Costa Rica in Review – What I Learned while Traveling There

I try to do my research before I travel to a new country, but of course there are always things you learn along the way. Here are some of the nitty-gritty details we learned about traveling in Costa Rica – I hope they help you plan your own adventure!

Language

“Everyone speaks English,” I was told – but we quickly found this to be a little untrue. Maybe my friend meant “everyone” as in everyone who works at a hotel, but it wasn’t a problem! We had rudimentary Spanish skills (seriously. The thing I knew how to say best was “Como se dice…” which is “How do you say…?”) and we were eager to practice them. We tried speaking only Spanish with the Ticos, and they were incredibly gracious and helpful. We used English at the hotels and during our activities, but while actually traveling we tried to rely on our basic Spanish skills. It was so much fun!

Itinerary

We had one week and we visited three places — Manuel Antonio, Monteverde, and La Fortuna. Originally we had also planned to go to San Jose, but we cut that for an extra full day in Manuel Antonio, which I think was the right call for us. We spent a few hours wandering around San Jose before our flight left, and I think we made the right call by changing our itinerary.

This pace of travel might be too fast. We tend to like fast travel, but I also talked about the pitfalls of our timing when visiting Monteverde. There are, of course, many other beautiful places to see in Costa Rica, but these three places were the ones most often recommended and were a good introduction to Costa Rica. If I return, I’d like to check out the Guanacaste or Nicoya regions.

Getting To and From the Airport

We took a taxi from the airport because we were trying to catch a bus to Manuel Antonio. While this was more on the expensive side ($25-30), it was useful to have someone who knew exactly where we needed to go. Because we got to the airport so early for our flight home, we took the local bus into San Jose for a few hours. It was very easy and cost less than $2 per person each way.

When leaving Costa Rica by plane, you will need to buy an exit visa (about $30). These can be purchased in the airport.

Transportation in Costa Rica

You have a couple different options when traveling in Costa Rica, including the public bus, direct shuttles, and even boats.

Going from San Jose to Manuel Antonio, we took the public bus. This was a fantastic idea because it only cost us about $9 per person. The draw back? No air conditioning, so we had our windows open to the hot semi-breeze the whole way. Talk about sticky! The other problem was that we weren’t really sure where to get off. We talked to the bus driver when he stopped in Quepos, so he let us off at a reasonable spot, but we still had to walk a significant way uphill to get to our hotel. This saves you A LOT of money, though, so I would recommend it. Be aware when you go to the bus station. Keep an eye on your belongs. We found the tellers didn’t speak English, but they were still very helpful and we had no problems getting on the right bus.

If you’re trying to maximize your time in Costa Rica, you’re probably going to rely heavily on the shuttles that run between the main destination points. Our shuttles from Manuel Antonio to Monteverde and La Fortuna to the San Jose airport cost about $50 per person. They are hotel-hotel vans or mini-buses. The main draw? They are air conditioned. However, they also run at limited times, so even though our flight out of San Jose didn’t leave until the evening, we had to take the 8:30am shuttle to make it to the airport on time.

Perhaps the most adventurous of our trips was going from Monteverde to La Fortuna, taking the ‘Jeep-boat-Jeep.’ We rode in a mini-bus (not a Jeep) with several other couples down a bumpy dirt road to the edge of Lake Arenal. The scenery was gorgeous (it felt a little bit like the Shire), though the road never got better. Ideally, you take a boat across the lake and then get a minibus directly to your hotel (on paved roads). When we disembarked from our shuttle, there was no boat waiting. The only thing that marked this was a major tourist route was a set of movable metal steps.

“Fifteen minutes,” our driver said.

And so we waited.

And waited. And waited. We thought we saw a boat in the distance, but after another fifteen minutes we realized it wasn’t moving. Turns out the boat coming from La Fortuna had had engine failure in the middle of the lake – and there were people on it.

The company sent out another boat, which took two trips to ferry the stranded travelers to our side, and then we all piled on the bus and headed out over the lake. This was the biggest hiccup in our travels so it was easy to swallow, and we had a stunning view of the sunset as we jetted towards the volcano.

Jeep-boat-Jeep was cheaper than the shuttles, $25 per person.

You can try to take local buses the entire time, but we talked with a pair of sisters who did so, and they said they felt like they had wasted a lot of time. In Manuel Antonio we were told that we would have to take three local busses and go back into San Jose just to get to Monteverde. Sometimes the savings in time is worth the extra cost.

And, of course, rent yourself a motorbike in La Fortuna.

Food

Be careful when planning your meals. Even though there’s a lot of tourist infrastructure and there are usually plenty of options in town, there’s not a lot between towns. We made the mistake of leaving La Fortuna before breakfast, thinking we’d “stop along the way” to Arenal for breakfast. There was nothing once we got out of town, and since we were hungry and faced several hours in the park we turned around and drove almost all the way back to town for breakfast. There was no place to eat in Manuel Antonio park, and we thought the beach where we waited for the boat to La Fortuna could have used a little pop up shop (but we’re Americans, so clearly we’re a little capitalistic). My advice – find a cheap place to get some snacks and stock up.

Eat casados. Eat a lot of casados and gallo pinto. YUM.

Water

We drank it. Not everyone’s comfortable with that. I did get some unfortunate food poisoning that started on the plane back to New York, but I think that was from the airplane food. Whatever you decide to do, make sure you are always stocked up with plenty of water.

Money

Costa Rica was way more expensive than we expected. I had seen that reported in a couple places, so we were a little bit more prepared when we left than we had been when we were initially planning our trip, but if you’re going to stick to the main tourist destinations be prepared to pay nearly Western prices. Luckily sodas are everywhere so you can almost always find a meal on the cheaper side of things.

We also found that we used more local money than we expected. I was told that many places would be willing to take American dollars, and maybe they would have if we had asked, but I didn’t see pricing in dollars the way I usually do when a place accepts them. We used our no-international-fee credit cards when possible and withdrew money from ATMs when we needed it.

I hope these tips help you plan your own adventure to Costa Rica!

Have you ever been to Costa Rica? Would you add any helpful tips or suggestions? Or are you planning a trip to Costa Rica soon? I’d love to hear your travel stories too!