We decided to spend most of the day on the property of the Private Villas.
My early morning (5:30) visit to the Ranch House at the top of the hill was amazing. Arriving with me was a pair of Macaws who obligingly landed in the tree directly above me. On this day they were all lovey-dovey. (Note the spectacular change in brilliance when the sun rose high enough to catch them directly.)
Until that morning I had only seen them on quick fly by’s over the water!
Above the pool, what I thought was a small iguana in the tree turned out to be a “common” basilisk. Sorry, but not common for me. A cool lizard!
When I got back to our place, Jackie was keeping her eye on a Roadside Hawk in the backyard of the neighboring house. Due to the subtle lack of striping on the top of the chest, I think this is a Juvenile.
We spent a good part of that blisteringly hot day up at the pool and in the shade of the Ranch House veranda drinking delicious pineapple juice. I stepped into the sun to photograph the little hummingbird that seemed to have laid claim to these flowers as its own territory. After each foray to the flowers, he/she made its way back to the perch where I had seen it for the past couple of days.
Lots of beautiful fluttering butterflies. This one finally landed for me.
I had seen several White-crowned parrots during the week but always at a distance. Relatively speaking, this one was close – enough to get a decent picture anyway. I love the subtle blue/green coloring with the red under the tail.
A lone female Frigatebird came down from high above for a quick photo op. A giant swallow!
The heat broke with a downpour. As soon as it passed, we went out to see the monkeys. I was busy taking pictures of them deep in the foliage when squawking in the treetops drew my attention. Two Macaws were coming in to dry off. Their initial landing was photographed at the camera settings I had been using for the monkeys, unfortunately, but you might enjoy seeing the chaos when two big birds try to land on the same branch.
They finally settled on separate branches in the company of a very wet vulture. (I adjusted the camera settings.) They preened, cleaned off their tail feathers, discussed the state of the world with the vulture and then flew off!
While there was a pause in the monkey business, a Toucan across from the house got our attention by calling repeatedly for someone to come keep him company! Another bird arrived, it left, came back and then they both left. Here is the sound of their rather sweet call which we heard all day long. It also shows how long it can take to locate the bird although the sound is so persistent.
And then after much more monkey business, the daylight was gone and we went inside to read and edit pictures, respectively.