Reserva Los Cedros - Week One - June 14 to 21, 2015

I set out for the cloud forest on Sunday, June 14th, by taking a 4-hour typical Andean bus ride - meandering through the mountains on roads that wound in and out of valleys and zig-zagged up and down though hairpin turns.  As usual there were numerous thousand-foot (or more) drop-offs with no more barrier than a barbed-wire fence.  A beautiful ride!

View from the bus

I arrived in the dusty village of Chontal and got a room in a basic hostal, then went out for a tasty $3.00 lunch.  It was still mid-afternoon, so I wandered down the road and enjoyed the views of rushing mountain streams and misty hills.  Next morning I met another volunteer for Los Cedros, Madeline from Pittsburgh, who arrived on the 9:00 bus from Quito.  Darwin drove us and the cook in his pick-up to the start of the trail to the reserve.  After a while Fausto arrived with the mules and packed our gear - and 5 dozen eggs (which arrived safely) - on them. 

We set off through a banana plantation and up the muddy trail.  For the first half hour I walked behind the mules - working up a bit of a sweat as the humid day warmed up.  But then I got to ride one of the mules - a first for me - for the rest of the trip. 

Thinking  of myself riding a mule up through the cloud forest made me smile.  And sometimes the mud was up to the mules’ knees, so I was glad I wasn’t walking!

Up, up we went, through the misty,  vine-draped trees, reaching the compound of the reserve in about 1 1/2 hours. 

"Welcome to Los Cedros Biological Reserve"

We were greeted by Jose, the American founder and manager of the reserve (who looks a bit like Jerry Garcia), ate a tasty lunch, and settled in.  I have a lovely basic room with windows that look out on the cloud forest.

My Room

  Just outside my door is  a porch with several hammocks for relaxing

Bunkhouse Porch with Hammocks

and nearby are the shower house (with hot water) and outhouse - all with views of the forest.

Outhouse and Bunkhouse

Power is provided by a hydro-electric system and pure mountain stream water is gravity-fed to the sinks.

As darkness came on, the lights in the open-walled dining room drew in an amazing array of moths, from tiny to 8 inches across, with beautiful patterns and colors on their wings.  I must have seen at least 40 different species (there are about 900 in the reserve).  Here's a sampling of the variety of colors and patterns:

The wingspan on this one was at least 6 inches

Clown Face Moth!

Look at the proboscis on this one!

And with the darkness the sound of the birds, insects and frogs diminished and I was able to sleep without earplugs.

In the morning, I plucked bananas off the bunch hanging in the dining room to put on the home-made bread with peanut butter, and ate listening to the sound of the birds.

Morning Mists at Los Cedros

Then Fausto gave Madeline and me a taste of the reserve.  We hiked down the mountainside to a pool below a series of cascades, where in the future we might take a dip but today we recovered cords used to tie together a ruined bamboo bridge, to save it for future construction.

Flower-like fruit by the river

 Then we hiked sweatily back up the mountainside (did I mention that it’s humid here?)

Madeline and Fausto on the trail

and then down again on another trail to the intake for the hydro system, so we’d know how to find it if it ever got clogged with debris.  It was a  jungle down there!

Flower along the trail

And after lunch, we hiked up another trail to switch out batteries and SD card on a camera trap.  Among the photos taken by the motion-triggered camera were mice and armadillos - and several pumas.  No spectacled bears on this one, but cameras along other trails have caught them.

On Wednesday the 17th, Madeline & I were assigned to check out the trail to the “new” waterfall (only the trail was new - the waterfall had been there for a very long time) - both so we would know where it was in case we wanted to go for a dip on a sunny afternoon, and so we could make sure the trail was in good condition.

Me with Machete - watch out!

We actually did quite a bit of trail maintenance on the way - we alternated machete duty, hacking back the encroaching jungle, and moved several smaller fallen trees off the trail.  When we finally got to the waterfall,  we found it to be at least 30 feet high, falling into a gravelly pool.  Can’t wait to test it out on a warmer day.

Me at the "New" Waterfall

A wonderful bonus to the hike was viewing a kinkajou up in a tree - especially since they’re usually nocturnal - but Jose says the juveniles are sometimes active during the day.

A very blurry pic of the kinkajou we saw - but I had to have evidence!

We saw another smaller creature scurrying  through the trees that Fausto says was probably a squirrel - though it didn’t look like a squirrel to us..  It was cute staring down at us, however, and I had never seen one like it before.

