Hacienda Barú

Hacienda Barú is an ecotourism lodge close to an undeveloped beach on the central Pacific coast. It's a great place to see swamp forest and mangrove habitats

top image: taken by Courtney Holvey

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on the way to Hacienda Barú, we stopped at the Tárcoles River to see the crocodiles that hang out near the bridge

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a stunning group of scarlet macaws along the road just south of the Tárcoles River

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cashew trees (Anacardium occidentale), originally from Brazil, grow wild along the beach at Hacienda Barú. The fleshy fruit was a treat

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the Panama hat plant (Carludovica, Fam. Cyclanthaceae) has interesting fruits that turn inside out as they ripen

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in addition to eye-catching arthropods, we saw a ghostly sloth and several kinkajous in the treetops during one of our Hacienda Barú night hikes

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even at low tide, it's not easy to enter the mangrove forest

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Red mangrove (Rhizophora mangle) prop roots

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Biol. 472/563 is a full-immersion tropical ecology course

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