My wife and I traveled to five Costa Rica locations from June 15th to July 2, 2010.  We used a variety of sources to plan, but I can definitively say that we would not have had the confidence to do this trip on our own without Barrett Lawson's book.  It was our most important planning tool, and the success of our trip (180 species in all) is a testament to the book's accuracy, relevance, and ease of use.  Thank you, Barrett! 

We started in the mountains with a quick stop at km 70 on the InterAmerican Highway at Paraiso del  Quetzal/Mirador de Quetzales.  The fiery-throated hummingbird display (35 ) at the feeders was remarkable and we picked up a few other species on our short walk.  We then moved to our first stop - the Savegre Mountain Lodge in San Gerardo de Dota.  Awesome place, awesome food and service, and most of all, awesome guide.  Marino Chacon, one of the best in Costa Rica, was ours exclusively for two days of birding.  We had a great time tallying and carefully observing 53 species, including emerald toucanets, collared trogons, sulphur-winged parakeets, flame-colored tanagers, golden-browed chlorophonias, elegant euphonias, and volcano and scintillant hummingbirds.  We also watched a whole family of quetzals for over an hour!  Marino’s passion, and persistence in making sure we always had a good look, was inspiring.

  
After Savegre, we moved on to La Cusinga Lodge in Uvita on the Pacific Coast.  La Cusinga is a dazzling tropical paradise with incredible panoramic views, beautiful beaches, an outstanding gourmet chef, and excellent birding.  Among the aracaris and toucans were a variety of parrots, red-capped and blue-crowned manakins, blue dacnis, golden-hooded tanagers, and abundant blue morpho butterflies.  We saw our first mixed-species flock on the La Mora trail at La Cusinga (10 species).  We spent four days here, and wished it could have been more.  On our last day, we took a boat ride with Bahia Aventuras from Punta Uvita to the San Pedrillo area of Corcovado National Park where we observed groups of spider and howler monkeys, and scarlet macaws.   Bahia Aventuras was a good outfit and I would not hesitate to use them again or recommend them to others.

Our next stop was a few kilometers down the road at Hacienda Baru, just above Domincal. Here, we had very comfortable and convenient accommodations in the midst of a variety of beach and forest habitats in various stages of succession and restoration (see website and owner Jack Ewing’s book “Monkeys are Made of Chocolate”).  Baru has a lot to offer, but we connected with guide Pedro Porras, whose skill at locating, identifying, and attracting birds and wildlife was phenomenal. We did two, six-hour morning walks with Pedro and among all the bird species, we saw poison dart frogs, coatis, agoutis, porcupines, two-toed sloths, three-toed sloths, sleeping raccoons, and white-faced capuchins.  As for birds, the list included the yellow-headed caracara, double-toothed kite, white hawk, masked tityra, black-crowned tityra, white ibis, boat-billed heron, blue-crowned motmot, great curassow, and an amazing photos of a king vulture. It rained significantly on our last morning, so we didn’t get to the canopy platform or a couple shorter trails, but we didn’t feel shortchanged given the prior two days with Pedro.

From Baru, we headed back to the mountains.  After a white-knuckled drive through San Isidro de la General at midday on a Saturday, we arrived at the Talari Lodge near Rivas.  As Barrett says in his book, the reason to stay at Talari is its’ proximity to several great locations.  We found this to be exactly right.  Our accommodations were a bit cramped compared to other places we stayed (if you go you might want to ask for a larger room), but the price was right, the food was fine, and the location was ideal.  We saw several bird species on Talari’s small property, which included the orange-collared manakin, green honeycreeper, speckled tanager, common tody flycatcher, and lineated woodpecker.  Talari’s website advertises that guides are available, but this turned out not to be the case.  It didn’t matter to us, however, because our two primary destinations – Los Cusingos, and Chirripo / Cloudbridge – did not require guides.  At Los Cusingos we met guide Andres Chinchilla Sanchez, who gave us a tour of Alexander Skutch’s casa and helped us add shining honeycreeper, long-billed starthroat, long-billed hermit, yellow-crowned euphonia, bay-headed tanager and several others to our list.  While at Talari, we also visited the Cloudbridge Reserve, a cloud forest near the base of Chirripo.  We didn’t see many birds on this walk because it was raining steadily, but the place was magical and inspiring in the rain and mist.

