Keep in mind that there are many people like my friend who is a licensed tour operator that can arrange a tour specific to your abilities and what you enjoy seeing and doing. We took custom tours for several years. Sometimes I would do the research and ask them to make it happen. Other times I would ask for their suggestions.

Hi, Suzie2. I'm just checking in after a few days absent. Thanks for the <i>Bosque del Cabo</i> recommendation. I'll make a note of it for our next Costa Rica trip, which will probably be to the Osa. But it won't be for a while; our next trip will be to Spain.

- Larry

justretired,

One more question about your camera if you don't mind. How long does

Justretired. Sorry, my laptop is acting up. What I wanted to ask is how long it takes for your shot to focus while pressing the shutter down halfway. I've been doing some research and I have read some comments about losing the shots (i.e. birds) due to the length of time it takes to focus. Thanks for your help.

Usually the camera focuses pretty quickly, in around a quarter to a half a second. It's bound to take some time, since focusing is a mechanical operation - it's actually moving the internal lenses.

The problem with it taking longer is when it doesn't succeed on the first try. The camera focuses based on an optical analysis of the scene, and it displays a small rectangle around the part of the image it is using for this. Sometimes I would roughly aim the camera, press the shutter half way, and find it to be focusing on a tree branch much closer than the one the bird was on. A problem with forests is that there are things in the scene at many different distances from the camera. When that occurred, I released the shutter button, moved the camera to get the bird into the focusing box, and again pressed the button half way.

Another thing that could happen was that the focus box would fall on something with no sharp edges in it for the camera to focus on, such as a large leaf in a dark area of the scene. In that case, again, I needed to pick something better to focus on.

You also need to be careful about the focus "mode" - the camera has many of them. I usually had it focus on the center of the image, the most basic mode. But there were other modes in which it would pick several spots, and focus on a compromise distance. It also has a face recognition mode, in which it locates faces in the scene, and focuses on them. I often used this mode when taking pictures of people. Again, it displays boxes around the faces on the viewing screen, so you can verify that it's focusing on the right things. I usually used this mode only for people, but I once left it in this mode by mistake, and I'm pretty sure I saw it properly identify the face of a squirrel monkey as the object to focus on.

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