Cali-ente!

My visit to Cali was too short, but very nice. I stayed with my friend and colleague Mauricio and his family, who were extremely gracious hosts. I received a nice tour of the city, which is situated right on the edge of the mountain range and the valley of the Rio Cauca. The temperature is around 85 all year, with a bit of rain every day but not as much as some places in higher elevations that I have visited. It is a very lovely city that reminds me a lot of Cuernavaca, Mexico. The first picture is Mauro and I at a 15th century church, the second is of an awesome chair that I saw at the Museo del Oro in Cali (much smaller than the one in Bogota, but still had neat stuff!).

I spent a bit of time at the library of the Universidad del Valle looking up some documents and books that are not available in the U.S. I had more luck than I could use, because I definitely didn't have time to read all of the books I wanted to. I photocopied some parts that were more important, and Mauricio offered to scan some others for me later. He is also going to help me track down a digital copy of a thesis that I would like to read. Muy amable!! After I get back home we are going to write a paper about the Guardianas de la Ladera program. He's worked with them before, and he is in fact the person who suggested the program as a case study. Photo 3 is a strange tree on the university campus with pretty flowers and coconut-like (but inedible) fruits growing all over the trunk.

We also spent some time just hanging out and eating interesting local foods. Off the street we had some not-yet-ripe mango with lime juice and salt, and some chontaduro with honey and salt. Chontaduro is a fruit from a very, very tall palm tree that has similar texture and flavor to sweet potatoes. Mauricio recently worked on a project to design and distribute a new tool for obtaining the fruit that is otherwise pretty dangerous (the palm is tall AND spiny). I also had a lulado, which is a drink made from a fruit similar to a kiwi but more sour. One of my favorite foods so far was a cholado, which is shaved ice covered in different kinds of fruit and a creamy sugar sauce. One of the more interesting food/drinks was chocolate con queso, which is hot chocolate with a slab of cheese that you put in it. Sounds weird, but it is actually pretty good! The fourth photo is Mauricio and his girlfriend Victoria in a random department store. I had a lot of fun hanging out with them and I hope to be able to visit them again when I return to Colombia.

Hacienda Venecia coffee farm

My glorious return to Colombia started with a visit to a coffee finca called Hacienda Venecia. We took a tour of the farm and learned about the entire process, from the nursery to the harvest to the roasting. We also learned about different coffee flavors, which depend on the soil, altitude, etc. Coffee in Manizales has chocolate flavors, mmmmmm.... Part of this lesson involved sniffing extracts and studying flavor charts. I'm not sure how they decided that some coffee tastes like beef or rubber, but that must be some kind of specialized expertise.

The tour guide confirmed that the good coffee gets exported and the substandard coffee is made into instant coffee or is consumed by locals. He showed us how to sort the green beans by quality, then we roasted the ones we picked out and tasted them. The first picture is the roaster. We had some yummy espresso and then headed out to the fields to see the plants. The guide explained the planting and harvesting process. The hillsides are so steep in places, it looks like pretty dangerous work.

We also got to visit the actual hacienda, which is a very lovely bamboo house with a giant wrap-around porch. It featured a lovely view of the farm, beautiful orchids and other plants, and large fowl like turkeys and peacocks. We got to eat some starfruit right off the tree! Then we visited the processing center, where the beans are weighed, cleaned, and dried. When we got back to the beginning, we had another cup of coffee and chilled in the hammock until our jeep arrived to take us back into town.

After all of that, I headed into town with Yoly, one of the staff from the hostel, to look for a new suitcase. The one that I brought with me (Jesse's, actually) was destroyed on the flight from Bogota to Manizales. Avianca won't pay for it because it is an external piece that was damaged, even though a giant hole was created when the wheel was ripped off and I could lose all of the contents inside. I bought one that is made of fiberglass, so hopefully this one will survive the rest of the trip!

Amador Causeway

We had a couple of hours off in the afternoon, so a few of us rented bikes and rode to the end of Amador Causeway. It was a very lovely ride alongside the canal and the Pacific, and the weather was very nice. The first picture below shows where people who are in shape get to exercise. The second shows where people not in shape get to exercise, a little bit further down the causeway. The third picture is me biking past a nice view of the Panama City skyline. It is a pretty city, although half of it is under construction (many of the buildings have been under construction for decades, so something shady is definitely going on).

