Hummingbirds, hiking, helping

Days three and four, in Mindo, finds the group split into two.  One group will hike to the Las Tangaras, a biological birding missnetting activity and the other will hike to the waterfalls. Then we switch the next day.


The stay in Mindo is full of environmental and biological activities.  

We are starting day four in the Mindo village.  We are surrounded by hills and in the mornings very low lying clouds blanket the green canopy of trees and plants. By mid morning the clouds give way to blue skies….but only for a few hours.  The afternoons and evenings bring dark clouds and rain.  The group activities continue….my rain coat gets used every day. We spend part of every day having a session or two or three with Massimo.  Then we go out and practice newly taught photo skills on local subjects.  We travel by "taxi" (a white small pickup truck with special rails attached so that 8-14 people could stand and hold on).  Michael thought road surfing was fun and that he would like to do that everyday. I say road surfing because the roads are dirt and full of pot holes.  We bumped and jiggled along slowly… there was not a chance to fall because we were tightly compressed against eac other.

On day two we spent hours trying to take portraits of hummingbirds. Very difficult but so cool when we finally got a good photo.

The afternoon was spent taking photos of the town and highlighted by a surprize,special chocolate making class. 

In the evenings we bug hunt. Yes, we turn over leaves and look behind rocks to find the nocturnal insects and frogs waiting to be uncovered by us.