Back at the station after lunch, I got to do my laundry the old fashioned way - by hand, using soap and a brush on a cement scrubbing surface outside.  Now I’ll see how long it takes my clothes to dry on the line.  It’s very damp here, so it may take a while!  Today it started out very foggy (actually we’re in the clouds) and then it rained while we were on the trail, before clearing - whereas usually it’s been dryer in the morning and then has rained in a fine mist in the afternoon.  We’re supposed to be entering the drier season, so we’ll see what happens in the days ahead.

Thursday the 18th I had the morning off, so I went for a nature walk.  I hiked back up the trail toward the new waterfall, but this time taking it easy and stopping frequently to look at the forest and listen to its sounds.

At the trail junction I cut back via the Inca Trail toward the mule path we came in on .  It gradually descended the hill through more open forest, with many circumscribed view of nearby ridges - a nice trail - but it obviously hadn’t been used much lately and needs a lot of machete work and blow-down removal.  And finally the trail seemed to disappear.  I hated the idea of having to backtrack all the way back up over the hill (and it was getting near the time when folks expected me back at the station), so I carefully explored a bit ahead - and spotted the mule trail!  So it was a quick and easy walk back to the station. 

 View from the mule trail

In the afternoon, after we got to see a Choco Toucan in a tree by the dining area, Madeline and I hiked with Fausto down to the river and up the next ridge to place a camera trap by the trail.  This one, however, was not for recording animals.  Jose had heard gunshots off in that direction recently, so the camera was for recording and identifying any hunters who might be coming illegally into the reserve.

Red-Tipped Plant

Heading back to the station, Fausto was in a hurry because he was going down to his family in town that afternoon.  I decided that his pace was more than I found enjoyable, so I let him and Madeline (both of whom are at least 30 years younger than I) go on ahead.  I had no need to rush back.

Patterned Leaves

On the 19th, Madeline & I did maintenance on the Inca Trail and cleared all but a couple of bigger tangles and blow-downs - and this time I was able to locate where the “disappearing trail” came out on the mule trail, and with lots of new-growth clearing we connected the 2 trails. Mission accomplished!

Spikey Flowers

Jose has been cooking great meals, but that evening he was looking for suggestions to use some fresh chard that was starting to wilt.  So with Madeline’s assistance I made "Cheesy Beany Chard", a favorite of mine from Recipes for a Small Planet:  chard, onions, rice, beans (we had lima beans and chochos) and cheese (we used Gouda), all mixed together for a vegetarian treat.  It seemed to go over very well (unless folks were just being polite).

On the 20th, I went with Fausto down into the pastures to fetch mules for bringing in some new volunteers.  We saw a couple of Chestnut-Mandibled Toucans

Chestnut-Mandibled Toucan

and found a metate (oval stone bowl) and mano ( rock for grinding) that are probably a coupe hundred years old.

Fausto wirh metate he just unearthed

I was assigned to carry it up to the station - and decided it was a very heavy piece of equipment.

Me in open dining room with metate and mano

Madeline’s back was hurting (I guess she overdid it on the trail clearing). so I went off by myself to explore and clear the trail to the “Old Waterfall”.  I enjoyed another trek in the cloud forest, swinging  the machete (carefully) as I went, going around the ridges and a steep-sided ravine and then down rather steeply to the river.  The trail from there to the falls was a bit hard to follow, but I managed to find my way, crossing the small river several times. 

Me at "Old " Waterfall, about to take a dip

I took a great refreshing dip in the pool at the base of the 40-foot waterfall  then ate my lunch while drying off in the sun.  Unfortunately the hike back up had me hot and sweaty again, so back at the station I headed for the shower.

Were were running low on ripe bananas, so Fausto and I went down into the banana grove below the kitchen and harvested a few bunches.

"Hey, Mr. Tallyman, tally me bananas"

The morning of the 21st I enjoyed showing Mac & Jessica, the new volunteer couple, the trail to the new waterfall.  We seemed to have a very compatible pace and interests.  We would have taken a dip at the falls, but clouds had moved in and it was cool in the falls’ mist, so we just rested and ate our sandwiches and apples. 

Jess, Me and Mac at the "New" Waterfall

We got back in time for burritos to celebrate the solstice, and then I sent out a group email (which I've copied edited and pasted for this blog post) from the Los Cedros Internet Cafe - an open-sided shed in the mule pasture on the hillside that receives the best wifi signal.

Los Cedros Internet Cafe 

Another blog post - about week 2 at Reserva Los Cedros - will follow soon!