Qualla: Monteverde https://qualla.com/monteverde en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:12 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/d/1/g/d/monteverde-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Monteverde https://qualla.com/monteverde Monteverde: Introduction https://qualla.com/monteverde/ Photo credit Matthias Bethke, CC BY-SA 4.0. In 1949, four young men from the Quaker community in Fairhope, Alabama, were imprisoned for refusing to register for the draft. Released after four months, they and their community decided they could not remain in a country moving toward permanent militarization. In November 1950, eleven Quaker families left Alabama. Led by dairyman Hubert Mendenhall, who had visited Costa Rica on a farmer's tour, they settled in a misty, cool stretch of the Cordillera de Tilaran -- attracted by the climate for dairy farming, the friendly locals, and a national constitution that had abolished its army. They called the place Monte Verde, Green Mountain. The cloud forest they set aside for conservation would become one of the most studied ecosystems on Earth.

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Image: Matthias Bethke | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Sun, 22 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/1/g/d/monteverde-wp/d1gd-monteverde-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Monteverde: Five Thousand Years in the Clouds https://qualla.com/monteverde/ Photo credit Fran Devinney, CC BY 2.0. The mountains around Monteverde were not empty when the Quakers arrived. Archaeological evidence points to Clovis-culture settlements farming and hunting in the region as early as 3000 BC. Between 500 BC and 300 CE, agriculture intensified and simple chiefdom societies replaced s...

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Image: Fran Devinney | CC BY 2.0

]]> Sun, 22 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/1/g/d/monteverde-wp/d1gd-monteverde-five-thousand-years-in-the-clouds.mp3 0:06 2 full Monteverde: The Quaker Experiment https://qualla.com/monteverde/ Photo credit CC BY-SA 3.0. The Quakers and pacifists who arrived in the early 1950s were not the first outsiders. During the first decades of the twentieth century, Creole populations had come in small numbers, many working the Guacimal gold mines or providing goods and services to mining communities. But ...

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Image: CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Sun, 22 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/1/g/d/monteverde-wp/d1gd-monteverde-the-quaker-experiment.mp3 0:06 3 full Monteverde: The Jewel in the Crown https://qualla.com/monteverde/ Photo credit User: (WT-shared) Velorian at wts wikivoyage, CC BY-SA 1.0. National Geographic called the Monteverde Cloud Forest "the jewel in the crown of cloud forest reserves." The numbers justify the superlative. The 10,500-hectare Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve harbors 500 species of orchids -- more than anywhere else on the planet -- with 34 dis...

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Image: User: (WT-shared) Velorian at wts wikivoyage | CC BY-SA 1.0

]]> Sun, 22 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/1/g/d/monteverde-wp/d1gd-monteverde-the-jewel-in-the-crown.mp3 0:06 4 full Monteverde: Quarter Million Visitors https://qualla.com/monteverde/ Photo credit Junebug2433, CC0. Costa Ricans voted Monteverde one of the country's Seven Wonders in 2007, alongside Isla del Coco, Tortuguero, Arenal Volcano, Cerro Chiripo, Rio Celeste, and Poas Volcano. An estimated 250,000 tourists now visit annually, with about 70,000 entering the cloud forest reserve itsel...

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]]> Sun, 22 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/1/g/d/monteverde-wp/d1gd-monteverde-quarter-million-visitors.mp3 0:06 5 full