EARTH to Costa Rica

Our last official visit was to EARTH university's campus in Liberia. We met with Carolos Murillo, the director of EARTH La  Flor. We discussed EARTH's plans for development of this campus (main campus is located in Guacimo, Limon) and further collaboration between our two universities. This visit was really good especially for Nick who was able to interview Carlos on program development and evaluation.

Check out a picture of Carlos below:

Hummingbirds

The van the guys were riding in broke down on our way to the ziplines and toward our next stop in Las Juntas. The rest of us got to the ziplines early, and had the chance to give hummingbirds a rest as they drank their sugary syrup of a lunch. It sounds like my kind of food.

Here's a clip from Youtube. Check it out!

We have a lot of catching up to do

We were super busy over the past few days, so we're behind on the blog. Carolina and I are putting together a learning module to teach students about blogging abroad, so it's kind of fun to learn these lessons ourselves - like the fact that Internet may be available, but you may have to climb a really steep hill to get to it. Seriously. At the UGA Ecolodge, internet was available at the main building, but that was a 10-minute hike away from our rooms. Fortunately, the connection was awesome there, and it's also in the same building as the cafeteria. That worked out well.

On Sunday, we hiked through a Monteverde cloud forest. It was incredible. And we got incredibly soaked. Being that a cloud forest in the rainy season is really a rain forest, it's to be expected. We did see a couple of really cool birds, mostly through binoculars. Then, in the afternoon, it was off to a small sugarcane farm that raised cane mainly to preserve the history and to show tourists old traditions of harvesting and collecting the juice.

These photos are from the Monteverde cloud forest:

Las Juntas Agricultural Production Tour

On Tuesday and Wednesday we were hosted by Sr. Juan Guillermo Fernandez of the Montana Ranch. He prepared a wonderful tour which allowed unprecedented access to many of Costa Rica's well known agricultural companies. So unprecedented that in some of the locations we were not allowed to take video or pictures. The city of Las Juntas, where Montana Ranch is located, has a large amount of food, animal, and ag production within a one hour radius.

On the morning of the 15th we met Sr. Fernandez and visited a Teca (teak) plantation. The Italian owner of the "teca" plantation harvests his trees and produces "muebles"(furniture) for the Four Seasons Hotel. Later in the morning we went to the Jade Lime farm. The visit was incredible, especially for our plant pathologists and horticulturalists. Unfortunately, since it is the rainy season and there was a lot of standing water, it was a breeding ground for mosquitos. At one point, you noticed some of us had a towel and were swatting the mosquitos away, while others had developed funny arm and leg movements to keep the critters off. The only person who stood still was Stephanie, the videographer! By the end of her taping sessions, she had over 50 mosquito bites on her arms and legs!!


After lunch, we went and visited a Tilapia farm with Andres as our tour guide. We learned that the most important factor that needs to be controlled in the fish farm was oxygen levels. The water used in this farm came from the river. Check out the pictures below to see what other creatures like to sneak into the tilapia farms. Along with the growing of the fish, we also visited the processing plant of the tilapia. Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to take pictures, but the fish is being sold under the St. Peter's Company name.


On the 16th the group split up into small teams. Maria and Robert went to a Picasa Chicken Operation, which serves as the reproducer and producer of chickens. Again, no pictures were allowed! The measures for biosecurity were extremely strict and Maria and Robert each had to take 5 showers as they moved throughout the chicken plant. Kari and Stephanie were taken on a driving tour to a friend's farm of Sr. Fernandez . He has a beautiful selection of horses that he shows throughout Costa Rica. The rest of us went to the Choma farm which produces pineapple for Dole. Sra. Maria (not UGA's Maria) was the farm manager, and showed us the whole life cycle of the pineapple. Again, no pictures were allowed, but of course, we did get to eat all the pineapple that we could have ever dreamed of eating.

As a group, we then reunited at RP Fieno's horse farm. They raise mix breeds and pure bread Iberoamerica's. We were given a private show by their top trainer. See the pictures below.
Enjoy!

Carolina

Recap of Rancho Margot and UGA Day 1

Check out our pictures from the last few days. Our group spent some time in Rancho Margot, a self sufficient organic ranch. On the first day we did a tour of the farm, and had a great dinner with Juan, the owner of Rancho Margot. He gave us many first hand stories of agriculture in Costa Rica. The next day we had some time off, where some of us kayaked in Lake Arenal and others took a horseriding tour of the ranch. We left in the middle of the day on Friday and arrived to the UGA campus 4 hours later. A group of us hiked to a waterfall close to campus and then we all took a tour of Finca La Bella.

Enjoy!

Carolina

Yeah Internet!

We have officially landed back on "UGA" soil... although not in Georgia, but in San Luis, Costa Rica. Our group had an "amazing" time yesterday at Rancho Margot, but the internet was down for most of the day. We will post pictures and stories soon, but they involve horses, kayaking and an errupting volcano!
Last night we arrived at the UGA campus and this morning some of us will hike to a waterfall and then head to a Coffee plantation tour.
More to come later now that we officially have internet again!

Carolina

Can't Touch This- Finca Luna Nueva

We named this little guy "Levi". He was tired when we found him and was panting heavily. Guess the Jeanous of this frog!

New Friends, New Food and a little bit of Mysticism

On Wednesday we spent the day at Finca Luna Nueva. We took a tour of the facilities where we learned about organic biodynamic farming in Costa Rica. The tour lasted a few hours and some of the highlights were:

• meeting the pigs and goats who help work the soil when fields are being rotated
• tasting tumeric straight from the field. If you ate too much, you were left with the "mark of health", which means your teeth and lips were stained yellow.
• Seeing a toucan and a sloth in their natural habitat. I bet the sloth is still in the same tree today as it was yesterday... that is how slow they move
• Eating all kinds of herbs, beans, plants from the garden and fields.
• Learning about all of the elements involved in biodynamic organic farming, such as an astronomical planting and sowing calendar and the balancing of the interrelationship of plants, soil and animals.

Check out the photo gallery for more pictures and explanations.

Enjoy!
Carolina

Last night, our group met with Kim Dooley from Texas A&M who is here visiting their Solstis Center and who is also a part of the grant. She introduced her interpretation of the RLOs and then we all as a FLC discussed and brainstormed some of the groups topics and objectives.

This afternoon we are headed to Rancho Margot, and good example of Eco-tourism in Costa Rica that is on the outskirts of Arenal, the volcano! More stories and pictures to come...

We're here, and it's dark and not rainy

Hola from Costa Rica! We're here, and the Internet is great. Here we are at the hotel, checking our e-mail:

Notice all the netbooks. These are awesome little machines. Paul Thomas took this photo with his iPhone. Those are also handy little machines.

Tomorrow we head out at 7 a.m. for Finca Luna Nueva in San Ramon. Finca Luna Nueva (New Moon Farm) is a certified organic biodynamic farm. We're meeting a group from Texas A&M. More details to come tomorrow as internet is available.

Buenas noches to all!

Ready... Get Set...

A handful of CAES teaching faculty and staff are participating in a teaching-focused international experience, traveling to Costa Rica to develop Reusable Learning Objects to bring the "world" to their classroom.

As a Faculty Learning Community, we will be visiting agricultural locations such as small "fincas" (farms), larger food producers and educational institutions, all while experiencing the Costa Rican culture!

Below you will find an itinerary for our trip!















Please visit our blog as we document our travels, our process and our learning experience!