Final Europe Recap: Rome June 30, 2009

Day 7

We took the overnight train from Paris to Rome, and it was really fun (for the first 14 hours, more on that in a moment).  We had our own “room” with bunk beds and as the sun set I really enjoyed watching the many castles on the French countryside as we rode past.  We drank some beer and ate chocolate we bought in Paris before turning in.  We couldn’t eat from the dining car as we were out of Euros and they do not take credit cards. Doh! That’s ok.  Both of us slept pretty well with the rumbling of the train.   Our scheduled arrival time for Rome was 10:30 am (we had left Paris at 7pm the night before) but at 8:30 our train stopped.  In the middle of nowhere, for an hour and a half.  And then, later on, it stopped again!  We were 5 hours late arriving in Rome and we were famished!  No one told us why, though apparently this is not uncommon with Italian trains.  Who knows.

Once we arrived we hopped on the metro to Circus Maximus, to see our pal Melanie who was hosting us for this leg of our trip.  Melanie originally hails from Western NC but has been living in Rome for two years working for FAO, which is the Food and Agriculture Branch of the UN.  She speaks 3 languages and has lived in more countries than I have visited.  Plus, she is a lot of fun!  Her office overlooks the Coloseum and the Palatine Hills, which sure beats my view of the basement hallway.

We loitered around the Circus Maximus until Melanie finished work and we rode home on the most crowded bus I have ever been on (she told us she usually walks).  Melanie lives is the Trastevere neighborhood (translates too “across the Tiber”) in a neat flat that is happily 30 seconds from a tasty gelato shop.  After showers and a nap we walked through winding cobblestone streets past a number of lovely piazzas to a small restaurant that turned out to provide the first of the three amazing dinners we ate there.

After an amazing dinner we went to Isola Tiberina, a small island in the Tiber River connected by bridges.  Well, a better name for the Isola would be “Cocktail Island” because during the summer months all these temporary bars pop up and all the city goes there to drink and hang out.  We sat on a pile of cushions on a blanket and watched the river cross over rapids as we enjoyed a drink.   Romans love cocktails, which surprised me. I would have though they were all into wine!

Day 8

We pounded the pavement in Rome!  Visited the Palatine Hill ruins (where many of the early emperors lived) and then the ruins of the roman forum, the temple of the Vestal Virgins, the arch of Titus, and all kinds of amazing roman architecture. I am not going to lie that watching the first series of the show “Rome” helped me understand some of the time line.   It is amazing what they accomplished.  We learned that Romans are great recyclers, and that the finery from the emperor’s palaces; statuary, marble and the like, is all at St. Peters Basilica now.

We also visited the Colosseum, which is really large and then walked across the street to the Celian Hill, where there is a large park and the Church  Santa Paulo and Giovanni, two Roman soldiers who were martyred.  Then we walked over to the super swanky Aventine Hill, where the US Embassy and some enormous homes are located.

We met Melanie at her apartment after work and again she led us through piazzas past fountains, the Pantheon, and great statues to another great night out:  drinks along the Tiber with her pals Vilan and Valentina and then dinner.  Her coworker and friend Mami joined us for dinner.  Mami is a marathoner, and holds the record for being the 16th fastest woman in Rome.   On the way home we saw the ruins of Argentina Largo and the statue of the elephant with an obelisk on its back.  If Napoleon had sticky fingers when it came to Egypt, the Ancient Romans were even worse.  Melanie told us there are more obelisks in Rome than in Egypt.

A few bits of Rome trivia:  there are lovely water fountains throughout the city that you can drink from.  They come straight from an aquifer and are so nice and cool!  Feels great when its hot out.  Also, cats are revered in Rome for saving the city from a plague many years ago. Every ruin or monument had a dish of cat food somewhere nearby.  There are cats everywhere!

Day 9

We woke up late and went to the Vatican.   Instead of taking us 20 minutes to walk there it took us 2 1/2 hours because I got us really lost.  Oops!  The upside was that we ate breakfast from a bakery we stumbled upon and it was the  most amazing donut I have ever eaten in my entire life. Ever!  Filled with real deal Holyfield pastry cream.  Mmm. We finally found the right way, which was through Janiculum Hill which afforded us fine views of the city and the Garabaldi Memorial.

