Notes from the field: Life in Mastatal

In Santa Maria de Dota

We are finishing up our fourth day here in the small rural village of Mastatal – we are now over halfway through our Costa Rica expedition. We rolled in Saturday evening after spending the morning in San Marcos visiting a coffee farm way up in the highlands and stopping for lunch in town…all settled into open-air bunks upon arrival in Mastatal, and were greeted by a cacophony of bird sounds the next morning. A tour of the Villas Mastatal, the sustainability center and organic farm where we are staying, was followed by a hike through the rainforest to a waterfall – terrific relief from the heat and humidity down here in the lowlands! Sunday night we all went into town to have dinner at the community center, followed by a rousing evening of Bingo (Nicole was our big winter, taking home two different prizes!). Monday morning we had a tour of another nearby sustainability center (Rancho Mastatal) and then took another hike through tropical forest to a river where we all swam with local Costa Rican families enjoying the afternoon. This week, the one before Easter, is Semana Santa – kids are out of school and many families are on holiday.

Villas Mastatal, with La Cangeja National Park in background

Enjoying fresh watermelon in the dormatorio, Villas Mastatal

Nicole with a big win at bingo night in Mastatal!

Hiking the river at Villas Mastatal

Monday evening everyone had a chance to experience a homestay, pairing up to spend the night with local families. This morning all reunited at the local primary school and did some service work, transplanting some grasses and trees onto a steep slope adjacent to the school.

Yesterday afternoon we were visited by a local “medicine man” from the nearby indigenous village of Zapaton. He described several various local forest plants that are traditionally used for medicinal purposes – a great chance for students to get a glimpse of a different (and fading fast) world! We finished off the afternoon by making straw baskets in the traditional manner of the residents of Zapaton.

Visiting with Gerardo from Zapaton

Tree planting in Mastatal

Today we started off the day by planting native trees around a spring (water source) at Villas Mastatal - in addition to offsetting our carbon footprint stemming from the flights to get to our Costa Rice Expedition, these plantings will help shade the water source and help stabilize the riparian zone. We planted over 45 plants in under two hours - hitting our estimated 2-3 plants per person target to offset the carbon output associated with our trip. In the afternoon we hiked up to see a cacao plantation belonging to local farmer Juan Luis - and then spent a few hours learning about chocolate production - including a hands-on session extracting seeds and grinding them to make chocolate confections (which we also sampled extensively!). We celebrated our time in Mastatal with a big send-off, eating homemade pizzas made in Javier's earth oven. Tomorrow it's off to the coast!