Turrialba and around

Regarded as one of the world’s premier tropical research stations, the Centro Agronómico Tropical de Investigación y Enseñanza, otherwise known by its acronym CATIE (wwww.catie.ac.cr), is unique in Costa Rica. For the last 65 years, the agricultural research and higher education centre, 4km east of Turrialba, has worked on marrying the needs of Latin America’s rural poor with those of the environment – it was here that the technique for producing palmito (heart-of-palm) from the pejibaye was developed – and at any one time it is involved in over a hundred research and development projects, from tackling climate change to producing disease-resistant tropical crops.

It’s this expert knowledge that makes the tours of CATIE’s landscaped Jardín Botánico so eye-opening. The genial guide will introduce you to some of the 472 species being preserved here, explaining the virtues of the miracle fruit (it makes sour things taste sweet) or divulging some of the 101 benefits of eating noni; the tour is very interactive, so you’ll spend much of your time sniffing spices, touching tubers and munching on freshly picked tropical fruit such as mangosteen and pink ornamental bananas.

As well as hosting a number of vital germplasm projects, including one of the most important collections of coffee and cacao plants in the world, CATIE harbours a variety of wildlife: armadillos, coatis, sloths and caimans, and, attracted by the myriad tropical plants, 300 species of bird – the central lagoon alone is home to boat-billed heron, northern jacana and purple gallinule, and is the roosting site for a hundred or so great white herons. Keen birders can take part in the bird-banding research run by the Programa Monitoreo de Aves, part of an ongoing study into land-use transition – vital when so many Costa Rican farmers are replacing their coffee plantations with sugar cane. Volunteers can help with the catching, weighing and releasing of birds in various habitats across campus.

The most accessible ancient archeological site in Costa Rica, the MONUMENTO NACIONAL GUAYABO lies 19km northeast of Turrialba and 84km east of San José. Discovered by explorer Anastasio Alfaro at the end of the nineteenth century, the remains of the town of Guayabo, believed to have been inhabited from about 300 BC to 1400 AD, were only excavated in the late 1960s. Administered by MINAE (which also controls Costa Rica’s national park system), Guayabo today suffers from an acute shortage of funds: some of the montículos (stone mounds) are in a poor state of repair and only a small part of the site has been excavated. With the withdrawal of the annual US aid grant, the prospects for further exploration look bleak.

The site, a dairy farm until 1968, is visually disappointing compared to the magnificent Maya and Aztec cities of Mexico or Guatemala – cultures contemporaneous with Guayabo – though it’s well to remember that civilizations should not necessarily be judged on their ability to erect vast monuments. Facing the considerable difficulties posed by the density of the rainforest terrain, the Guayabo managed not only to live in harmony with an environment that remains hostile to human habitation, but also constructed a complex system of water management and social organization, and expressed themselves through the “written language” of petroglyphs.

The mysteries of Guayabo are amplified by today’s site, which lacks anything in the way of information or interpretation; it’s a good idea to hire a guide to help you decipher what can otherwise look like random piles of stone. Either way, it’s best to start at the gloomy exhibition space, which has a model showing how the town would have looked, before heading up to the mirador for an overview; the trail (1.6km) then weaves its way down among the mounds.

Most of the heaps of stones and basic structures now exposed were erected between 300 and 700 AD, though the (still working) aqueducts at the northwestern end of the site are some 2000 years old. Excavations have shown that the Guayabo were particularly skilled in water conducting – look out for the stone tanque de captación near here, where they stored water carried in these subterranean channels from nearby springs.

At the heart of the town is the central mound. Of the 43 montículos that make up the site, this is the tallest circular base unearthed so far, with two staircases and pottery remains at the very top. Guayabo houses were built to a hierarchial system, and it is likely that this was home to the community chief, a cacique, who had both social and religious power. Near the central mound, you can see some of the tombs (known as Tumbas de Cajón, or Drawer Tombs) that have been uncovered in various parts of the site. They were constructed in layers of rock (hence their name) brought from surrounding rivers; unfortunately, the tombs discovered so far have been plundered by looters long ago. Beyond here, at the eastern end of the site, a paved road, the Calzada Caragra, runs for 200m before disappearing into thick jungle; the main entrance to town, this was believed to have once stretched for 20km.

The people of Guayabo brought stones to the site from a great distance, probably from the banks of the Río Reventazón, and petroglyphs have been found on 53 of these – most are now in the Museo Nacional in San José, but you can still see carvings of what appear to be lizard and jaguar gods, and an altogether more intriguingly patterned rock, the so-called Sky Stone, believed by some experts to represent a celestial map of the southern skies, and therefore possibly of use as an ancient calendar.

Other than this, little is known of the people who lived here, and there are no clues as to why Guayabo was ultimately abandoned, though hypotheses include an epidemic or war with neighbouring tribes.

The least-visited of the Valle Central’s major volcanoes, Volcán Turrialba (3328m) erupted for the first time in 145 years on January 5, 2010, blowing a large vent in the crater’s upper wall and forcing the evacuation of sixty people from local villages; dramatic cloud plumes (up to 2km high) continued to spout skyward for the first few months of the year.

The park is open again, but with restricted access, according to volcanic activity. Check the latest before venturing up here – and note that the Volcanological and Seismological Observatory of Costa Rica (OVSICORI) haven’t ruled out the January eruption being the precursor to further, larger-scale seismic activity.