©
Written by Christian
The year was 2013 when I decided to travel for the first time ever. Yes I was 19 years old when I sat on my first airplane and I did so alone to the other side of the world. Traveling 27 hours from Sweden to Costa Rica was quite the adventure for me, one I'll never forget.
I went as a volenteer for a GVI project to study the Jaguars predation of Sea Turtles. As one would guess this was nothing I was ever prepared to do. Actually the whole trip and my decision for doing it I decided on a whim, very spontaneously. This inclined alot of preperations to be done, since I had none of the stuff that one would require for a life in the jungle of Costa Rica. I also had to train for several weeks before my departure to increase my overall endurance. I was and still am an asthamtic and have been my entire life. My physician told me that I were not allowed to go if I didn't improve my condition until departure. Being a martial artist since 10 years old, it was a challange I had to take on.
The Arrival of the Swedish boy
Arriving in Costa Rica with basically no expectations of what to expect, I was pretty lost. I met up with the people from GVI shortly after arriving. We took a cab and I thought I was going to die 5 minutes after we left the airport, because something I learned pretty quickly was that you should never try to drive a car in the middle of San José if you aren't born there. The trafic is crazy and being used to plain old Sweden, well in my eyes it was chaos. Next day we traveled to Jalova in the jungle of Tortuguero to meet the rest of the staff and volenteers. One other thing I learned pretty quickly was that when you travel, everyone is nice to you... of course if you're nice to them. This made it really easy to find friends and to form new friendships.
First day in the jungle
I had no problem being awake before the sun went up to eat breakfast and prepare for surveys, but my first day tracking Jaguars by the beach in the heat was really strenious on my lungs. Walking and focusing in the rising sun was not a good combination for me, but hey, I was too excited to care or complain about it.
Later I followed a small party out along a survey trail to identify "Incidentals" wich they named an animal they identified when not actually on a survey. That's where I saw my first "Eyelash Pit vipers" (Bothriechis schlegelii). Beautiful animals and probably the most venomous snake I've ever seen in the wild, even until this day it's one of the coolest things I've ever seen.
We ate no meat at all out there, it was hard to come by but after a while in the jungle you learn to live with it.
Birds and Jags
After a week in the jungle I felt at home, I had new great friends who all loved nature and animals as much as I did. My experience I felt from this trip, outmatched everything else in my entire life. I enjoyed all surveys we did and my body had adapted even to the Jag Walks we did everyother morning. I enyojed the bird watching more and more for every day (something I always found boring when I was younger), when I had learned the different spieces and how to identify them it all became much richer somehow.
(Pteroglossus erythropygius)
Identifying lizards and snakes became more natural, even the arachnids drew my attention more than it used too.
To see a Jaguar would of course be extremely incredible, but that never happened. We however found a carcass of a freshly killed sea turtle that had just been draged into the bush from the beach, we asumed that we probably had disturbed it in its meal and therefore couldn't see it... Probably somewhere in the bushes it sat and just waited for us to leave its food alone, after our analyzing and documentation we left after stationing a camera there that we could later retrieve.
But as far as mammal sighting was, I was in luck when me and only three others went on a survey to identify monkeys and we saw a White-Nosed Coati (Nasua narica). We saw it just up a tree when it climbed down towards us, we stood as still we possibly could and it came closer for every second. It jumped down only meters away from us and then ran off into the bushes, it was amazing. They are extremely beautiful animals and I never expected it to be so large. Unfurtunately we had little time to take pictures, we froze as soon as we noticed that it came closer to us, afraid that it would be scared of if we kept taking pictures.
My Departure
If I could have chosen, I'd have stayed in Costa Rica for several years. My economy wouldn't allow it however and my flight were going to leave with or without me. After having one final night with my friends in the jungle my leave next morning was an early one.
Some of the most important things I've learned about myself, was in the Jungle of Costa Rica.
When I came home I knew who I wanted to be and to this day still I'm trying my best to be that person.
The End
(© We reserve all rights and ownership of the pictures on this page to GVI)
(Jaguar Tracks)
(The Swedish Boy)