Our last destination was Rancho Naturalista, outside of Turrialba on the Caribbean slope.  Many things were great about this place - the beautiful surroundings and views, the exquisite food, outstanding accommodations – but what stood out the most was the warmth and hospitality of the owners, Kathy and John Erb.  They really made our last experience a special one, and like other birders, we would definitely put Naturalista near or at the top of our list of recommendations for biding destinations in Costa Rica.

We spent our first day birding the forests around Naturalista with our guide Herman, who provided unique insights into all of the biodiversity we encountered.  Our list of birds on this day included Montezuma’s oropendola, crimson-collared tanager, rufous motmot, black-headed trogon, white-collared and white-ruffed manakin, crested guan, and bicolored hawk.  On day two, we hiked with guide Juan Carlos, who rounded out our list of bird sightings by taking us to riparian, meadow, and edge habitats, which we had not yet visited.  On this excursion, we added tawny-capped euphonia, bay and band-backed wrens, band-tailed barbthroat, russet antshrike, cinnamon becard, common and gray-crowned yellowthroat, and after some effort and persistence, sunbittern.   Both Juan Carlos and Herman were excellent and impressed us with their use of recordings to lure birds in for a great view.  We also saw several new species of hummingbirds around the lodge and house, such as green hermit, white-necked jacobin, brown violetear, green-breasted mango, white-crested coquette, garden emerald, green-crowned brilliant, and the diminutive snowcap. 

All-in all, it was a great trip – our first to Costa Rica – in part because we had such good guides.  Because it was the beginning of the green or wet season, we were a bit concerned about being rained-out on several of our days, but we were happy that this was not the case.  As a result, we packed a lot into each day.  We had to work hard at times to see the birds given the dense foliage and somewhat subdued bird activity at this time of year, but it was still well worth it and we can’t wait to go back again.     

Just got back from a 9 day trip to Southern Costa Rica.  Used the Lawson book as a guide of where to stay.  My wife and I flew from San Jose to Golfito then rented a car and drove to Wilson Botanical Garden near San Vito.

The facilities at the Organization for Tropical Studies are quite nice and offer easy access to the garden and a short walk to the forest at Las Cruces.  Also, a very cheap place to stay for great food and room.

Spent 2 days birding the area.  Highlights were lots of tanagers(bay-headed, speckled), marbled wood quail on the first part of the river trail, streaked saltator in the yard near the main building, and multiple views of fiery-billed aracari.  Found green hermits singing in the woods and great tinamou.

From Las Cruces we drove out onto the Osa Peninsula and stayed near Puerto Jimenez at the Bosque del Rio Tigre lodge.

This was by far the best birding of the trip.  The lodge is really in the middle of the forest with a lot of amazing finds, just from outside our cabin.  Little tinamou feeds on rice just near the lodge and black-cheeked ant tanager was seen multiple times per day. 

We walked with a guide(Stefan) up the rio tigre river on our first afternoon and found a black hawk eagle and a fasciated tiger heron hunting in the river. 

The next day, we walked around the lodge's trails.  Red capped manakins and orange collared manakins were found lekking on trails near the lodge.  Yellow-billed cotinga was visible across the pasture at the top of the trails(only a distant view).  The trails also yielded spot-crowned, white-vented, and yellow-throated euphonia.

We went the following morning into the town of Dos Brazos.  Our guide helped us find a white-throated crake and olivaceous piculet.  A white hawk and king vulture were both seen flying over the hillside. 

Back on the trails around the lodge, we saw close up views on bicolored antbird, plain xenops, buff-throated foliage gleaner and chestnut-backed antbird.  Baird's trogons were seen multiple times as were scarlet macaws.

Our final stop was Esquinas Lodge near Golfito.  There was some species overlap with Bosque del Rio Tigre, but we saw Least Grebe and American Pygmy Kingfisher in the lagoon near the lodge, Uniform Crake on the trail just outside the lagoon, gray-headed kite flying above the main road near the lodge.  The trails above the lodge were sometimes quiet(it was brutally hot weather), but we found a mangrove cuckoo, got another good view of olivaceous piculet, and saw black hooded antshrike.  Gray headed wood rail and purple gallinule were also at the lagoon. 
 
We took the mangrove tour offered by the lodge, which we did without a bird guide, but saw lots of close up views of frigatebirds, lots of shorebirds(whimbrel, willet, ruddy turnstone, sanderling, etc), roseate spoonbill, tricolored heron and yellow-crowned night heron.  Great closeup views of royal and sandwich terns and brown pelicans. 

Overall, all three sites are worth visiting.  Bosque del Rio Tigre offers an amazing opportunity for birding and Las Cruces is cheap, easy access, and a great place to support.