Custom Family Trip to Costa Rica

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Custom Family Trip to Costa Rica By Mike de La Chapelle, Wildland Traveler January 7, 1998

The following is an account of a wonderful 2 week Christmas holiday trip to Costa Rica with my family (parents, brothers and girl friends). Wildland Adventures of Seattle did an excellent job!

A Bad Start
We left on one of the busiest travel days of the season. This was our second trip to Costa Rica so we anticipated problems with getting luggage into San Jose. On our previous trip Continental Airlines intentionally left our bags for several days in the U.S. because of a backlog of Christmas holiday baggage into San Jose (Ticos returning from shopping sprees in the U.S.). Because of anger at Continental for this incident, we decided to fly with American Airlines this time. But American intentionally left late on our Dallas to Miami connection to accommodate late passengers causing us to miss our flight from Miami to San Jose (the fact that they had overbooked the flight by eight people may have had something to do with why they didn't wait for us). The next flight available was late the next morning on Lacsa, the national airline of Costa Rica. Having heard bad things about this airline I was apprehensive. In fact, we all liked Lacsa much better than American because their jets were brand new (American was flying 20 year old Boeing 727s) and the food was superior.

A Good Recovery
Our itinerary called for us to spend the night in San Jose and leave for Corcovado early the next morning. Instead we spent the night in Miami and arrived in San Jose in the early afternoon. We had phoned Costa Rica Expeditions the night before to let them know of our problem. They met us at the San Jose airport and whisked us off to the nearby small plane airport where our group of eight was quickly loaded into two small Cessnas for the trip to Corcovado National Park in the southwest corner of Costa Rica. So within minutes of clearing customs in San Jose we were once again airborne on a beautiful sunny day.

Corcovado Tent Camp
The hour-long flight to Corcovado was very scenic and the landing on the short gravel runway (Carate airstrip) was very exciting. We were met by our guide, Erik, and a horse drawn cart for carrying our luggage to the lodge. Since there is no road to the lodge, guests must walk a short distance along the beach. Immediately we began to see lots of wildlife in the jungle along the beach. Bright red Macaws were plentiful in the trees along the beach. The tent camp consists of a few large platform tents along the beach with several permanent Robinson Carouso style structures for the bathrooms, kitchen/dining room and bar/hammock room.

Our family was very happy at the Corcovado tent camp. We were comfortable in the tents, and the food was excellent. We loved to go swimming and body surfing in the ocean, and we enjoyed nature walks on the trails behind the lodge and in the national park, which starts a mile up the beach. We saw all kinds of wildlife including White Faced, Spider and Howler monkeys, and many species of birds. The platform tour was not as interesting as I hoped. There was not much to see in the two hours we spent in the canopy but the ascent and descent were fun. We thought the platform tour was very safe and professionally run. We saw a lot more wildlife in our hikes around camp than we did on the platform in the canopy. Our favorite hike was just inside the park taking us through the jungle and into a river where we waded down stream to its terminus in the ocean and then hiked back along the beach.

Being from Seattle, we were not accustomed to the hot and humid weather we encountered in Corcovado. We had difficulty sleeping the first night because there was no breeze to blow through the screened tents. Our only minor complaint about the accommodations was the use of plastic covered mattresses that became sticky and damp on hot nights. We liked the Corcovado tent camp much more than the relatively luxurious accommodations we had later in the trip at Monteverde.

When the generator is shut down at 10:00 at night, there is no light for miles around, and the sky is filled with stars. Turtles were hauling themselves out of the surf and laying their eggs along the beach in front of our tent. We saw their tracks and holes in the morning but we were too tired from our active days to get up in the middle of the night to watch the turtles lay their eggs (we had done this at Tamarindo on a previous trip to CR).

Tortuga Lodge
We flew back to San Jose in two small Cessnas, just like the ones we flew in on. A short time later we were again airborne on our way to Tortuguero National Park in the north east corner of the country. We landed on a small paved airstrip on a sand bar along the Caribbean coast. The airstrip has a surf-covered beach on one side, and a river canal on the other, with the Tortuga Lodge located directly across the canal from the airport. Guests of the lodge simply wave to summon a boat for the short ferry ride across the canal. Despite warnings of dangerous rip currents and bull sharks, we immediately went swimming in the ocean so as to claim to have swum in two different oceans in the same day.