We passed a Gehry building under construction. One of the signs described what it will eventually look like as "a colorful sandwich." The building is so complicated that they are not using tape measures, they are using survey equipment to get a more precise placement of materials. Very interesting.

After our closing ceremony we went out for dinner. We walked along the causeway for the nice sunset view, and that is where picture 4 was taken. I sat down with my food and noticed the gorgeous moon, so I actually got up, left the restaurant, and walked across the street to snap photo number 5. It was worth it, although the photo really doesn't capture the scene.

Panama ended on a fairly good note despite all of the illness and discomfort of the trip. I spent some time with Javier and his friend who lives there before checking in to a hostel for the night. That place was okay, but they locked everything and I mean everything up for the night, and the owner doesn't hang around overnight so I had to leave my yogurt behind (awww) and climb over the fence to escape the place. But, I finally got to the airport and made my flight back to Colombia.

Isla Barro Colorado

I had the opportunity to take the trip to Isla Barro Colorado, which is by far my favorite part of Panama so far. The island was created in Gatun Lake when they built a dam for the Panama Canal. It is owned and maintained by the Smithsonian Tropical Research Center, so researchers can live on the island for a while or commute via ferry and do some fancy studies with tropical species. I'm not sure how I would feel about living or working there, since there are quite a few little critters that bite. I managed to get away with only some ant bites and one chigger bite, but there are some pretty venomous things out there as well.

We almost missed our ferry due to some intense rain and floods on the way. We made it and enjoyed a rather noisy but otherwise tranquil ride across the canal and Gatun Lake to the island. We got an introduction to the island and some of the research conducted there by our guide, Mauricio, and then started on a hike through the forest. The minuses first: it was so, so humid and the ants found me so, so delicious. We stopped a lot to talk about various plants and animals or research projects, and I suppose that we were close to an ant nest or something. They would go inside of my shirt a lot and bite there, but I even got a bite through my pants. Although they had wings and were really annoying, I'd rather be bitten by those ants than the bullet ants. The latter apparently have a nasty bite and the nastiest sting ever. I will take their word for it, the ant is gigantic (~1 in long) and fast. Check out the video on my picasa site, the pictures were all too blurry! The same is true for the leaf cutter ants, which are very cool to see in person but the video will have to do.

I also got some video of monkeys! We saw 3 different species throughout the hike, the only one missing was the tamarin. They are apparently very small and quiet though, so they are not easy to see. The spider monkeys and the whiteface capuchin were very active and super cute. They were definitely working the charismatic megafauna bit. We heard howler monkeys quite a bit throughout the hike and finally saw some towards the end of the hike. We also heard all sorts of birds that we couldn't see, including two species of toucan. I FINALLY SAW ONE!! They like to hang out in the canopy beyond the eyes of a land-bound human, but this one was hanging out in an opening. I included the photo here, but you will probably have to zoom way in to see it. Try picasa if it doesn't show up here. This one is a chestnut mandibled toucan. Among the creepy crawlies, we saw some HUGE golden-orb spiders, lots of ants, one large and one small crocodile, a boa constrictor, and a poison dart frog. Most of them were hanging out near the boat dock, ha.

One of the cool things that we learned about was their radio tracking research that they do. They showed us one of their very interesting maps, which showed the paths of a collared ocelot chasing a collared agouti (rodent mammal snack). Amazingly, the kill happened right near a motion-sensing camera, so they also got video of mama teaching the baby ocelot how to eat agouti.

If anyone is interested in conducting research in a tropical rainforest, you should consider applying. You're pretty much guaranteed permission unless you say you want to chop down the forest, introduce invasives, or something like that. Photos below are: the toucan (right fork in the branch, near the center of the image), a monkey (whiteface capuchin, I believe), all of us in front of the aptly-named Big Tree, the docks, and our ride to and from the island.

Ruins and markets

It is finally the weekend and we are free to leave the hotel and check out the sights around Panama City. Unfortunately, several of the conference participants have come down with either a cold or the flu. I'm included in those ranks, although mine is not nearly as bad as some others who ended up with a high fever. I took some cold meds and hit the road, not about to spend the 1 day I can leave in bed!

A group of us hired a van from the hotel and had the driver take us to see some of the sights around Panama. We mostly visited some artisans markets and bought some nice things made by Kuna or Embera-Wounaan indigenous groups. I got some molas and a couple of beaded bracelets. One bracelet is basically a string of beads that makes a neat design when it is wrapped around the wrist. I like it, but the very nice lady shown here tied it on too tightly so I ended up taking it off already. I've tried putting it back on, but it is proving to be a bit difficult to do so.