Anyway, we made it to St Peters, and all I can say is, wow.  Words cannot describe how beautiful it is.  There is art in every corner of the room.  It is so massive you could fit St Pauls, Westminster Abby, and Notre Dame in there and still have room for my house, or 4 of my house.   We skipped the Vatican museums on account of the fact we couldn’t actually find them and it was pretty late at this point.  We wandered off across the Tiber river, got lost again and found the Pantheon, which we were able to go inside of (our previous visit with Melanie was at about 10pm and it was closed).  We did some drinking and shopping (yes, I spent 70 Euros on olive oil, balsamic vinegar and other food items) and never did find our way back to the Tiber so we took a taxi home.  Just fine as our feet were about to fall off!

Another fine dinner with Melanie!  It was Thursday, which is the only day most restaurants make gnocchi.  Melanie and I both had gnocchi with radicchio and clams and it was amazing.  A great dinner on which to end our vacation.

Epilogue

We made it home just fine, though flying to the states from Leonardo DaVinci airport is a little bit of a nightmare.  There were luggage issues so it took everyone forever to get checked, and sure enough Chris’s suitcase got lost.  It finally showed up in Raleigh the next day.  When we opened it we found it had been tampered with:  the balsamic vinegar had been unwrapped and put back in the suitcase (not interesting enough to steal, I guess) and hilariously enough, in Chris’s suitcase was an article of  someone elses’s clothing, specifically, a pair of bikini bottoms that probably belonged to a 10 year old girl!  I bet right now her parents are mad and accusing her of leaving it in Rome when in truth it was a very slack airport employee.

A wonderful vacation.  Thanks to everyone who gave us travel tips, and special thanks to Tom and Tallie and also Melanie.  Thanks!

Oh yeah, and of course

Birds Seen on the Continent!

Goldfinch, finally

Monk Parakeet

Tree Creeper

Serin

Hooded Crow

Siskin

House Martin

Redstart

Black-headed Gull

Swift

the European  oriole that was yellow with black wings, can’t remember the name.

Europe Part 2: Paris June 30, 2009

Unfortunately for poor Paris, it got the short end of our schedule: we were really only there for Sunday and Monday and Sunday all the restaurants are closed and on Monday all the museums were closed!  Things to save for next visit.  We arrived very late on Saturday night, just enough time for a stroll to the Eiffel Tower and Jardin de Trocadero before crashing into bed.

Paris trivia:  first of all,  the person who designed and built the Eiffel Tower was named Gustav, NOT Alec Eiffel like the Pixies song always led me to believe.  Secondly, it was the winner of a contest to design a  gateway to the 1890 worlds fair.  The design that came in second place?  A giant guillotine.

Day 5

Again we started off our visit by participating in a Fat Tire Bike Tour, as we did in London.  We had another great leader who maneuvered us safely around some of the city’s great landmarks:  The Louvre, Les Hospital de Invalids, the Place del la Concorde, Musee D’Orsay.  Apparently, Napoleon had very sticky fingers and is responsible for the obelisk in the Place de la Concord and most of the Lourve’s Egypt collection, which is quite extensive.

After our tour it was fairly late, and because it was solstice the big celebration Fete de Music we decided to take advantage of this opportunity.  We spent the next 6 hours walking around the Latin Quarter drinking wine in cafes and checking out bands.  We did make it down and into Notre Dame, which is so huge, I think you could fit about 10 of my house in there.  The amazing thing to this woman who lives at the 34th latitude?  How late the sun went down.  It was still light out at 11!

Day 6

Breakfast was  Pan au Chocolate from a local patisserie, yummy!  Those French know how to eat.  The only museum that was open was the Louvre, so we headed over there.  Here is what I learned about the Louvre, that probably everyone else knows and I didn’t is that it used to be a really, really large castle.  And on the inside, it is gorgeous!  The rooms are so ornate they are as lovely as the art on the walls.  We wandered through and kept getting lost, but enjoyed everything we saw.

For lunch we went to a cafe where I had duck and Chris had (drumroll) Steak Tartare.  Yes, it is raw ground beef, and yes, it was on accident that he ordered it.  But, here is the thing: its pretty good!  Those of you who like sushi, it tastes and the texture is very close to salmon sushi.  And its served with pickles and cabochons to cut the richness of the beef.   We managed to make quite a dent in it.

