My Limited Experience Traveling In Costa Rica
My Limited Experience Traveling in Costa Rica
We recently visited Costa Rica for our honeymoon and since it seems to be a popular destination for outdoor oriented travelers, I thought I would gather my overall thoughts about the beautiful country on our limited time there.
Food: Let’s start off with my favorite part of traveling, FOOD! The Costa Rican food is nothing like Mexican food, so don’t land expecting that. In more populated areas of the country, you will find American replicated restaurants (with some names you might even recognized). Seriously, avoid those like the plague. Across the country, you will find a variety of places that serve typical cuisine. This varies from region to region and meal to meal, but the heart of this dish is rice, black beans, plantains and a protein (usually eggs for breakfast and things like chicken and beef for lunch and dinner). If you want to travel the country on the budget and eat well, this is your way to go. Outside of typical food, you can find some great cuisine from region to region. In areas like Monteverde and la Fortuna where cattle farming is big, beef and chicken dishes are very common. For me though, the best part of eating our way through the country was the reasonably priced and fresh seafood. Heavily cooked in garlic and butter – these dishes make me drool to this day. Water was generally safe to drink on tap, but if you wanted coffee or juice – these were also common with most meals. The craft beer scene in Costa Rica is surprisingly varied (none were “great”) but mixed drinks and cocktails seemed to be the king of adult beverages.
Driving: Before our trip, we hard horror stories: “don’t drive at night,” and “the roads are horrible” were the most common. Maybe it’s because we live in Colorado and I have a lot of experience driving on roads my car had no business on, but I thought driving in Costa Rica was really pretty similar to the US. Sure, driving at night was harder in areas due to limited or no street lights, but it was not something I ever felt uncomfortable doing. Are the roads great? Meh, it depends on where you are, but overall they were solid. Sure, we had a few roads that crossed rivers, forced us to drive 5mph, and were as steep as a ski run, but we face similar conditions in many of our Colorado mountain roads. I will say, expect to be passed regardless of how fast you are going, speed limits are absolutely not followed. Also, use passing lanes to your advantage; getting stuck behind a truck on a long narrow highway, will ruin your day very quickly. Quick note about rental cars: be sure to inquire about all hidden taxes and fees, what seems like a great deal online quickly turns expensive once you are on the ground.
Guides: Costa Rica is a country built on tourism, its how the economy survives. Due to this, you will find a tour guide for everything. Hiking for 5 miles? Hire a guide. Going to the bathroom? Hire a guide. Overall my opinion on guides in Costa Rica is this: would you do this activity on your own without a guide at home? You don’t need to hire a guide. Do you want to spot more animals and learn things about the area? Hire a guide. Some activities require guides, but many are optional. Think about what you want out of the experience and weigh if it’s worth the extra money. If you do hire a guide, ask for their license. Costa Rica requires official guides to get extra education and pay fees to be recognized as official. When creating a budget for your trip, plan on tipping guides at least 20%.
Tipping: Over the course of my travels, tipping has been one of the most inconsistent things from country to country and always makes me scratch my head. Simply put, Costa Rica is all over the place when it comes to tipping expectations. If you are from North America, specifically the United States, you will probably be judged if you don’t tip on everything (mainly guides and meals). You will notice that most restaurants don’t have a “propina,” tip line, on the bill after you eat, but leaving cash is often a good idea. Regardless of your nationality, tipping a guide 20-25% is expected (higher amounts for larger groups or longer tours). When it comes to meals, it’s really up to you. We left tips at some places and didn’t at others. Looking back, I felt bad about leaving no tips after certain meals, but since the restaurant didn’t have a tip line on the bill, it forced me to use cash which was tough since I never had a lot of it on hand.
Hiking: Costa Rica is such a beautiful country with terrain any hiker would be in heaven just looking at. Costa Rica hiking is mainly built around National Parks. For us, we had highs and lows during our time in National Parks. Manuel Antonio=low for hiking, Rincon De La Vieja=high for National Park Hiking. Here is what I will say about National Parks: they are generally underfunded, have poor infrastructure and even worse maps but they are the easiest hikes to find when researching online. For a country who charges each person to enter their national parks, you would think that their infrastructure and map system would be much better. My recommendation would be to find hikes outside of National Parks if you really want to maximize your experience in the country. The problem is that when you do a search online, to my knowledge, there is no one resource for free hiking across Costa Rica. However, if you do some searching, you can find gems. Nauyaca Waterfall was our favorite hike in Costa Rica and was not in a National Park (although there was a fee associated with it). Ask locals, do research beforehand and expect to get lost when trying to find hikes outside of National Parks but in the end, they will probably be worth it. For people like me who do not have the ability to hike to waterfalls on a daily basis, Costa Rica really blew my mind in that aspect. Check out my detailed hike reviews here.
Beaches: We live in Colorado, our beaches are nonexistent so I am probably a bit jaded when I say this, but Costa Rican beaches are stunning. The variety of calm beaches for relaxing and rougher currents for surfing was fantastic. Down south we found remote sandy beaches that stretched on for miles without a soul in sight, while up North we found raging waves that would be a surfer’s paradise. The coolest part about the beaches in Costa Rica was the seclusion. If you wanted to find a spot where no one else was, you could easily do that – if you are at all familiar with my hikes, you know this is a massive bonus for me.
Weather: Costa Rica has two major seasons: rainy season and the dry season. Rainy season (green season or winter) is from May to mid-November. If you plan on traveling to CR during this time, expect rain and lots of it. Dry Season is (summer) is usually mid-November to April. In between both seasons is called transition season where the rains can last longer or the dry summer weather can hold on for a couple more weeks. We visited during late November (Thanksgiving) and had to change our plans down south because transition season was taking its sweet time. If you plan on traveling to Costa Rica during the rainy season, your best bet for dry weather is to stay up North. If you plan on visiting the Caribbean side of Costa Rica, plan on rain for most of the year except September and October when its generally drier.
Safety: Simply put, we never felt unsafe during our time in Costa Rica. Sure, we didn’t put ourselves into situations where danger would be a possibility, but we did spend time walking at night, hanging out at secluded beaches and walking around with valuables. Overall, safety was never a concern for us until we traveled down south and were planning on going to a secluded beach with ocean caves. When researching this area, we read multiple reports of theft and assault. It was really a bummer to see this because it put a massive damper on the day and forced us to change our plans. Costa Rica is full of secluded beaches and remote areas and if you are in these spots, it does put you at a higher risk to be targeted for crime, especially if you carry around valuable gear (raises hand – Gopro, DSLR, iphone, etc.) Overall, my advice would be to just use common sense and be precautious when carrying around valuables.
There you have it, my thoughts on Costa Rica during our limited time there. Have questions about something I didn’t cover? Something you disagree about? Leave it in the comments below!