We also walked around some of the ruins of Old Panama (Panama Viejo). They were built in the 1500s but the city was sacked by Henry Morgan and mostly destroyed. The city was then moved to Casco Viejo, so the ruins are still hanging around, giving a nice contrast to the very modern Panama City. The second and third photos are the former convent of Panama Viejo, the fourth is me falling into a well.

We got some vegetarian food, which was fantastic and extremely cheap. After that, we tried to go to the fruit market next to the fish market, but it was pretty lame so we just came home. Leah and I will probably head to the supermarket tomorrow instead, and perhaps to the outlet mall. I normally wouldn't care much for a mall of any type, but I have heard some good things about this one so I would at least like to check it out. I was hoping to do a canopy tour, but they won't organize a tour for just me and no one else is interested. I guess I'll just have to come back! It's just as well, I still have more than a month to go on a limited budget!

A man, a plan, a canal... Panama!

Palindrome City! It is easy to forget that there were many men (75000), many plans, and even more than one attempted canal. At least that's what I learned today from the Panama Canal Authority, the folks who maintain the famous waterway since the US handed it back to Panama in 1999. We also learned that they are developing a new system for reusing the water that fills the locks so that they can let bigger ships through and conserve more water. The field trip was a very nice change. We finally got to get out and see something other than the conference room and the TGIFriday in the hotel! A few of us went to a grocery store as well so that we could grab some food that we can prepare with the microwaves in the room. I am looking forward to eating less expensively, and to eat some actual local food (especially the fruit and cheese)!

The first two photos are from the "cultural event" from the first night we were here. They performed some traditional folklorico dances (Panama-style), and I was one of the people taken from the audience to participate as well! No photos, unfortunately. The second two are from the Miraflores Locks, where we had lunch and got to hear about the canal. They told us about the history as well as the new plans to make the canal available for more transport while making it more sustainable as well. I guess it remains to be seen how that will turn out. We also visited the offices of the United Nations Environment Programme, which gave me a potential lead for some research in Peru. I'll have to follow up and find out!

Recorrido de Manizales

The first picture is the first time I have ever seen the top of Nevado del Ruiz from Manizales! It is usually shrouded in clouds, and in fact it was again when I went back out just a couple of hours later. It is so beautiful, it's a shame that you can only see it early in the morning!

Well, it certainly is easy to get a lot of interviews in when there is a room full of potential interviewees and program coordinators eager to help you out! I was able to attend a training session for the Guardianas de la Ladera, and then they allowed me to interview the women one at a time while the training was still going on. I am now up to a total of 25 interviews, which is pretty good for a 2 week period.

After the interviews, I was taken on a tour of the city by another person who works at the local disaster prevention agency. First we went to Ingeominas and checked out the seismographs, then we drove around looking at homes on precarious hillsides. The second picture is a view of Manizales from a hilltop just outside of town to the south. There is some interesting stuff going on around here. The third picture is part of a neighborhood that they are trying to tear down. The disaster prevention folks say it is because they are in high risk zones, which they are, so it is basically another relocation program. However, it is a bit controversial because they are going to replace the homes with shopping centers and a major avenue. The construction has already started in Macroproyecto San Jose, which you can see behind the houses in the photo. The last photo is a building ready for demolition, you can see the red X painted on the side. Either way, many of these people have lived there for generations in homes that they own, and now they will have to rent somewhere else or in some newly constructed apartments.

There are so many interesting angles to these issues, I'm not sure what I will end up doing! I certainly do not have a shortage of contacts to help me out, either. I have learned a lot and look forward to more after the workshop in Panama. I am also really looking forward to Panama, if I can ever get there! My flight was canceled today, so I'm stuck in Bogota until the morning. Not too bad, though, I got a bed in the same hostel, ran over to the bike tour shop and talked politics with the owner, and then got some dinner. I met a lovely girl from Japan in the hostel, who is making and selling jewelry as she travels. She just started learning how to make the jewelry 6 months ago, but she does phenomenal work. I bought the only piece I could afford, since I wasn't planning to stay in Colombia another night and I am running out of COPs. Hopefully the flight tomorrow is still on! I do have a conference to attend!