That was a cool encounter and made us wonder if a game trail of some sort existed in this area. That would explain sighting peccaries in the same location as last trip. In any case, we continued on quietly hoping to encounter something else. Where there was peccaries, there might be cats...right?
We rounded a bend in the trail and I immediately put up the stop signal. On the trail ahead of us was a Great Tinamou. These birds have one of the coolest calls, but this one had made no noise so we were lucky to stumble upon it. Thanks to the way the early morning light shone through the canopy, the blue undertones of the Great Tinamou really were highlighted.
Eventually, the tinamou wandered off the trail and into the jungle. It didn't seem to mind our presence at all. This was our best look ever at this usually elusive bird.
The rest of the trail was relatively uneventful. However, as we were walking down the road back towards the lodge, we saw some movement just off the side of the road. Some low palms were moving pretty good like something was tugging at them. Upon closer inspection, it was another Collared Peccary. Just as we were getting close to look, the Bosque del Cabo range rover came driving past taking some people to the airport. This startled the peccary and it ran deeper into the jungle.
Further down the road, we stopped at a fallen tree stump to look for woodpeckers that we had seen in this area before. One was around but playing hard to get. But, more movement caught our eye and it took me a moment to find the source. It was a beautiful Blue-crowned Motmot. We had seen one before in Belize last year but not this close and not in decent light.
After breakfast, we decided to hit the Zapatero trail. This trail is much like the Saino trail in that there are quite a few ups and downs and you feel the brunt of the rainforest humidity since any breeze never seems to find its way this deep into the forest. We didn't see anything of note for quite a while until we came up to a tree beside the trail. As I stepped past the tree, something "jumped" from just off the trail towards the undergrowth, I didn't see what it was but heard the cry of "snake!" from my wife. Obviously, the snake hadn't jumped but we seem to have startled it as much as it startled us. With hearts beating a mile a minute we backed off a step or two and stopped to search for the snake. Once again, we didn't have our snake ID guide with us (You would think we would have learned this lesson by now). So, we didn't know if this snake was venomous or not. Regardless, it wasn't running away so we stayed a respectful distance and managed to get a few good shots.
Phillip, the Bosque del Cabo naturalist, identified this as a Neotropical Bird Snake. Non-venomous but apparently another feisty snake. Which would explain why instead of slithering away from us, it held its ground and even inched closer trying to decide if we were friend or foe. After a while we pressed on. Our hearts were still beating pretty good (a snake encounter will do that to you) when we heard more rustling a ways off in the undergrowth. We stopped and looked for movement. Into sight wandered a Northern Tamandua.
This is typically a tree dwelling anteater, but this one was cruising along the ground in search of termite mounds. It never got that close to us so getting a clear picture was tough, but it sure was fun watching it wander around. Apparently, they have pretty bad eyesight and we don't think it even knew we were around. We think the Tamandua, with it's tuxedo like vest, is pretty darn adorable so this was a particular enjoyable sighting. Check out the claws:
The Zapatero Trail ends at the tropical garden and from there we crossed the suspension bridge and headed back to our cabina. Just as we rounded the bend in the trail at the intersection of the trail that leads to the overlook, I saw a mother and two tiny peccaries on the trail. They shot out of sight just as I fired off one shot. The result is blurry, but proof that we saw the tiny little peccaries if only for a moment.
Once again, we stayed still and waited to see if more peccaries crossed and sure enough, they did. Two more crossed so there were five in total. This was an unexpected treat so close to "civilization". It wasn't even noon yet and we had seen 11 peccaries. Not too shabby.
After lunch we headed back to the Titi Trail. We really wanted to increase our chances of spotting a puma and we thought this was the way to do it. Since the afternoon was not typically a great time for wildlife, our expectations were low. We even joked that every time we went looking for something, we wouldn't see it. Instead, it would pop up another day when we weren't looking for it. So, we decided our quest this afternoon was for an ugly brown bird. Hoping instead that we would see something completely different. Well, as it turned out, our plan worked, sort of. All we saw on this hike were gorgeous birds. The Titi trail was alive with bird life, coatis and agoutis. All told, we saw Red-lored Parrots, Violacious Trogon, Fiery-billed Aracari (a fantastic bird), Black-throated Trogon, Red-capped Manakin (I forgot how loud their wing "smack" was...but we didn't see the male moonwalk), and more. But, no pumas again...
Once darkness set in, and after our nightly visit to the bar, we headed off to the small pond to see what was out. Before getting there, we saw familiar eyeshine in the grass of the garden. It was another Virginia Opossum wandering around. It didn't seem to like our gaze and quickly wandered into the undergrowth. At the pond itself, we ran into our friend the Smoky Jungle Frog, another Cat-eyed snake, and this Marine Toad.
After dinner, we decided to mix it up a bit. Previously, we had seen the organized sunset hike start at the pool to look for critters. We had never thought about this so we headed up there first. Boy, had we been missing out. There is a frog called a Masked Smilisca that apparently comes out around the pool every night. We were able to find one enjoying a dip in the pool.
After leaving the pool we decided to hike down the road to the Titi trail. Phillip had told us that the Ocelots like to mark the "gate" near the Titi trail as part of their night rounds. For this outting, we decided to take our night vision since photography wouldn't be the emphasis. The night vision monocular is really cool because you can stop and scan and see eyeshine much better than with flashlights and of course, the animals can't see you as well.
We didn't get very far down the road before we spotted eyeshine. Based on the one bright whitish eyeshine low on the road and not moving, we guessed correctly that it was a Pauraque. We ended up seeing two along the road including one that would jump up a few feet to catch insects and then flop back down. The night vision really let us see the bird exhibit normal behavior since it wasn't in the beam of a flashlight. But, this bird also posed for a picture.
We walked slowly up the road and all the way to the entrance to the Titi trail. We stopped regularly to listen and scan the trees for eyeshine. We were hoping to find a Kinkajou in the trees but no such luck. With no cats in sight, we turned around and headed back. Just as we reached the makeshift thatched gate, we saw eyeshine in the bushes. We excitedly stopped and waited for the creature to emerge. Our hopes of seeing a cat were dashed again as a Virginia Opossum emerged and foraged around in the leaf litter. Cute in its own right, but not a cat. The rest of the walk back was uneventful. I have uploaded a video of the night vision sightings from the hike here.
No cats again today, but all in all another great day in paradise.
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