Caño Negro National Wildlife Refuge
 

If we are staying in Arenal and have a 4x4 rental car should we drive up to Caño Negro village or Los Chilles and take a boat tour from there or should we buck up for one of the tours that our hotel can sell us? Anyone driven up and taken a tour from the area?

We rode our bicycles to Los Chiles then hired a boat through the refuge, offloaded our bikes in Caño Negro Village and continued North. We mainly did it to avoid backtracking.

I wouldn't say that having your own transportation in the area is a big advantage. You won't miss any terribly interesting pulloffs or points of interest going straight through on the tour van. We also found that prices were only marginally less for the boat alone than it would have been for the round trip tour with transfers from Arenal (although we had the boat and guide to ourselves and went farther than most of the tours do).

Driving up would be worthwhile if you want to to try canoes from the village dock, or check out the Río Medio Queso wetlands. I don't think either of these are offered on standard tours from the Arenal area.

Hope this helps. Have a great trip.

ttt

Ray,
Thanks for the info! I think you're post and my "ttt" post came up at the same time :)

We arranged a Canon Negro boat tour through our hotel and had a wonderful trip. It really helps to have a knowledgeable guide relating information about the areas you are travelling through. We learned so much that we wouldn't have driving ourselves.