My first week in Costa Rica was filled with excitement over seeing all the different animals and biodiversity in the area, but this second week has been a bit different. We have spent a lot of time out of the forest and interacting with more local places. There was a strong focus on agriculture. As we learned in class, a large amount of land in Costa Rica is used for agricultural purposes. One of the greatest threats to the rainforests are them being cut down and converted to farmland. When driving along the roads between destinations, this is quite apparent. You can see endless pineapple fields or other agricultural pastures. Coming to this country, I knew it was a large exporter for certain products, but I guess I never realized just how much land is dedicated to it. I was reminded of driving through Indiana and seeing all the corn fields, with smaller towns dispersed through the land.
The first farm we went to was a pineapple farm. And I had the best pineapple I have ever tasted in my whole life. It truly was an enlightening experience. As a big pineapple girl, I do not think I will ever be able to eat pineapple again in my life since I know nothing could ever amount to that pineapple straight off the plant. It was juicy and flavorful and I loved it. On the tour I learned that pineapples are bromeliads which was something I never knew, but it makes sense with their shape. I also learned how pineapples are grown, which is from little baby plants within the plant. You can even grow pineapples using the crown of one, which kind of makes me want to try to grow my own when I get home, even though I doubt I would be successful. Although the tour was fun, I was disappointed that it was still a monocrop farm. While I understand they were trying their best to be organic and a good Costa Rican owned farm, monocrops are still not great. It is much better to employ polyculture tactics. That night we had a lecture and something that really stuck out to me was when we learned about her research with child puberty being affected by the pesticide usage. During the lecture we were discussing the lack of adequate nutritional food and infrastructure which all of us in this class are privileged with. She also mentioned that areas of Costa Rica have some of the highest life expectancies in the world, so how is this possible if they lack a lot of the resources that more affluent countries have? Maybe it is because the people here do not care as much about the material goods and quality items that the rest of us care about. She said that a lot of these people do not see themselves as living in poverty. They measure the richness of their lives in other ways like meaningful time spent with family or connecting with nature. I think that is beautiful and a lesson that we should all take away from Costa Rica.
The next farm we visited was a banana farm. This place was much more wholesome and you could tell the family cared about their environmental impact. Although we went to visit a banana farm, it actually contained so much more than just bananas. They grew lots of herbs and other plants they needed. The family was very careful with how they planted the crops in order to utilize their land well. It turns out the bananas are not actually grown on trees; the plants are actually herbs which is wild to me. I also never knew that the plants only could grow one batch of bananas before they become unproductive. It seems like hard work having replant a whole new banana plants after only getting a single batch. The wonderful ladies at the farm made us a delicious meal with their home grown plantains and bananas. I was a little skeptical about eating refried beans on fried plantains, but it was actually pretty good, and the banana pancakes were fantastic. I loved this farm and I was glad to be supporting a local farm that supplies food to their community.
Tortuguero National Park was a nice area to visit. The boat ride their was great and we got to see lots of caiman, crocodiles, lizards, and iguanas. But my favorite part was the boat tour around the park where we got to see monkeys, different types of birds, and even river otters! The beach was fun to walk along, but I was a little disappointed I did not see any turtles. I enjoyed the town but found it strange how integrated the residents were with the tourist stuff. Like to get to the beach you had to walk right through a school yard where kids were at playing and having class. I expected the areas to be more separated, just because I figured the residents would not want to always be right where the main tourism area is.
The Baldi Hot Springs were not what I was expected at all. I figured we would be going to a more natural place, which it was not. It was very much a tourist attraction. The hot springs were built up and so bougie. It was the perfect place for a tourist who wants to feel like they are enjoying nature without actually being in nature. Nonetheless, it was still an extremely fun place. I had a lot of fun hanging out in the naturally heated water, which got extremely hot. When I got up to the highest pool, it was kind of hard to even sit in the water because of how hot it was. Along with this, in the town of La Fortuna we also went to the waterfall and got a chance to walk around. The waterfall was enjoyable with the exception of horrifically large spiders. But swimming there was beautiful, and who doesn’t love a waterfall. The town was also fun to walk around. It was pretty much the first chance we have had to explore a local town on our own. I had this delicious muffin from a bakery, and my group also went to a bunch of little shops looking at the jewelry that people had made. The Arenal Volcano overlooking the town was a beautiful touch for the town. We got a great view of the volcano when we were at the Hanging Bridges. This place was fun because we got to see a lot of the canopy, it was a good experience being higher up in the jungle. Plus we got to see an Eyelash Pit Viper and a Hognose Pit Viper!
Rancho Margot was much more primitive of a place to stay at compared to La Selva. But overall I thought the place was pretty admirable. They are a mostly self-sustainable farm. The produce almost all of their energy using a hydroelectric plant and also using methane collected from their farm animals. They also grow almost all of the food they serve at the place. It is so impressive how they have managed to build a self-sufficient community from the ground up. They utilize their land so well, having some crops just dispersed through the land. They allow their animals much more room to be free and run around, which is nice compared to many large-scale factory farms that practically torture their animals before they slaughter them. It makes me wonder how possible it would be to create this in other locations. It would take a ton of investments financially and in dedication to make a project like this work. It seems like it would be a dream to own a place that can run off the grid. I would love to be able to grow my own food and produce my energy. I think moving forward this is going to be an important step for combating climate change. Smaller communities are going to need to step up and start producing things on a local scale. Reliance on large agricultural and electrical companies will not be sustainable in the future.
Overall, I have enjoyed my time traveling and experiencing Costa Rica, but I still do not know where I stand on ecotourism. While I will very much admit that I am here and participating in this, I still feel a bit of guilt around it. I do not want it to come off as though I am exploiting this land or the native people of Costa Rica by being here and indulging in this place. It feels rude to come tour some of these places that people live and work. I know there are educational and financial benefits to ecotourism, so it does provide some positives. I hope that throughout the rest of the trip I get to learn more from this country and local people to learn how to be a better tourist when traveling.
Leave a Reply