Up Close and Personal with Capuchins

The last couple of days have been filled with wildlife opportunities galore. Friday, as Michael and John played at the rock-pile across from Stella’s bakery, we were beckoned by Miguel (our friend from the Hotel Bosque) to come see the white faced monkeys in action across from his reception area. He had a huge bundle of bananas with him and we hurried quickly behind him to get a glimpse of these animals. In a word…AMAZING! This troop was about 20 in size, with 3 ‘bosses’ from what Miguel tells me. Miguel extended his hand with the bananas and the monkeys came right down from the tree to snatch them out of his hand. He then proceeded to high-five one of them – awesome! He gave bananas to the boys and told them to be patient – however the monkeys weren’t sure what to make of us, so Miguel assured us that in four or five more visits, they would feel comfortable with us, make the quick descent down from the tree tops and too feed from our hands. I have never been so close to a monkey where I could actually see their face, (I mean really see it) WOW –
Unfortunately, my pics are blurry and do not do the experience justice, they move so fast it was hard to get a good photo!

The day prior, we discovered a little treasure in our extra bathroom toilet….a drowned mouse. We figure the mouse must have been thirsty, leaned in for a drink and that’s all she wrote. After talking with Mike (‘do we flush or retrieve?’ Mike decided to flush and just have it decay with all the other ‘stuff’ – pleasant!.

We found our first scorpion (albeit dead) in a kitchen cabinet….yes, inside the house. A little thing, but none the less, you really have to be ‘one’ with the bugs or you’ll never make it here!

A couple of other finds from Dad and the boys as well…caterpillars and not sure what the other creature is?

The wind was quite strong today – good for drying clothes, not so good for the stench it was blowing directly our way. As I went for a run, I left the three boys in charge of discovering just what was causing the odor and where in the world was it coming from. As I arrived back 45 minutes later, their task was done. They led me to the edge of our property and there about 100 feet away lay a dead armadillo. We are hoping the vultures circling overhead find this little treasure and do away with it pronto so we can again enjoy the fresh mountain air.

Signed: S

P.S. – As mentioned in a previous blog – the artwork (compliments of Michael and John) adorns our living room/dining room wall – we have a great little nook outside on our patio for crafts and painting – the recent paintings were done using foam cubes (I cut up a large piece of foam the boys ripped out of one of the mattresses (how’s that for resourceful)?