Bug Paradise

Bug Paradise, a.k.a Casa Maria. Those are two official names of the one superb posada 3.5 hours west of Caracas in Carabobo State where we just spent the weekend with several friends. It hardly seemed paradise for the bugs because the entomologist owner had huge numbers of them crucified in display cases.

(This picture and all the others are tiny in here but you can click to see them bigger.)
Also the numerous ponds on the premises were teeming with fish and frogs that made short work of any mosquito larvae so unfortunate as to hatch there. Ha! YES! Numerous other bugs met a grisly end when (attracted by the light) they sneaked into the screen cage teeming with golden orb-weaver spiders.

The posada as it exists today represents a 16 year labor of love of Bavarian immigrants, Norbert and Gabriele (Gabi) Flauger. Norbert is foremost an entomologist and ecologist but has obvious talents in horticulture and landscape and building architecture. Gabi is business manager, decorator, and master chef. Both are trilingual in Spanish, English, and of course German. Check out their website at www.bugparadise.com. To proceed from the home page, click the language of your choice.

Bug Paradise is not only a native plant horticultural garden but a menagerie of native animals including huge aquaria of salt and fresh water fish, a butterfly house, a sociable free flying Amazon parrot, a cute native possum, an impish Capuchin monkey, and two lethargic boa constrictors. The owners also deploy the right attractants of fruit and seeds to bring many flying visitors of the bird and butterfly sort. It was a paradise for Homo sapiens too. There was a small but picturesque swimming pool amidst orchid wrapped trees and dangling bag-like nests of the Crested Oropendolas. The sleeping rooms and the grounds were all maintained with stereotypical German fastidiousness. The feng shui was right on the mark.

You can hang out in the Garden of Eden premises if you're sedentary but Norbert can take you on naturalist excursions to the cloud forest and other locations on the Caribbean beaches or in the Los Llanos (plains). You can also take walks in the extensive orange groves up the hill behind the posada, enjoy the view, steal oranges, and get lost. We did that Saturday evening. On Sunday we took a lurching ride in the 1957 Unimog pictured at the top to a point higher up in the cloud forests. (No side impact airbags there.) In addition to Norbert, we had a distinguished German botanist guest Winfried (Vinnie) accompanying us.

Vinnie was inspired and inspiring, definitely a botanist worthy of a Gary Larsen caricature. He is cataloging the native species in Venezuela in the cloud forests from about 200 meters to 1000 meters I think he said. Here are some interesting specimens such as the compound Hibiscus and the walking palm tree.

We ended our adventure by going home, which is the way we end all adventures. These last two pictures are at a stop for fruit (mangoes and avocados). A very poor looking mother with a one year old baby came up and asked if I'd like to take her baby's picture. I didn't know what the deal was so I said no. Then I sized her up as truly needy and found a BsF 10 note in my nearly empty wallet. It's hard to know how much that's worth as both the dollar and the Bolivar race toward worthlessness. I think about $2.75. I gave it to her and she was crossing herself and giving me blessings of gratitude till we rode out of sight. It's cheap to feel generous in a poor country.