There was a question about girly stuff and BdC here. The thread gradually morphed into a discussion of the whiteface monkeys there. It is such a fun topic, I figured it needed its own thread.

I am sure we all have lots of monkey stories. But here are my two favorites.

We were hiking on the switchbacks at BdC once, and encountered a juvenile white faced monkey. He was completely engrossed in eating a piece of fruit, that was as big as his head. He was up in a tree. But since these were switchback trails, he was about even with us on the trail. He was so cute. His whole face was in the fruit, and he was oblivious to our presence. If we had been predators, he would have been history.

We stopped to fumble for the camera, when the rest of the monkey family arrived. They saw how close we were to the baby, and the attack came. Suddenly there was a loud commotion of hoots and screams, and small branches rained down upon us. We ran off up the trail, laughing the whole time. But one of them caught my wife on the back of the neck with a good sized chunk of wood. It was very well aimed shot at a rapidly moving target.

Another time we were driving through Tulemar, and stopped to take a picture of a large white face male I saw in a tree. When I stepped out of the car, he became very aggressive. He would stand on a branch, and hold the one above. He would then jump up and down until the branch below broke. He then would move to another and repeat this. He was screaming the whole time. He was looking me in the eye and showing his fangs.

It was the most obvious "Ya wanna a piece of me?" behavior that I have ever been a party to! I had never witnessed such an aggressive challenge from a monkey. But after a minute, I saw what was really going on. There was a female slipping away behind him, with a very tiny baby clutched to her breast. This guy's bluster was all about creating a diversion while his family escaped.

Had to admire it. Not that I would every hurt a monkey anyway. But I would not have wanted to tangle with this little dude. He was scary!

Anyone else?

Warm Regards,
Pat Hewitt
(Travel professional)

I have a couple....

2 years ago at Costa Verde we were arriving to swim very early am at the pool by building B. We saw a whole troop of White face surrounding the pool, mama's, babies, papas, etc. A few were dipping their legs in the pool to cool off. I started to move closer & closer to one perched on the railing for some pics.

He was huge and seemed very brave so I was able to get really close......well WAY too close for his comfort as he bared his HUGE teeth made a screeching hissing noise and started to chase me!!! My daughter had been following me close behind and unknown to me at the time I ran straight past her nearly knocking her in the pool, smashing through a pool chair, a look of horror on my face. When I reached my husband and son at the far end of the pool he calmly said, "So much for a mother's protective instinct?" I hadn;t even seen her in my fear of Killer monkey!!!

2nd story, same trip and Hotel....

Walking up from the D-Unit to the waiting taxi we hear plop-splat"...not poo but an iguana arm(or leg...it was hard to tell!)

As we looked at the ground around us there were various body parts & blood splattered about. Looking high in the trees above were a troop of whitefaced capuchins, who knew they were "meat-eaters!!!?"

These are nice

*reminder to self to not be standing behind faithie when caphuchins are around

Don't have any stories per se, but have had branches shaken & thrown at me by spiders & caphuchins. They certainly have no problem with bravado.

Lol. Makes me think of Costa Rica last summer. A group of us were hiking in MA, and the monkeys were out and about. A woman in front of me was carrying a back pack. The monkey jumped out of the tree, landing on her back, reached into her bag and promply stole a package of ritz crackers and a bannana. Let me tell you, the monkey had no trouble opening up his new found lunch. It promply discarded the bannana, ate a few of the crackers, and dumped the rest on the ground below it. Luckily the woman wasn't hurt, and everyone had a good laugh.

I have a monkey story too - from Bali. We were at a park with lots of monkeys. One woman had a earrings ripped off her ears. A monkey jumped down on her like lightning and pulled off her silver earring. A little later, a monkey pulled off my husband's glasses off his face, scratching him in the process. There was an old man there who lured the monkey to him with some nuts and got the glasses back. What a scare! My husband did not have an extra pair of glasses and it would have been a bother to get an immediate replacement.

Now we admire them from afar!

I had a white face yank my glasses off. I had a heck of a time prying them from his little hand! About the time I would get them pried loose, he'd grab them with the other hand!

I'll play.

I was in Roatan. We were getting ready to board a dive boat, and this monkey jumped down out of a tree, up into my chest and wrapped its arms around me. It was at this moment I realized those long arms actually wrapped all the way around me, so much so that I could not pry the monkey loose. The boat was getting ready to leave and they were waiting on me. Somebody tried to get the monkey off of me and it let out the most horrendous scream. We were face to face and I was terrified. I might have screamed as loud as the money at that point. Everybody around me started laughing hysterically. Apparently the behavior was typical of this monkey, who was used to people being around, and also to people feeding it. I was apparently the only one (well, me and my travel companion) who didn't know this particular fact. I truly was afraid, and everybody was laughing hysterically. Finally somebody offered the monkey a piece of fruit and it let go.

I was in South Africa at Londolozzi. During breakfast monkeys were everywhere in the camp, jumping down onto the table stealing packets of Equal sweetener. They'd go up into the trees and open them up and eat the Equal the way we'd eat SweatTart powder as kids. That afternoon I was taking an outdoor shower. Those mischievous monkeys surrounded me while I had soap in my eyes, and ran away not only with my towel, but with my clothes as well. From that time on I won't take an outdoor shower without my bathing suit!

LOL! You may have won the "story prize"!

Dana, that completely cracked me up! They're devilish, aren't they?!

They are devilish, aren't they? The Londolozzi story always gets a good laugh.

Last summer I was at Duba Plains, a wonderful camp in Botswana with a beautiful outdoor shower. I was in Tent # 1, which was closest to the main dining/lounging area, and there was no way to get back into my tent without going around the front of it, in plain view of other guests. The monkeys loved the tree above my tent, perhaps because of the proximity to the dining area. During the day I watched them play and at night I could hear them running across the tent roof, which I loved. But because it was winter in Bots I did not pack a bathing suit. At dinner people asked why I did not use the outdoor shower. I of course explained the situation at Londolozzi (which was back in 2003), and I got a good laugh. I'll probably tell that story for a long time.