The lodge was very beautiful with large rooms made entirely of tropical hardwood. The climate was even hotter and more humid than Corcovado but a large ceiling fan in each room made it bearable. The food was once again very good.

Like Corcovado, there are no roads to the Tortuga Lodge, and all supplies must be brought in by boat. The large fleet of John boats is also used for taking guests on wildlife viewing trips into the jungle. There are a few trails around the area, including some behind the lodge, but one quickly discovers that it is far easier and more comfortable to view wildlife from the boats. A hike into the jungle required full clothing and a head net for mosquito protection as well as rubber boots for the mud. I was covered with sweat even from short hikes in this outfit.

Wildlife is very abundant around the lodge, with Howler monkeys and Toucans visible from the window of my room. We went out for guided boat trips along the canals in Tortuguero National Park during two mornings. We saw a large number of birds, monkeys and a very active 3-toed sloth. Sick in the Jungle

While at Tortuguero I began to develop an infection in my right ear. Having had outer ear infections before, I knew that quick treatment with antibiotics was necessary. However, we were far from a doctor or a pharmacy. I had to hang on for a couple of more days at Tortuguero until our group flew back to San Jose where I could visit a clinic. By the time we left for San Jose my ear was swollen shut, the whole side of my face was in pain, and I was running a fever. The local staff really came through for me in San Jose. They whisked me off to a private clinic where I received quick and professional treatment. In a couple of hours I was back with the group having received the medications I needed (including an injection of Morphine which made me feel great). Many thanks to Gerrhart for expediting things at the clinic.

Monteverde Lodge
The relative coolness of San Jose felt great after more than a week of heat and humidity at Tortuguero and Corcovado. There is no airport at Monteverde so visitors must arrive by ground transportation. Our group of eight was transported to Monteverde in a spotlessly clean CRE microbus that would have been comfortable for a group twice our size. The first half of the 3-hour drive is spent along the Pan-American Highway before turning on to the rough dirt road to Monteverde.

The Monteverde Lodge is luxurious, with beautifully landscaped grounds, rooms having panoramic views, a large comfortable dining room/bar and cozy fireplace. The weather was cool and comfortable, with evenings requiring long pants and a jacket. The food was the best of all three lodges.

The first day we visited the Monteverde reserve three times, a guided trip in the morning, an unguided loop hike in the afternoon, and a very interesting guided night hike. The morning hike was very crowded with a long line of visitors waiting for the park to open. After watching a professional slide show at the visitors center we finally got started with a very knowledgeable guide named Ricky, a descendent of the original Quakers who settled Monteverde. Ricky slowly moved along the trails pointing out many interesting plants and exotic birds. Within a short time we heard the call of a Resplendent Quetzal and then briefly spotted one eating fruits high in the canopy. Later in the afternoon I was to have a brief encounter with another. After visiting the park, it is well worth stopping in at the hummingbird house to check out the activity at their feeders. I must have burned a couple of rolls of film photographing all the exotic hummingbirds.

The evening guided hike was far more interesting than the day hikes were, and I consider it to be one of the highlights of the trip. There were many more interesting things to see at night. Immediately we saw an owl that didn't seem to mind a dozen headlamps pointed at him and many flash pictures. Our guide Mark, an eight year veteran of Monteverde, pointed out all kinds of interesting insects and frogs that are only active at night. He showed us how to lure hand-sized tarantula spiders out of their holes by tapping a small stick at the entrance and then pulling the stick out when the spider bites it. Both my brother John and I tried it on different tarantulas with great success. The highlight of the evening was the sighting of a rare cat called a Margay, which is a bit bigger than a house cat. The guide had only seen one on three occasions during his eight years of guiding at Monteverde, so he was all pumped up.

The next morning the weather had changed to conditions more typical of a cloud forest, high winds blowing mist and rain filled clouds with the sun continually breaking through. These conditions produced magnificent rainbows that could be seen continuously for the remaining two days of our stay. In the morning we took a very nice hike to a small private nature reserve called Finca Ecologica, which is accessible on a short trail from the lodge. Dozens of Cotomundis and Agutis can be seen at a feeding area near the entrance to the finca. The trail we took had superb views of the rain forest and the Golfo de Nicoya in the distance. The waterfall trail was slippery, steep and muddy but worth the effort. On the way back my mother pointed out a 2-toed sloth all curled up in a tight ball, apparently in a hibernation state because of the cold windy weather. After our hike we walked a short distance to a butterfly farm, where I finally was able to get a good picture of the giant blue Morpho butterflies that we had been seeing all trip.

