Border wars. . .

Here in Costa Rica, squatters have a lot of rights. Sneak onto some property, throw up a fence and if no one notices, folks can claim it as their own.

The man that owns the 70-plus acres behind the hotel (and lets just our guests use it to hike to the waterfall and river; and a fellow named Israel who runs some cows back there) is always worried that someone will do just that, as the 70 acres are pretty remote.

That happened recently, as Miguel and Keneth found out when they were clearing the fence line deep into the property. No idea of who put the fence up, though best guesses are the yahoos who own the property on the other side of the river.

The next day, Miguel and I went back there to check it out so I could take pictures and send to the owner of the property.

It was not an easy hike that deep into the forest and took about 30-plus minutes each way. With all of the rain lately, it made for some fairly treacherous footing and the editorial department only stumbled a few times. In some places, a wrong step can send you down about 30 feet and into the river.

When we finally got to the new fence, it was obvious that it was really new (no rust on the barbed-wire, and you could see the cut marks on the fence posts were still fresh) and hadn't been there for much longer than a couple of weeks.

It was an odd thing, as it basically formed a loop from the river. You can see the far boundary of the fence in the picture. It runs up for 20 to 30 meters from the river and 150 meters long.

It is clearly the current owner's property, which extends to the river. The odd thing: from May through the first part of November, a heavy rain is going to flash-flood that whole fenced-in area. It's useless for any sort of building.

After some legal papers are filed tomorrow, Miguel and Keneth will head back down and wrap up the fencing and cut up the posts.

Hopefully that will be the end of the border battle.