Manuel Antonio National Park, Costa Rica
Manuel Antonio National Park is the smallest National Park in Costa Rica, but one of the most heavily visited. Beautiful sandy beaches are backed with forest that comes down to meet the ocean. Several rocky islands also form part of the park.
Nobody seems to know exactly where the name Manuel Antonio came from! The most commonly heard story says that a cross with the name Manuel Antonio was found by the beach and the people starting referring to the area as the place where Manuel Antonio is buried, and eventually over the years the area just became known as Manuel Antonio.
Well today we had an early start, since it is such a popular place and we have been granted a special permit to enter the park before it officially opens - so we start disembarkation to the beach at 6:30 am.
The view is outstanding! Dense forest, a deserted beach, deserted with the exception of a large troop of Red-backed squirrel monkeys which are endemic to this area and that just happened to be moving exactly at the time and the place were we hit the beach. Once we all had have arrived to the beach we split into smaller groups and took off in different directions, each group with a naturalist at the lead. This park has always been very rewarding and soon we started finding other interesting things to see. Agoutis, huge rodents that look like giant guinea pigs with long legs walked out of the forest into the open trails were we can easily spot them, White-face capuchin monkeys were moving gracefully through the canopy, many spiny-tailed iguanas, and the masters of camouflage, the sloths.
We returned to the ship for breakfast and later in the morning we came back to M.A. to spend some time swimming in the warm ocean and practice our snorkeling. Some of us decided to walk again along the trails and are rewarded with monkeys again and a very rare sighting, a sloth that came down to a branch just above the trail. We got excellent pictures of it, and we can even see all the insects that live in its fur.
Manuel Antonio National Park is the smallest National Park in Costa Rica, but one of the most heavily visited. Beautiful sandy beaches are backed with forest that comes down to meet the ocean. Several rocky islands also form part of the park.
Nobody seems to know exactly where the name Manuel Antonio came from! The most commonly heard story says that a cross with the name Manuel Antonio was found by the beach and the people starting referring to the area as the place where Manuel Antonio is buried, and eventually over the years the area just became known as Manuel Antonio.
Well today we had an early start, since it is such a popular place and we have been granted a special permit to enter the park before it officially opens - so we start disembarkation to the beach at 6:30 am.
The view is outstanding! Dense forest, a deserted beach, deserted with the exception of a large troop of Red-backed squirrel monkeys which are endemic to this area and that just happened to be moving exactly at the time and the place were we hit the beach. Once we all had have arrived to the beach we split into smaller groups and took off in different directions, each group with a naturalist at the lead. This park has always been very rewarding and soon we started finding other interesting things to see. Agoutis, huge rodents that look like giant guinea pigs with long legs walked out of the forest into the open trails were we can easily spot them, White-face capuchin monkeys were moving gracefully through the canopy, many spiny-tailed iguanas, and the masters of camouflage, the sloths.
We returned to the ship for breakfast and later in the morning we came back to M.A. to spend some time swimming in the warm ocean and practice our snorkeling. Some of us decided to walk again along the trails and are rewarded with monkeys again and a very rare sighting, a sloth that came down to a branch just above the trail. We got excellent pictures of it, and we can even see all the insects that live in its fur.
