RAIN FOREST MISSIÓN STATEMENT !!!
I am writing this sitting at a table in our "rancho"
at camp. It is 5:45 AM, I have a cup of coffee, the
sun rising downstream in the notch of the canyon,
and the guests are still sound asleep in their tents.
This is my time. My favorite time in my favorite
place. The howler monkeys are sounding off across
the river way up in the rainforest somewhere. A
hundred yards downstream, a bare throated tiger
heron stands on a midstream rock in a Class 2 rapid.
He is staring intently down into the Pacuare river,
waiting for his breakfast to swim into the eddy
behind the rock. I have seen him many times. I am
pretty sure it is the same heron.
I think back on my seventeen years here in Costa
Rica. It is like it has been a second lifetime for
me. My "first life" was spent on the rivers of West
Virginia, learning to kayak, first with my father,
then with friends, then with those same friends
taking the sport of kayaking to a whole new level in
the seventies and eighties. It was also spent
building a rafting business with my partner, Roger
Zbel. Precision Rafting is still there and so is
Roger. So are most of my friends. I'm the one that
left. I'm the one that came to Costa Rica.
I didn't just come to Costa Rica, I was drawn in.
There was no escape. The rivers, the endless summers,
the life-style, the magic of the forests and jungles.
The place just exudes life. However, as I came to
learn, sometimes life is not easy here.
The Costa Rican people constantly strive and
struggle to make a living (a lot like the tiger
heron). Watching it all happen all around me, it
made me want to be a part of it and give something
back. Years ago I adopted a couple of the kids from
the "precario" the squatters' neighborhood at the
Pacuare takeout. I raised Angel and Poca on the
rivers and taught them how to guide and kayak. They
are grown now and work for RainForest World. Back in
1990, a couple of Cabecar Indian boys stepped out of
the jungle and onto the river bank. Urbano still
lives in the canyon but Octavio has been with me
since the first week this company opened. Close to a
dozen young Costa Rican men and women got their
start here at RainForest World and have gone on to
do things they probably never imagined they would
do. Take "Semilla" for example. When Semi was 12 he
picked fruit in the RainForest World organic farm in
his home village of Peralta. This past year found
him guiding on the American River in California and
then living and working for 2 months in Manhattan.
In West Virginia, rafting takes place in gorgeous
river canyons, but the rivers are crowded and
rafting trips are at best an "adventure sport". Here
it is different. While I'm not going to tell you
that our trips are "educational," or even
necessarily "eco-tourism", I do know that it is hard
to go down the Pacuare, or canoe the Sierpe, or
watch a sea turtle lay her eggs on a beach at night
in Parismina without the experience enriching us as
human beings.
My time in Costa Rica has truly given me a whole new
perspective of our role on this planet. We must
leave a mark, a positive mark, in our lifetimes. I
have been immersing myself in the never ending
battle to save the Pacuare from proposed dam
projects. I'm a Costa Rican citizen now and have a
voice. I am going to make sure that it doesn't
happen in my lifetime. People ask me why. Well, I
guess it's for the future of the company, and the
future of our guides and drivers and the Cabecars.
But I'm also doing it for the Tiger Heron. It is all
part of giving something back.
Go to Top
Phil Coleman |
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