Poisonous Lizards
6. The Living Planet – The Baking Deserts Broadcast 1 March 1984, the next instalment explores the world of deserts. It begins in the largest, the Sahara, where the highest land temperatures have been recorded. Rock paintings depict creatures such as giraffes and antelopes, suggesting that at one point there was enough vegetation to support them. Now, such life has all but disappeared, with the exception of the cypress, whose roots find water deep underground. Since the night brings low temperatures, many of the creatures that live there are nocturnal. They include Fennec Foxes, geckos, jerboas and caracals. A scorpion is shown fighting a black widow spider. During the day, the desert belongs to the reptiles, which rely on the sun to warm their bodies. The Sonoran Desert is home to the Gila monster, one of the two poisonous lizards. By mid-afternoon, it’s so hot that even reptiles must escape the sun’s rays. However, some birds have developed methods for keeping cool. The sandgrouse evaporates moisture by fluttering its throat, while the road runner also uses its tail as a parasol. Plants that are best adapted to the habitat are the creosote bush and cacti, of which the saguaro is one of the biggest. The nomadic Tuareg people cross the Sahara from one side to the other — but can’t do so unaided. They rely on the camel for transportation, as much as it needs them to periodically dig for water. Despite this, it is one of the best adapted desert animals: it can go without …
A TripAdvisor™ TripWow slideshow of a travel blog to Manuel Antonio, Costa Rica by TravelPod blogger Morganfay titled “Manuel Antonio…or, rather, the Iguana Files.” Morganfay’s travel blog entry: “Manuel Antonio, Costa Rica…gorgeous, but hot! I was granted the opportunity to visit this lovely tourist attraction the weekend of February 17th. My cousin decided to do a destination wedding, and while all the other guests had to fly in from various cities and states, I only had to hop over from San Jose! My Aunt Betty flew in Friday night, bringing with her a traveler’s nightmare, thanks to American Airlines. We headed out from San Jose mid-day on Saturday, and got to Manuel Antonio halfway through the rehearsal dinner…like, 7:30pm. Waaaayyy too long, and it wasn’t even a public bus! It was a shuttle, that did pickups and drop offs…they didn’t mention they do it ANYWHERE, including upper crust Uppity McUpperstein private resorts that have private drives that take 20 minutes to get to the reception….and 20 minutes back out to the main road. Throw a couple of these in, and there ya go…waaay too much time tacked on to the travel. Oh, and then there was the German lady who dragged us on some goose chase to get to her Apartahotel; I’m talkin’ dirt roads and chickens running around. Then she made the driver go in with her, and kept him there for a good half hour…something about a voucher. Who knows. We were supposed to stay at the Blue Monkey, but they botched up the …
A TripAdvisor™ TripWow slideshow of a travel blog to Puerto López, Ecuador by TravelPod blogger Luke_t titled “13hrs on the road & 3 buses, but totally worth it!” Luke_t’s travel blog entry: “Well as you can tell from the title of this post it was a pretty long & painful journey from Latacunga to Puerto Lopez. I was originally planning on only spending a day in Puerto Lopez as I´d heard the place itself wasn´t that great, but after arriving so late & being unable to sort a trip for the next day I had to stay longer, but I was actually quite glad in the end. I´d come to Puerto Lopez for two reasons; i) Whales and ii) Isla de la Plata with Puerto Lopez just being a base. However with not much to do on my first day other than sort out a trip for the next day, I didn´t really know what to do with myself (Puerto Lopez is pretty small, about 9k people). So at first I´d sat by the beach & just took in the misty morning in the small fishing village bay, which was beautiful. After eating breakfast by the beach I decided to go sort my trip for the next day & in the process of sorting it out I managed to negotiate a bargain price for a whale watching trip leaving in 5 mins (I think that helped quite a bit with the great price!). I was slightly worried that I wouldn´t see any whales as it´s coming to the end of the season, but within about 5 mins of setting off I saw my first whale and it was a magnificent site. They are such massive animals, but yet so graceful, playful & immense to …
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A TripAdvisor™ TripWow slideshow of a travel blog to Cape Trib/ Daintree/ Cairns, Australia by TravelPod blogger Sarahx titled “Rainforest, Crocs and Beach” Sarahx’s travel blog entry: “We were up bright and early this morning- 7am start. We had to wait 15 minutes for the bus, during which mum was getting more and more agitated but they turned up in the end- turns out they had to swap buses because more people got on at one hotel than they originally thought. We drove up the coast, pretty much the same route that we took last night, and a little while later we arrived at our first rainforest for a quick ‘introductary’ walk. It was quite nice really- extra fresh air, really tall trees, lots of vines that tarzan would do well on. We saw a lizard and a sun bird which was cool- they were both pretty close up, so got some good photos. There was a nice river that ran through a clearing of the rainforest- it looked quite like New Zealand. We carried on further North to the Daintree river, where we boarded our boat for an hour river cruise- it looked almost like a paddle boat, but it had a motor (!) We were warned that we probably wouldnt see any crocodiles because it was warm enough in the river at this time of year (about 31 degrees) that they didnt need to come out and lie in the sun. However as soon as we got on the boat we went over to the other bank, and sure enough, there was a big mummy croc lying on the bank! Looked kinda sinister if you ask me, I dont want to think what …
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