater and go to a store to buy children's books. Bibi got in last night with smaller, sterile, sample vials and I can not wait to start using them! I predict by the end of the month I should be in the lab and hopefully done collecting samples until I decide to compare rainy vs dry seasons.

Just like a scene from the bat cave!