Archive for January, 2010

Extreme Costa Rica Zip Line Tours

With the rise in tourism here in Costa Rica, canopy tours are also growing in popularity. An activity for any age, it’s definitely something you do not want to leave Costa Rica without having the experience. The canopy tour is a thrill of a lifetime with breathtaking views for the young and old.

There is something about the rush of zipping through the forest above the treetops on a cable connected to a pulley. The pure adrenaline rush you get is unexplainable as well as one you will never forget. There are many tour companies to choose from so do your homework before booking your tour.

Depending on what your extreme adventure idea is, you can bet that you will find it on a canopy tour. With a range of activities outlined along the way, you get to choose what works best for your perfect adrenaline rush! Choose your tour operator according to your “extreme”, or not, desire.

Canopy tours consist of a series of platforms and cables placed strategically throughout the forest. As you travel from platform to platform, you will be connected to the cable with a harness and pulley. Some tour companies offer safety connections while you are standing on the platform waiting to move to through to the next location.

What better way to view the upper levels of a rain Forest than by flying along harnessed to a cable gliding over the treetops. Sit back, relax and enjoy the view. I f you have questions about age restrictions, people with disabilities, weight or medical issues, check with your tour operator of choice prior to booking.

A favorite location for many tourists is near Jaco beach in Herradura. This destination is located near the Gulf of Nicoya which is on the Central Pacific Coast. As you are flying through the sky you have amazing views of the Gulf of Nicoya as well as the Pacific Ocean.

Congo Trail Canopy Tour is a canopy tour located between Flamingo and Ocotal beaches. Turubari is an eco-adventure oriented theme park and a Costa Rica adventure travel company offering premium quality one day adventure Rain Forest tours. Some of the tours available are the famous Costa Rica canopy tour, the rain Forest aerial tram tour, the tropical park tour, the horseback ride tour, the sensational cable tour and much more.

If it’s just a quiet laid-back walk you are looking for then you have to experience either the Monteverde or Santa Elena Reserve. Taking a nice walk on one of the few suspension bridges to get a view from above the trees of the forest bottom is spectacular! There are many spectacular sights to be seen from these incredible heights.

As with any vacation, it’s best to always be prepared. When visiting Costa Rica remember that we are very close to the equator here and it’s best to bring lots of sunscreen. Bug spray is also suggested, you are experiencing a different climate and precautions are always suggested. Make this vacation an adventure in this beautiful scenic country, and enjoy!

Costa Rica is a great place to visit, filled with much beauty and magic. The writer has resided for many years in Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve. If you ever decide to visit Monteverde make sure to check out How to get Transportation to from Monteverde.


Make Your Own Electricity And Save Some Money

There is nothing more frustrating right now than the way the economy is going. It is not a surprise to you when I tell you that we are in an economy that really needs to save up a lot of money, but what is the best way to do that? Well for starters, you can make your own electricity. By the time you are done reading this article you will have learned three incredible and popular ways to save money on electricity.

1-Solar Power Electricity

The use of solar power electricity has been around for a while. This works by using the sun’s rays to power your house. This might sound really cool at first, but there are a few problems. It cost a lot of money to install and maintain it and it can be very unattractive. Another down side is that you become very dependent on the sun, if the sun is not out you will not get electricity. That means that during the night when there is no sun you will not be able to generate electricity.

2-Wind Power Electricity

Just like the solar powered electricity, wind power has been around for a very long time. The concept behind this is very simple, the customer purchases a wind turbine to put near their house, whenever the win spins the turbine, the turbine generates electricity. Again, you become very dependent on the weather. If it is not windy you will not get electricity

3-Electricity Through Magnets

This is the coolest and newest form of alternative energy and has been proven to be the best. The magnetic power generator is the cheapest out of all of them and is not dependent on the weather at all. It simply uses the earths natural magnetic pull to generate a person’s home. Another great thing about the magnetic generator is that it is small and can be put anywhere, most people like to put them under the sink.

Do you want to know how you can Make Your Own Electricity and save money on the important things? If you do then just Click Here


How to Build a Chicken Coop to Fit Your Budget

There are a variety of things to keep in mind to building a backyard chicken coop under a firm budget successfully. There have been many chicken farmers that could of saved hundreds of dollars just by a few simple adjustments. Here are some key facts you should know about building a cheap chicken coop on a budget.

Know Your Land Before Building – It’s always best to survey the entire land you have available and pick a place where you would not need to landscape. Landscaping is important is due to the fact that building a chicken coop on a non firm ground would significantly decrease the stabilization as time progressed which could lead to rebuilding the chicken house again which is costly and time consuming.

The other option is to do it yourself, but this will still take time and could still cost you a small amount of money. So the smartest and best way to do this is to just survey the entire land you have available and pick a place where you would not need to landscape. This may be hard to find, but once you find a firm enough ground you’ll be happy you did.

Windows Needs to be Properly Placed – When the windows are stationed well, you essentially kill two birds with one stone as well as saving money in the process. The windows will also serve for ventilation purposes which is critical in helping the chickens maintain good health. And unless you plan on wiring in electrical light which can be expensive, windows are going to be the primary light source that the chickens will have. So to help you save money is to make sure that the windows are properly placed in the chicken coop to allow proper lighting and ventilation.

