In 2022 we decided on a last minute short trip so somewhere neither one of us has been, Costa Rica.
Our first night was in San José where we got a tour by a local to various parts of the city to learn some history of the area. We had some delicious food at the end but the most memorable experiece was the urber ride from downtown to the hotel. I’m pretty sure we were in the middle of an urban car race.
We hit the road in a rental the next day, with the final destination of La Fortuna in mind. We first went to a volcano on the way, which was a first for me. They made us put on hard hats and walked us up to the edge after some volcano education.
We stopped at La Paz Waterfall Garden Nature Park for some nature like walking. There were lots of animals in a zoo like setting but also and outdoor hummingbird garden with many species in it. We didn’t spend too long before getting back on the road.
Our next stop was La Fortuna where we would go on a walk in a sloth forest, and visit North Fields Coffee Tour to learn all about how coffee and chocolate are produced and processed.
We checked out some hiking on the far side of Arenal Volcano where we spotted a wild cat we think is called Jaguarundi. We didn’t get any photos of it, as it disappeared pretty quick.
Costa Rica would not be complete with some “in nature adrenaline” activities, so some crazy long zip lines it was! No photos of that apparently, but I’m sure I had some somewhere! We had really cool accommodations in a cabin on a resort surrounded by plants and also down the road from the resort was some wetlands so the birding potential was really good here in the mornings. One of the more interesting birds I saw was a Northern Jacana.
From La Fortuna we did a drive around Lake Arenal on a very twisty road, sometimes not paved. It took us most of the day to go around to Monteverde. Mid way around we stopped for lunch at a hole in the wall place called Soda La Macha. We crossed a little bridge on foot to arrive at what looked like the outside area of somebodies house. This was both the cheapest meal, and best meal we had on our entire trip in Costa Rica. There was a dog and iguana with us pretty much the whole time.
In Monteverde we did a night time wildlife tour and also a very expensive hike in this area with a whole bunch of suspension bridges. It was beautiful, and we got many photos of birds including a beautiful Golden-browed Chorophonia. Nothing was cheap in Costa Rica. Except for the one exception above, restaurants were expensive, and food was mediocre.
We were in La Fortuna for two nights, Monteverde for two nights, then we had the last two nights in the tourist town of Jaco on the coast where we were to relax with nothing planned. We did some more hiking in the area, and saw many more birds, monkeys, lizards and crocs under a bridge.
Costa Rica wasa good time!