We did a little shopping in the afternoon, more wine at cafes,  and then went to catch our overnight train to Rome!

See photos of Chris’ raw meat mountain, as well as other Parasian delights over here.

Nica Highlights March 15, 2009

Now that I have explained the how and why of the trip, here is a quick rundown of some of the highlights!    In total, we saw over 200 species of birds and 12 mammals and a handful of herps.

Day 1:

-3am wake up to get to the airport, painless flights to Managua.

-3 1/2 ride to Finca Esperanza Verde, located at 4000 feet.  Its so beautiful, with great views and amazing birds seen on our first short hike.

-We all go to bed early, I share a cabin with the 3 female students and Mariamar.  The beds are super comfortable and we sleep like logs.

-Best birds:  Yellow-throated Euphonia, Yellow-winged Tanager, Blue-crowned Motmot.

Day 2:

-Long morning hike on a finca trail over hill and dale, come back to the farm for lunch and relaxing, and then a hike through the coffee gowning area in the afternoon.  A night hike reveals a possum and some alarmingly large spiders.

-We see both 2 and three toed sloths on our hikes.

-Best birds: Bat Falcon, Violet Sabrewing, Rufus-winged Tanager

Day 3:

-Start banding!  We catch Wood Thrush, Black-headed Nightingale Thrush, and a Cocoa Woodcreeper among others.  I have done a lot of banding but this is the first time I hear Howler Monkeys while opening nets in the morning.

-Lunch today is a masa ball soup, and like all the food here at the finca is fabulous: rich broth overflowing with veggies and meat.  The vegetarians have their own meat free version and indeed they eat well the whole time we are in Nicaragua.

-After lunch Lynn gives a lecture about Tropical Ecology, and Pasqual, the coffee manager, explains how coffee is grown, harvested and roasted.

-At night Cesar, a local former Sandinista soldier,  gives us a great talk about the history of Nicaraguan government and Nica/US relations.  Suffice to say, the US has never been very nice to Nicaragua.  Its a very interesting, non biased talk.

-Best Birds: Slaty Antwren, Brown Parrots,  and I want to mention that every day we had many Swallow-tailed Kites soaring overhead.  I never get tired of those birds!

Day 4:

-Banding in the morning.  We catch a Bright-rumped Attila that I still bear scars from: a lovely feisty bird with a hooked bill that it repeatedly bites me with.   We also catch a Long-tailed Hermit (we can’t band hummers but record data about their health and status before release).

-We leave the finca for a field trip to “General Nestor’s land” a nearby finca at as lower elevation.  A creek with an amazing swimming hole runs through the middle, so we all swim and enjoy a great barbeque lunch.  After lunch we bird the lowlands.

-Its worth mentioning that the road into the General’s land is sort of like driving on the surface of the moon, if it was at a 45 degree angle. I have never been on a road like that before!

-Best birds: Common Tody Flycatcher, Turquoise-browed Motmot, Collared Trogon, Emerald Toucanet.

Day 5:

-Last day of banding.  We band all day, and at this point the students are really getting the hang of handling birds, putting the band on and recording data.

-At night the finca has a fiesta for us; a local band comes to play and we dance around the bonfire for hours.  The full moon makes the night so lovely and bright, a very special time.

-Best birds: Pale-billed Woodpecker, Chesnut-headed Oropendula

Day 6:

-We leave the finca (sadly) and head to Selva Negra, another private preserve. We search here for Three-wattled Bellbird and Resplendent Quetzal but are dissapointed.  The very windy conditions make birding more difficult, but we stumble upon huge flocks of neotropical warblers as well as an army ant swarm that has attracted the attention of woodcreepers and Grey-headed Tanagers, among others.

-After a long ride back to the lowlands, we go to Las Isletas, an archipelago of tiny islands created when Mombacho Volcano erupted millions of years ago.  On an sunset boat ride through the canals, we spot almost 40 bird species.

-At night we stay in the pretty town of Granada, in a hotel right on the main square.

-Best birds:  Limpkin! Bare-throated Tiger Heron, Northern Jacana and White-necked Puffbird.

