Saturday March 8, 2014
We woke up early this morning, and excitedly started checking things out. We were so sure there would be monkeys swinging by our porch and toucans feeding from our balcony after hearing so many glowing reviews of the Treehouses Hotel. Well, we had neither! We did not even have any fruit left on our balcony to attract birds, because we had declined the morning coffee order. I was a little disappointed by that.
We headed to breakfast in the Rancho and heard other guests talking about their wildlife sightings. One family did have a toucan on their balcony, and another had a sloth between their house and the next one. Phooey. We did see several kinds of birds eating the fruit that the kitchen staff put out for them around the Rancho, and we saw an agouti twice – he slipped out of the forest to steal the mango pits that were left over from our breakfasts. Mallory, who is a notoriously picky eater, refused to eat much but the pineapple on her plate, while the rest of us dug in – fresh fruit plates, coconut cookies, and the main course was a sort of scalloped potato pie which was also very good. The kids were also treated to hot chocolate with syrup and whipped cream!
Right after breakfast the Proyecto Asis van pulled up to take us to our volunteer morning. The drive was advertised as ten minutes, but it only took three – it was very close by. Once at Proyecto Asis, we met our tour group (there were 12 of us, the max, which figures as it is high season – also all but one were from Canada – a bunch of March Breakers I suppose!) and our guide Carlos, who was very friendly and funny. Our morning started with a tour where we learned about each animal’s history and how they had come to be under Proyecto Asis’s care. There was a macaw with a broken wing, peccaries (?) who were taken in as babies when their parents were killed by hunters, a baby boa constrictor who is unable to fend for herself, and lots of monkeys.
Right as the tour began, Mallory got sick to her stomach, and unfortunately she sat out the rest of the morning, throwing up a few more times along the way. We found her a cool shady bench by a pretty lagoon with lots of birds, and she slept on and off while Liam finished the tour and Chad and I alternately checked on her or stayed with her. After the tour, we had some fruit and iced tea for a snack, and then it was time to volunteer. We peeled and cut up fruits and vegetables and made ‘cookies’ out of birdseed, flour and water, with black beans and sunflower seeds as a treat. We took all of this, plus some kibble, back to feed the animals. We fed the monkeys by hand, and got to go into the bird cages to feed them the cookies. There is one wild white faced monkey who hangs out with the caged ones and he came out at feeding time to help himself to some of their food – he was quite mean looking! Once feeding time was over, so was our morning, and Carlos drove us back to Treehouses.
We had our leftover pizza and some of our snacks for lunch. Mallory got sick again, and again it was a really hot day which must have made her fever feel that much worse, so we spent the rest of the afternoon in our cool treehouse or on its porch so she could rest. I read my book and she dozed on and off and watched ‘Frozen’ on her iPod. We wondered whether maybe she’d swallowed some river water the day before and that made her sick, though the rest of us were fine. The boys went out on a few short hikes to look for wildlife, but came back without any good sightings to report. They also went down to the dried up waterfall just to check it out. We thought we’d be spending the afternoon at the river again, but Liam didn’t feel like going down without Mallory.
As it got dark, she was sick yet again. Poor thing! But she did perk up considerably afterwards. Chad took a walk over to the restaurant next door to pick up a takeout order of arroz con pollo for our dinner. This time we were much smarter about ordering and dinner for both of us (one order was plenty to share) cost $8! Mallory did not want dinner, and Liam had spent the afternoon noshing on trail mix and granola bars so he did not want anything more either.
The boys went out on a night hike with one of the staffers, Rolando, while the girls stayed home to get packed up and let Mallory rest, buoyed by the fact that we had one more opportunity for a night hike coming up on this trip. The night hike was long, probably 90 minutes. They saw some tree frogs and iguanas and a tarantula, but nothing furry. Well, except for the tarantula!
Cook Family Travels 