altarose

Feb 27, Myself,my wife, my sister and her husband flew Continental airlines from Calgary, Alberta to Liberia, with a 4 hour stop in Houston. I got a very good deal on the flight tickets by doing a lot of research and shopping on the internet and then had The Flight Centre match my best price. Flight went well and arrived in Liberia 7:30 pm. Got through customs fast and without any problems. All of our travel plans, (flight, accommadations, car rental,just about everything) was planned well ahead of time through many, many hours of reading reviews on this web site and many others, reading books and even some t.v. travel shows. Allthough all things were reserved and most paid for in advance, we left most of our daily activities to be decided while there. Beside getting lost almost daily everything went as planned. On with the trip. We took a taxi from the airport to Bramadero Hotel in Liberia $10 us. a little high but after a long day of travel nobody cared. Some people say that being able to speak spanish would not be necessary. If you plan on a trip like ours, away from the big resorts, being able to speak more than just the basics is absolutly needed! We stayed in small villages and ate at Sodas with the locals. Fantastic experience. Hotel Bramedero is a small place nothing fancy, but well kept, easy to find at the first main intersection coming in from the airport. The restaraut was good but quit a bit more expensive than most of the others we later found. We paid $42 per double room. At 8:00 am the next morning Tri-color delivered our Nissan Almera to the hotel and I went back to their office to do all the paper work. Again everything went just as planned on internet. We all live in the country on aceages and have driven on bad gravel roads all of our lifes. Believe me you do not want to rent a car! This poor thing had only a couple of inches of clearance when fully loaded with four adults and all luggage. ps. this was no fault of Tri_color, it was accualy a very good car, but we should have rented a four-wheel drive, both for clearance and power to get up some of the remote roads we traveled. These were the worst roads I have seen in my life, some times the three passengers would have to jump out to give extra clearance and more power to make it up particulaly bad spots. By the way we are all fityish and very good drivers (thankfully) I would drive one day then Glen would drive the next. I also used a Garmin etrex legend GPS with a detailed map loaded from internet, which saved the day many times. Finding gas was never a problem, but we did get ripped off at one station. It cost 440 colones per liter (88 cents). Gas is the same price everywhere. We stooped at SERVICENTRO COYOLAR, Lubricentro DEl Pacifico S.A. near Alajuela for gas, I got out of the car in time to catch the attendant trying to fill our tank without resetting the pump from the previous transaction. He reset it and proceeded to fill us, and I though no more of it. While my attention was deverted he finished and quickly reset the pump to zero, then gave us a written bill for $38. We though it was high but paid anyway. We later learned that when even when showing lower on the gauge it still took about $10 less to fill. This was our only incedent of any kind during our entire trip, the rest of the time everone was very friendly and extemely polite. Just be aware of what is going on around you. Whew, not much acual trip yet (lol). Anyway, from Liberia we then went to Santa Elena and stayed at Los Pinos Cabanas $75 for one cabin with two double beds. Again nothing fancy but nice location and very clean.The next day we went to Selvatura Walkways in the Santa Elena cloud forest, spent several very enjoyable hours walking through the amazing trails and bridges. Had the place almost to ourselfs. $20 per person. We did not hire a guide. We had a decent pizza for lunch at their restaraunt( fairly cheap) Then we were on the road again to La Fortuna, arrived at Hotel Fuego Arenal at about 4:30 pm. You can probably guess that we are not into big fancy hotels, again true with this place, but it is a jewel in the rough. It is a small family run affair, the owners name is Adrian, a very friendly, helpful guy. He speaks fairly good english. It had a nice view of Volcano Arenal from the front deck, and a open downhill slope with enough fruit trees in the back, with another deck which we viewed many birds from (Toucans, Parrots, etc). We went into town and had supper at Don Rufino's, this was one of our most expensive meals, but it was worth it. Very well prepared and presented. It was still only about $9 each including a beer. Most of our meals ranged from $1.50 to $4 for full meals, sometimes including seafood. Always very good and with excellent service. The next day a bus picked us up at the hotel for a boat trip at Cano Negro. $40 ea. This was an excellent excursion, included the bus trip there, stopped for coffee on the way,another stop to view big Iguanas in the trees from a bridge, about three hours on the river, seeing many birds, howler monkeys, capuchin monkeys, caimans, basilisk lizards, bats and hugh trees. Stopped for tico lunch on way back. Well worth the money. Unfortunatly the Volcano was clouded over while we were there. The next day we headed south to a private rental near the small village of Turrucares ( near Atenas)We rented a cabin which