We began this morning our trip to the northwest of Costa Rica by visiting the Curú Wildlife Refuge. Own by the Schultz family it is also a running farm. We easily landed on a beautiful beach to start exploring the tropical dry forest of Costa Rica. It’s at this moment an interesting time of the year, because it is transitioning from the very rainy season to the very dry season, and here most trees will gradually lose their leaves to save precious water for the following months.
Also here in Curú we have extensive mangrove forest along the estuaries of the rivers. Mangroves are a very important and protected ecosystem that filter the sediments carried by streams, slowly building the coastline and at the same time protecting it against the erosive action of the ocean and storms.
The walks through Curú provided excellent opportunities to understand both of these important ecosystems, the tropical dry forest and the mangrove forest, while at the same time have great views of some of the wildlife such as playful white-faced capuchin monkeys, the long-nosed coatis, northern raccoons, mantled howler monkeys, white-tailed deer, and others.