Consider Building a Smaller Sized Chicken Coop – Building material is where you will incur the highest amount of cost. And the smaller you build the fewer materials you will need. By just taking the right measurements, you can decrease your building costs and still build a cheap chicken coop that’s right for your budget. Often two to three chickens will be plenty to give you more than enough eggs that you need daily unless you’re planning on selling the eggs commercially. That would be the only reason to build a chicken coop bigger. If you feel you need to build bigger just keep in mind that the costs will be more and also maintenence down the road will be also.

Click here to learn more on how to build a chicken house to fit your budget.


Build Homemade Solar Panels And Eliminate Your Energy Bills

If you know how to build solar panels, you can eliminate your energy bills. The fact is not everybody who wants to harness free solar power to generate electricity is able to. What went wrong for those who have tried but failed.

Even though some hobbyists have built their own solar energy panels, they were unable to supply enough energy to their home so they can be self-sufficient. And they are still struggling to find out why. At least they are much better than folks who do nothing but complain about exorbitant electricity bills.

Many people do not bother to do anything about it even though they hate paying their electricity bills. If you are reading this, you are surely not in this category, so I know you are someone who takes action to make your life better. Therefore I’ll share with you some simple steps that can really take your house off-grid by building some homemade photovoltaic panels.

Start with doing some research. This helps you appreciate how others have benefited from using solar power. It gives you a feel that it’s indeed possible to eliminate your energy bills. This objective is indeed achievable but things may happen to go slow at the start so have some faith.

When you have finish your research, the next thing you should consider is to purchase a guide which will show you exactly what to do so that you can take your home off-grid. Do not try to figure things out yourself as those who do that usually fail.

Many of them made expensive mistakes while the rest simply go around in circles. And when it took them too long to complete their project, they give up.

You can learn from their mistake. A DIY solar guide costs less than $50 and it contains insider tips on how to build a professional-looking photovoltaic panel at one tenth the cost of retail models. If you were to figure things out yourself, you need to get very lucky to complete your project using so little money in such a short time. Yet the tendency for us is to save that $50…and loose $1,000 on silly mistakes.

Remember to start small when you first start building. When you are familiar with what you’re doing, then scale up the installation.

With more installation, you will get to the point where there is more than enough electricity coming from your solar panels. When that happen, you can sell your surplus energy to your local power company.

Make your own solar panels to save money and go green. Do you want to save thousands off the cost of solar panels? You can now make solar panels at home! Click here to find out how.


Plans to Build a Chicken Hutch

You probably would want to think about building a chicken hutch if your only planning on keeping one or two chickens total. It will be less expensive and the work will be less time consuming than building a full chicken coop. Something to keep in mind is that some people has also built a chicken hutch and placed it inside their chicken coop.

A chicken hutch is much easier to take care of than a coop for the obvious reasons, it’s smaller plus its small enough to where you can find a good location on your yard for it. This is a perfect option for those just starting out as chicken farmers. To build a chicken hutch, here is what you need to know.

Build a Good Size Door- Be careful of making the mistake of building a small door that the chickens will have a hard time getting in and out of. You need to give your chickens easy access to get inside and out of the hutch, building a good size door is very important. The best way is to build the door larger and then attach a wooden door flap so that they can get in and out. This will protect them from predators but will also allow for easier access for them.

Have the Hutch Raised Off the Ground- You want to raise the hutch about a foot or so off the ground. The difference between a chicken coop and a chicken hutch is the fact that one is built into the ground and the other is build above the ground. Make sure that you are raising the hutch off the ground. You want to raise the hutch about a foot or so off the ground. Don’t be overly concerned about the measurement, just as long it’s not placed on the floor. A ramp needs to be placed at the door if it’s any higher than a foot.

Easy Opening Lid- You are going to have to regularly clean the hutch considering that it’s a smaller place where your chickens are going to stay. The last thing you need to do is to make sure you have a lid that can open easily for easy access for you to the chickens and for cleaning purposes. The harder it is to get inside of the hutch, the chances that its going to be cleaned regularly are slim. It would be a smart move to clean it on a weekly basis. So when you decide to build a chicken hutch, keep all these points in mind.

Click here to learn how to build a chicken hutch.


Wildlife Art

Wildlife art is art about wild animals and birds. It is currently a popular area of art, and some of the first ever artworks were about wildlife.

Cave paintings from the prehistoric age often included wild animals and birds which were food or danger at the time and so conceptualized very differently from our current perspective on them. Sculptures from the ancient world also often include animals and birds.

Changing attitudes to wildlife can be clearly seen in the evolution of wildlife art. As humans began to be more isolated from their environment wildlife were almost absent in western art for long periods. Religions were about people and the outside world was ignored as much as possible.

In the romantic period animals and birds were used as emotional representations in art. For example a lion might be represented as a noble beast with head held high in pride, where as a tiger might be represented as an evil creature, slinking guiltily with head bowed in shame.

Around this time wildlife in art was also often about the boundaries between the human world and the natural world, rather than a view of nature in its own right. For example, there was art depicting a lion attacking a domestic horse.

The stag paintings of Landseer were among the most popular of all art during the Victorian era and are still well loved today. Wildlife increased in popularity around this time. The finest picture book ever published is said to be the book on birds of America by the famous bird artist Audubon.

Currently nature is of great interest as a thing in its own right as well as for conservation issues. Wildlife art reflects these interests with natural depictions of animals in their environment as well as art created for the purpose of increasing awareness of wildlife conservation issues.

Wildlife art, the definitive Guide, see the art referred to in this article, and lots more of the world’s best wildlife artworks, including photography, wildlife art blog etc.