Hey yall

Okay so been here about four days and I am already sweating my butt off! The humidity is slightly out of control lol.

Anyways, Monday was a shopping day in the good old El Rey (The King--24 hour grocery store). I braved the deli and the bakery and got some empandadas!! Yum!

My limited spanish skills hasnt gotten us too far yet. Our house keeping lady keeps trying to tell me stuff but I only catch about a 3rd of what she says.... I guess thats an improvement over last year when I caught nothing. So far me and Katlien have the apartment to ourselves but someone else will be moving in July. I think she is supposed be from Columbia?


We are in the same apartment this year, but lucky us the bathroom and refridgerator work this time. Talk about a fustrating time. Hopefully everything will stay in good order.


Some packages with our field equiptment hadnt come in till today, so yesterday was a really chill day of reading, going to the pool and watching a movie on my laptop.



Today we went out to the study plot (its called "Limbo) and its located on pipeline road. I took some pictures today but I havent uploaded them yet but I will soon. We basically just hiked around for a few hours so that Kaitlen could get oriented. Found lots of my ant and spider friends, I'm exited to get back to work on the project.

Anyways, on our way out of the forest, we ran into (well, literrally walked into) an army ant swarm. They are really cool because many certain species of birds follow the army ants around and pick off the insects that are trying to flee from the ants (the ants will attack anything in their paths---insects, lizards etc.) But since the army ant swarm was essentially on the road we got some good looks at the Ocellated Ant Bird. Its not rare or anything, but it is pretty neat if you look at it through binoculars. This is not my picture, because Im not that cool but I thought I'd share a glimpse of what Im talking about.

We also came across toucans and the collard acarcari today :), which are some of my favorites.

Crazy Creature isnt it?

Thats all I got for now folks!

Miss you all!

Love,
Loriann