In the afternoon we walked into the small town of Santa Elena, whose streets were a mess of mud because of all the rain. We found that walking along the dirt roads of Monteverde was unpleasant because of the dust when the conditions are dry and the mud when it's wet. The town was just beginning to pave the center streets with brick, which should be a great improvement. The tourist attractions in Monteverde are spaced far apart, too far to conveniently walk. We found the taxis to be slow, expensive and inconvenient.

Arenal Observatory Lodge
As usual the spotless microbus was ready and on time to take us to our final destination Arenal National Park. Our descent from the mountains into Lake Arenal valley was on a rough dirt road with beautiful panoramic views of pasture land and giant rainbows.

Clouds obscured the volcano as we drove south on the extremely potholed road along the east side of Lake Arenal. We had driven this road two years ago on a bright sunny day with perfect views of the volcano. Then we had no time to stop, now we had three days to see the volcano and the weather was expected to be bad the whole time. A cold front had pushed through bringing rain and wind to the higher elevations.

The observatory lodge is only 1.6 miles from Arenal's crater, but there is a small valley between giving hotel guests some psychological comfort that they could survive the pyroclastic cloud and lava flows from an eruption. Each room has a giant window that is filled by the Volcano when the weather is clear. The low cloud ceilings never permitted us to see more than the base of the volcano during our entire three-day stay.

Even though we couldn't see the volcano, we were reminded of its proximity by a large explosion during the first afternoon of our stay. The explosion was followed by the sound of falling rocks that were expelled from the crater. The volcano was apparently behaving quite normally by releasing one good explosion every few days. In many ways Arenal is the perfect volcano, it has perfect conical shape, it is in a perfect tropical location, at the end of a beautiful lake, it is well behaved, releasing the perfect sized explosions and a perfect amount of lava flow to attract tourists but not enough to scare them away. Too bad the weather isn't perfect - I've heard many visitors report that they never saw the summit.

There are some good hikes around the lodge. We enjoyed the hike to the nearby waterfall and the new lava flow. One afternoon we attempted to hike into a caldera lake near the volcano where the lodge keeps a canoe. A picture on the crude handwritten trail map posted at the lodge shows a red canoe on this beautiful blue crater lake. The trail (Cerro Chato) was only supposed to be 3 hours round trip according to the map so we requested the cheap plastic paddle from the front desk (for some reason they don't leave the paddle with the canoe) and started on our way. We are strong hikers so we expected to be in and out of the lake in well less than the 3-hour estimate. However, after a strenuous 2-hour climb on a steep muddy trail we had only made it to the lip of the crater, and the trail down to the lake was extremely steep and muddy. We hated to turn around without making our destination but darkness was approaching. I think adventurous visitors would enjoy this hike, but I recommend at least 5 hours round trip. We joked on the way back that the crater lake hike was like a Costa Rica snipe hunt, with locals laughing at the foolish gringos carrying the bright yellow plastic canoe paddle on what they expected to be an easy 3 hour hike.

The observatory lodge is closed to visitors during one month of the year when scientists move in to do research. The lodge is divided into two sections linked by a short path and suspension bridge. Both buildings have an observation deck and the new building has a seismometer. The food at the lodge was generally bad, well below the quality of food at the Tent Camp and Tortuga lodges. The breakfast buffet was good but lunch and dinner were terrible.

Return to San Jose
At our request, we left an hour early to San Jose because we were sick of the wind and rain. As soon as we descended down to Lake Arenal we were in bright sunshine. The drive to San Jose through the mountains with terraced fields and coffee plantations was quite scenic. Our driver, Roger, was very accommodating, allowing us to select our return route and stop where we liked. We spent about one hour shopping for handicrafts in the artisan town of Sarchis.

Wrap-Up
In summary, we had a great trip and we were very pleased with the quality of the local services. The few minor things that we didn't like about the trip were mostly not associated with the local representatives. One example of how your local ground operator really has their act together is their sophisticated communication system, which allows them to communicate virtually anywhere in the country, by using three repeaters sighted on mountains tops. This permits all their lodges and vehicles to be in continuous contact with the base station in San Jose.

! Pura Vida !