Day 2 all day Science

Hola from Costa Rica! Woke up with smiles and sunshine before six am!!! (at least half of us did). Those of us who rised and shined with the sun were able to enjoy some quality time with a few of the cows here at UGA. The unique experience of milking the cows was both hard and something we need to work on, but the cute little calves (shout out my little homeboy Bravo) made it all well worth it. Along with the cows we toured the campus biodigester (essentially artificial intestines) that turns waste into clean water and methane, later used to cook the food.

After a lovely breakfast, we walked to the Motmot classroom where we began our science journey. We started with a much needed review on how to use IMG and learned what our mentors have been working on—we’ll be held to pretty high standards. Then after another nice meal we brainstormed, found our project partner based on shared interests, and organized our many ideas into a comprehensible question that we presented to the group. On our many walks between the Cabinas and the main campus, some of us saw six (that’s a lot) armadillos just chilling and having a blast. They were pretty cute J

Our last adventure of the day brought us back to the dining room for some more delicious food and some (absolutely amazing) hot chocolate made with the milk from our hard work this morning. Last but not least we made our way around the campus in a night hike. We saw many different insects, including but not limited to a scorpion, tarantula, plethora of moths, and spiders galore.

Since it gets dark at six, and is now absolutely a void outside, we will be heading off to bed. Buenas Noches!


-Mari and Molly (M&M)









Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Day 1 Travel Day

Image
Hello fellow followers,                 We are happy to report that we have arrived; we are mentally broken, but safe. After sixteen hours of traveling it has been nice to settle in. We stopped for lunch at a local restaurant and had a delicious meal with either chicken or fish. It was very warm when we stopped and very humid. After lunch we got back on the bus for a long four hour drive up to the cloud forest. We passed many terrific landscapes along with a cute, little tourist town right at the beginning of Monteverde. When we finally arrived at UGA, we got into the bunks (which are very homey and quite comfortable) and headed to dinner. At dinner they served delicious rice, beans, a cookie, and some amazing hot chocolate! We are happy to go to bed, but it is a bitter-sweet moment because Jenna and Hayden have to get up at 5:30 to go milk cows… wooo hooo (note the sarcasm). Anyway, it’s been fun so far and we are excited to go to bed, so adios!                 Jenna and Hayde
Read more

Day 4 Zip lining

Image
This morning half of the group went “birding” (bird watching) at 6:30 before breakfast. After we ate, we headed to class in the Chachalaca classroom and continued work on our projects with a goal of answering two of our four questions. We had a quick coffee break at 10 before heading back to class and working until lunch. After lunch, we walked back to our cabinas to get ready for our afternoon of zip lining at a close zip lining park. A tram took us further up the mountain, deep into the cloud forest where we zip lined 200+ feet above the treetops. Today’s weather was fairly clear, and we were able to see past the forest and across to the the ocean. At the end of our amazing experience, we were offered an opportunity to “fall” off of the bridge. Everyone braved the drop: jumping off of the bridge, free falling for a few seconds, and ultimately being caught by a break before reaching the mats at the bottom. As our adrenaline rushes faded, we headed back to our cabinas and then went to
Read more

Day 5 Coffee Tour

Image
Hello all, This morning half of the group went bird watching again at  6:30 . We saw more birds than the other group, and we even saw Capuchin Monkeys and an Agouti (A small capybara). After a breakfast of the ever so famous Arroz y Frijoles, we headed down to the classroom for morning science. Our main goal was to finish our 3rd diagrams and start work on our final posters. We had a quick break at 10, and by  10:20  we were back hard at work. Lunch couldn't come soon enough, and by  noon  we were chowing down. At 1 we hopped in the vans and took an incredibly short ride to San Luis, a local coffee farm and tour. Apparently they didn't have our reservation, but within a half an hour we were given a warm welcome by Victor, the owner. He didn't speak any English, so we had to have one of on-campus naturalists translate for him. We learned about the coffee tree itself, the antique methods in  which it was prepared, and the more modern machine-dominated techniques. After th
Read more