#tamarindo

My partner's mom & stepdad took us to Costa Rica (near Tamarindo) for his 40th birthday & I was in bird/creature heaven! The nearest rainforest was a bit too far from where we were staying, but I got to experience some wonderful dry tropical forest & estuary/river ecosystems, plus got some good hangout time with the Pacific ocean <3

My partner gave me the good DSLR for the nature tours we went on & it was a joy being able to take pretty OK photos instead of sad zoomed-in cheapest-iPhone ones (obviously I still have a lot to learn, but these are exciting as a beginning!!):

Since our two nature tours were boat-based (one on the Palo Verde River, one on an estuary in Las Baulas park), most of my decent bird photos are herons, as they're larger, generally lower-down, & also move more slowly than goddamn passerines/parrots/smaller birds.

I did get an ok-ish shot of a common black hawk, tho!! LOOK at that eagle-y beak!

& finally, the reptiles!! There were green iguanas & black spiny-tailed iguanas absolutely everywhere...

...AND WE SAW AMERICAN CROCODILES!!

On the Palo Verde river tour we saw some BIG guys (smallest maybe 6', biggest must have been 10'-12')!

& on the estuary tour we saw a few young ones. Two were less than 3' long, and this guy was maybe 4' and let us get super close b/c it was tucked away in the mangrove roots!

I had a wonderful time on this trip and am already looking forward to coming back for a rainforest-focused adventure next time!!

Also, Tamarindo has two really good coffee shops run by the loveliest people (Nordico Coffee & Derecho Sagrado) so if you're ever there, pls check them out!