Beach Vacation in Costa Rica
 

Hi everyone,

My wife and I would like to take a nice relaxing beach vacation in Costa Rica, and I was hoping for some advice. We're in our 30's and will be going for 7 days. We will probably spend the first 2 days in San Jose because my wife has lived there before, and she'd like to visit some friends. After visiting San Jose, we would like to relax in a nice beach setting. I'm looking to find out what would be our best bet. I've heard alot about Manuel Antonio and Guanacaste. However, my wife mentioned Playa Tambor because she has been there before.

Having only 7 days and coming from San Jose, any advice on the best place to go to relax and enjoy a nice beach atmosphere with hotel accommodations would be greatly appreciated (Manuel Antonio, Guanacaste, Tambor, or others). Also, are their air travel routes from San Jose to these areas?

Thanks alot

We really enjoyed Quepos (the town near the national park - Manuel Antonio). There are many great restaurants, the park is spectacular and we saw lots of wildlife. We stayed at the Buena Vista Villas and found their beach to be exactly what we were looking for. You may want to check out their website. Buena Vista Villas is in the Tulemar property and share the same pools (gorgeous) and restaurant. We chose BVV over Tulemar for the balcony, but I think that one of the units in Tulemar also has a balcony. It is called Mot Mot top floor. That was booked during our time so we went with BVV one bedroom. The unit was excellent.

Thanks very much for your feedback. The information is very helpful, and I'll check out the website.

Tambor is okay, Montezuma down the road perhaps a little better--depends on how laid back you'd like your beachtime to be! More action in Montezuma. Near Tambor is Curu Wildlife Refuge. Near Montezuma is Cabo Blanco Reserve--both good for hiking and seeing wildlife.

A drawback to you may be the time it takes to get there. You'll need to take the ferry across, which necessitates arriving and waiting in line 30 min to an hour, plus 1.5 hour on the ferry. It's fun, though, for the first time! 5-6 hours from San Jose.

Pretty beaches--Manuel Antonio hard to beat, especially if you'd like to see the national park and its plentiful wildlife. 3 hours from San Jose.

We like Playa Flamingo up in Guanacaste as well as Playa Grande nearby. This area is great for exploring to the north and to the south. Lots of restaurant options. But certainly more "Americanized"! 5 hours from SJO.

I highly recommend the Mal Pais area! You can take a 30 minute flight to Tambor and then drive 30 minutes and you're there! Since your wife has lived in Costa Rica, she will probably enjoy the nice mix of ticos and foreigners. It's not like many places that have been overly Americanized yet. It has a natural beauty and amazing beaches. There is plenty to do there too! You can fish,surf, canopy tour, hike, snorkel(people say snorkeling isn't good in CR but we LOVED it and saw clownfish, sea turtles, bright tropical fish, tons of stuff), ATV ride through the jungle to go to Montezuma waterfalls, nice local restaurants and a few bars at night.
There are amazing beaches all over the place there. Forbes called a beach there "One of the top 10 most beautiful beaches in the World". There are many different small hotels around. One for any budget. there are no big hotels which is great and adds to the small town charm. This is a great web site www.malpaisbeach.com for more info on the area. We just love Mal Pais!

Thanks guys for all of your insight, all of this information is very helpful.

Playa Conchal in the rental condos is a relaxing way to go. You have access to their new Reserva Beach Club which is actually on the beach (the hotel has a wall between the pools and the beach), without the hotel prices. You can drive in about 4 hours from San Jose, and many more roads are paved out in Guanacaste than even just a couple of years ago, or Sansa flies. Summer through late fall though, stick to morning flights as the weather can get rough in the afternoon going over the mountains.