Day 7:

-In the morning we explore Domatila Private Preserve, the largest Dry Tropical Forest Preserve in the country owned by the amazing Dona Maria Jose.  The forest is amazing, and so different from where we have been.  We get a prehensile tailed Porcupine snoozing in a tree, as well as one of my nemasis birds, the Green Kingfisher.

-After a delicious lunch and nap at the Domatila, we head up to Mombacho National Park.  This high elevation cloudforest is amazing!  Trees covered with epiphites, orchids, and bromiliads.

-The road up to the top is extremely steep: here in the US mountain roads tend to hug the contors, but in this park the road goes straight to the top.  We ride up in huge former military troop transport vehicles.

-Best birds:  Mountain Elania, Purple-throated Mountain Gem, Black-headed Trogon, Ferruginous Pygmy-owl and did I mention that I finally got my nemasis bird, the Green Kingfisher?

Day 8:

-We go to Montibelli Private Reserve and spend the day birding.  Its another habitat type, similar in elevation to the finca but a little less humid.  I like the veranda, where you can sit and see all kinds of birds.

-In the heat of the day we go to Masaya Volcano, which is actively spewing out all kinds of fumes.   We do not see the parrots that live in the inside of the crater, but there are tons of black vultures around which cause us to speculate that they come from the volcano instead of being born in nests.

-The rooms at Montibelli are so nice, its like staying in a treehouse! The food is amazing, too.

-Best birds: Long-tailed Manakin, Collared Aracari, Canivet’s Emerald.

Day 9:

-Another 3am wake up to catch our flights back to the states

FOR PHOTOS, GO HERE

Nicaragua!! March 15, 2009

I just returned from a week in Nicaragua, helping lead an EcoQuest Travel trip for Guilford College.  It was amazing!  I wanted to share a few things about it.

The focus of this trip is birds, bird banding (where we catch songbirds in mist nets, give them a USFWS ankle bracelet and then release), and shade grown coffee.  EcoQuest offers the trip to various educational groups (Currently, NC State and Guilford College alternate years along with a few other schools) as a sort of spring break alternative.  The first 4 days are spent living on at Finca Esperanza Verde, a shade grown coffee farm banding birds and then rest of the trip is spent exploring habitats around Nicaragua and learning about (and seeing) the flora and fauna.

Our group consisted of 6 students and Lynn Moseley (“La Profesora”) from Guilford,  Juanita, an NC Audubon board member and proponent of Nicaraguan ornithology, Darren and Julie from the Rouge River Bird Observatory in Michigan, and trip leaders Curis, Mariamar, and Dave (owner and zoologist of EcoQuest Travel), and myself, leader-in-training.

The bird banding part of this trip is really neat, and really important.   Coffee can be grown in two ways: in an open field like any crop (“sun coffee”) and in the shade under a canopy of trees.  Shade grown coffee allows the native vegetation to stay which is home to many species of birds, both neotropical species that breed in the US but winter in the tropics as well as residents.  When you grow sun coffee and you remove the canopy, there is no habitat for birds.  In addition, sun coffee tends to be treated with pesticides and contributes to erosion (one of the reasons Honduras had such terrible landslides when Hurricane Mitch went through).  There is tons of information on the web about the benefits of shade grown coffee, so I won’t regurgitate it here but instead send you over to the Seattle Audubon Site, one of the biggest proponents of shade grown coffee.

Finca Esperanza Verde has a direct NC connection, and not just with the Kentucky Warblers, Black-throated Green Warblers, Wood Thrushes and many other species that spend summers here and winters there.  The coffee from this farm is bought and roasted exclusively by Counter Culture Coffee in Durham NC.  In addition, the nearest town to the finca is San Ramon, which is a sister city to Durham.  The finca and sister city relationship has put the coffee profits into San Ramon in many ways, from being able to pay its harvesters a good wage to building schools and improving city infrastructure.

The reason why we band birds here is twofold. For one thing, there are many holes in known habits of wintering neotropical migrants.  This project, through the capture/recapture of birds gives us some baseline data about the birds (we had a Louisiana Waterthrush recaptured in the same net as the original capture 4 years apart!) as well as giving the finca information about its resident birds.