was fully furnished and was acually more like a big tree house. It was all open aired with screens, on all four sides with two levels. Kitchen and living room upstairs with a deck on the back which was up in the tree canopy. Two bedrooms in lower level, again all open air, which turned out to be very noisey during the night. Dogs, chickens and jets going overhead. We used this as a base for the next week while we made trips to the pacific beaches, Sarchi for shopping (No big deals), Irazu Volcano, (amazing drive up the Volcano and wonderful sights at the top) Poas Volcano which was clouded over but we enjoyed the trails around the top anyway. We also went to Carara Reserve for a hike through the jungle, saw a few birds, Capuchin monkeys and different plant life. Very hot 40 celcius without a breath of wind, but we still enjoyed it. $8 ea., We stopped at the Tarcoles River bridge to view the hugh crocodiles, about 50 of them. ( there was a security officer on the west side of the bridge who kindly gaurded our car and gave us info about the crocs for free) We also went to Alajuela for more shopping in the Central market, what a sight and experience, just make sure to keep yourself and belongings save in these tight spaces. By the way there is no such thing as cross-walks anywhere that we saw. You just get as close as possible to the traffic whithout getting your toes crushed and make a dash for it when you can (lol). In the parking lot by the bus station again there was a gaurd who watched the cars. After a week we headed farther south to another private rental near San Isidro de El General. We drove on highway c1 over the mountain of death, which turned out to be one of the better roads that we traveled on the entire trip. The place we stayed at was called Casa Esabel which was set high on a mountain side on about three acres with a amazing view of the valley below. It had very well kept grounds with a small spring fed pool and two gazebos. Lots of fruit trees which atracted a host of birds. The main cabin had the kitchen and living room and the bedrooms were in a separate building a few feet away. The living room was open air on three sides, but this time the bedrooms were closed in and because of the remote location it was much quieter. The only draw back was that the dirt road in was so steep and rough that we couldn't make it up the worst hill, so we had to go around the long way and take another trail in and then when we would leave we went the short way which was downhill. So we just kept making a big circle. We went to some more beaches from this location, stayed three nights then headed up the coast toward Liberia. The road from Dominical to Quepos although being flat and wide was still mountain rock gravel. It took about two hours to go 45 kms. We stayed the next night at Vista Golfo Hotel near Miramar. It was a very nice place, with a nice little pool, a decent restaraunt and again amazing views from the top of a mountain. Saw the nicest sunset of our lifes overlooking the valley below with the Golfo de Nicoya in the distance. Lots of birds around the area. $135 for two rooms including breakfast. The next day we headed to Liberia and stayed the last night at Hotel Bromedero again. Had our last supper in a small Italian style restaraunt a couple of blocks from the hotel. With four meals of seafood and drinks including taxes and tip $30. Would have been at least triple that in Calgary. Took the car back to tri-color that evening and everything went great. Highly recomended. All in all we had a very enjoyable vacation and would not hesitate to go back again ( four wheel drive) we never felt threatened or unsafe and the people of C.R. were all fantastic. I have many pictures too share. The website I downloaded them to requires me to send personel invitations to view my galleries. I have 97 of scenery, 71 of birds and animals, 92 of flowers and plants. If you would like to view them please send me your e-mail address and I will gladly send you an e-mail invite. ps if you are planning on going to C.R. a camera with at least 10 zoom is an absolute must. Any questions We would be pleased to answer. My e-mail is [email protected] pura vida

rickandpat

Thanks for the trip report, loved hearing about some different off-the beaten-track places.

wanatrvl

Really enjoyed your report. I also liked hearing about the off-the-beaten track places that you stayed at. You sure saw a lot of different places and got to enjoy the Costa Rican culture and food. I'd love to see you pictures and have sent an email to you.

altarose

Hola: Thanks for asking, I have sent invites to Mel, Bill, Richard. Please let me know if the site works okay. Enjoy.

wanatrvl

Excellent pictures. Thanks for sharing. Well worth taking the time to look.

Earthtraveler

Thanks for the report and the pictures. The bird shots were great!

seawitch1

Thanks for allowing me to view your pics. Looks like you had a great time. Your pictures are really nice and crisp. Can I ask what type of camera you used? Digital SLR? # of megapixels? Thanks.

Diane

altarose

Hola Seawitch1, Most of the pictures were taken with an Canon Elura 80 Digital Video camcorder which has 1.33 megapixels when used in still camera mode. I also used an older Fuji 2600z still camera with 2.0 megapixels. The canon has 18 optical zoom which was good for birds and animals. Thanks for looking.