Cuerici, pt. 2: El Paramo

Sunday morning, the groups switched; the rest of the class hiked the oak forest, and my group went out to the paramo. The paramo is unique ecosystem found mostly at high elevations in the Andes of South America, but (luckily for me) the northernmost examples of paramo can be found in Costa Rica. The paramo is defined as the region at high elevations in between the treeline and the snow line, and is inhabited by plants with lots of weird adaptations to survive the extreme climate. Because it's so high up, there is literally less atmosphere above to block out the sun, so it is hot and harsh for much of the day. However, like Cuerici, it is really misty, and when the clouds roll in and block out the sun it gets really cold really quickly. Also, it's windy pretty much all the time. One of our professors described the paramo as "summer at day, winter at night," and after seeing it for myself I would say it's a pretty accurate description.

Some of the cool adaptations we saw:

This plant has white "petals" that bounce light into the black center, allowing the little flowers to heat up. Rather than providing a more typical incentive for pollinators (e.g. nectar), insects are enticed to stop on the flowers to warm up when it's cold outside.

Lots of the plants have really reduced leaves to prevent dessication from the constant wind. The leaves are also arranged differently to help retain heat and moisture. Lots of plants have fuzzy leaves to create more of a "boundary layer" that holds in water and even reflects light, since the sunlight is so direct when it's not cloudy.

We had a guide accompany us for the day, which was cool because she grew up in the paramo and has learned everything she knows about it just by exploring it as a child and studying it as an adult. Her parents were U.S. citizens who moved to Costa Rica (which has no military) before she was born so that she and her older brothers wouldn't get drafted in the Vietnam war. She led us around the paramo all morning and taught us about the plants that we saw, many of which have medicinal uses. Learning about the paramo plants was awesome, but more than anything else I enjoyed the beautiful and often bizarre views. It truly is unlike any place I've ever been before. 

On our way up near Cerro de la Muerte

Early into the hike we found a skink on a rock, and it got a lot of attention from us! Haha. While there are lots of awesome plants up there, it's harder to see animals since not many live there permanently; they just visit and feed during the day and avoid having to tolerate the extreme cold at night. Skinks will bite onto things in self-defense, and our guide demonstrated this by allowing it to hang on her ear for about ten minutes while we all took pictures.

Our paramo guide, with a skink on her ear

Anna holding the skink

We climbed a good deal during the hike, ending up around 3,400 m above sea level. The air really is thinner at that elevation, but my group was not as winded as we expected since we had already hiked the oak forest the day before and gotten used to it a bit. It was clear for a good deal of the time we spent in the paramo, but when we got up to the very highest point it was extremely cloudy! The group that had visited the day before had perfectly clear views and came back with beautiful pictures, but pictures can't really do it justice anyway... Instead, I got to see a "real" paramo view: misty, eerie, and incredible.

Classmates on a hill, with minimal clouds

Misty, eerie, and incredible, right?

We found another skink at the top, and took some more pictures of it.

Chesca, my tica BFF, and I at the highest point that we visited. It's like we're standing in front of a wall of clouds. You couldn't even see over the edge right behind us.

Coming down through the clouds

Miguel and my professor Susan on the way back to the car, though a bunch of grasses and flowering bromeliads

Justin, Chesca and I were the last ones back because we stopped to look at some sphagnum moss and listen to birdcalls.

Sphagnum moss. Where water accumulates in the paramo, little boggy areas appear. Walking on them feels like walking on a memory foam bed.

We made it back down!

I know I said that the oak forest hike the day before was one of my favorite days in Costa Rica yet, but less than 24 hours later I think I exceeded my previous level of amazement already. The paramo is an incredible ecosystem that's totally different from any other place in Costa Rica; it's amazing that we could go from a relatively lowland rain forest to this bizarre, beautiful, almost alien environment in just a few hours!