We stayed this last week in the coffee-carpeted hills above the town of Grecia ("Greece") on the flanks of the mighty Poas Volcano, in the western central valley. Just over the ridge above us, the volcano is restless - hissing steam and blowing dust and ash several hundred feet in the air. Temperatures on the crater floor have risen to 369C. Above 264C, sulfur which coats the dust and ash, burns. Each morning, before the day's breezes disperse them, we taste the thin acrid smell of heavier-than-air sulfur dioxide, drifting down through the lush forest canopy from the summit - a smell of caged, blind wrath.
Grecia is a thriving and congested agricultural and market town just north of the highway (Interamericana). Due to its picturesque setting, nice climate and proximity to the main airport, this town appears to be a San Jose slick-suburb-in-training and is on the gringo radar screen. Some slickness has rubbed off - we saw our first low-profile tires here, we saw a Mazda Miata (total madness in a country of chin-deep potholes), a Hummer has been sighted (we did not see it personally; perhaps it has been shot since...) - you get the picture (think Upper Mission, Kelowna). Eyesores symptomatic of wealth and status disease, and the sad striving to be North American. Witness the transformative power of TV ads on people's behaviour - a nearly uniform effect to buy and consume goods and services, and to emulate those who buy and consume the most (United States of America). We are striving to avoid this commercial, status-climbing bustle for mental health.
View from our bed and breakfast - Mango Valley.
On a walk we encountered piles of stacked sawn volcanic rock (for geo-types: a lithic ash-fall tuff). These slabs are used for sidewalk pavers in town.
A wasp's nest; tucked into a vertical bank; about 8" across. We did not knock at the door.
Ever on the look out for wonders of natural erosion, we spied these gullies carved in volcanic clayey soil on the sides of a road, due to torrential rain and flashy runoff. Note the sculpted fluted channel - these are the same same pothole erosional shapes carved by steep mountain streams in rock. Nature as artist displays equal elegance in all media.
Note, the cut banks are commonly vertical; no set back; and yes - they do fail.
Agave cactus with flowering stalk over 20 feet high.
No comments:
Post a Comment