Jack Ewing
By Jack Ewing A few months back the story of Doña Porfiria Gomez, A Real Life Superwoman appeared on this site. This was the story of a campesina who was married as an adolescent of 14 years to a man of 23 and, shortly thereafter, left her family in Guanacaste.
Read MoreBy Jack Ewing Years ago when I posted the first “NO HUNTING” signs on Hacienda Baru, the prohibition was aimed at neighbors who loved to hunt. Most of game in the parcels of forest left in the area had been killed, and the hacienda still had 180 hectares (445 acres,)
Read MoreBy Jack Ewing Joan When she opened the freezer the putrid odor of rotting meat seeped into the room. Doctor Jiménez pinched her nostrils and stepped back. She gave the restaurant owner a sidelong glance, pulled out her citation book and began writing. “You don’t have to do this,” he
Read MoreThe date was August 16, 2013, the time 4:30 PM. Steve and Peggy Sue watched as the bulky form emerged from the shallow waves and began dragging itself up on the moist sand of Barú Beach. It was a strange sight to behold, especially in the afternoon. Olive Ridley Marine
Read MoreBy Jack Ewing I once saw a menu from a fictitious restaurant called the Road Kill Cafe. “You Kill it; we grill it.” It offered selections such as flat cat, smear of deer, awesome opossum, chunk of skunk, and swirl squirrel. The daily special was called “The Mess. If you
Read More“Baarooom” resounded the hollow buttress-root of the Chilamate tree with each blow of the thick branch. Carmelita wasn’t sure which was louder, the “baarooom” of wood against wood or her pounding heart. Again she struck the hollow root. “Baarooom.” “Carmela honey,” her father’s voice penetrated the darkness before his silhouette
Read MoreThe Hardships, Tragedies, and Challenges of Women in Rural Costa Rica by Jack Ewing How many women do you know in their early 60s who have given birth to thirteen children, most of them at home, and without the assistance of a mid-wife? Eleven of this woman’s children are still
Read MoreBy Jack Ewing When the first settlers moved into the area around Dominical in the early 1900s, they found primary forests comprised of hundreds of thousands of species of living organisms. Over time trees were felled and the highly diverse forests replaced with several species of grass intended for the
Read Moreby Jack Ewing Back in the late 1980s we still didn’t have telephones in the coastal communities, and we were just starting to do some bird watching and ecological tours at Hacienda Baru. The lodge didn’t exist yet. For booking the tours we shared an office with a travel agency
Read MoreBy Jack Ewing Back in the 1970s Diane and the kids and I lived in the casona, the old Hacienda Baru home. We didn’t get around to digging a well until the early 1980s, and every year, the free flowing spring that supplied our water would dry up in mid
Read MoreBy Jack Ewing In the rainforests of Central America the jaguar (Panthera onca) is at the pinnacle of the food chain, and the next largest feline, the puma (Puma concolor,) is one step below. There isn’t much that will confront a jaguar except the larger crocodiles that lurk in some
Read MoreBy Jack Ewing In 1974 President Daniel Oduber began his four-year term as president of Costa Rica. Several months after the inauguration a small article appeared in the daily La Nación mentioning that the president and the minister of transport had stated that the planned coastal highway would be finished
Read MoreBy Jack Ewing Be Careful Bird Watching is Addictive Do you think birds are boring, and don’t see why anyone would want to watch them? Don’t put this article down yet. Let me share with you one interesting tidbit of information about birds, and see if you still think they
Read MoreBy Jack Ewing Forty years ago the interamerican highway was full of holes and had even more curves than it does today. It took Ricardo and me four hours to drive from San José to San Isidro de el General. Pulling into town we filled the Land Rover with diesel
Read MoreTurtle Season 2012 Is Here By Jack Ewing Beliefs are often formed on the basis of a combination of myth and wishful thinking. Since the first pioneers began to settle the southern Pacific region of Costa Rica they have exploited the marine turtles, patrolling the beaches during turtle season, and
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