HI

Planning to travel in February to Costa Rica.
Travelling from San Jose, California to San Jose, Costa Rica
Can only spend 5 days.

At present I'm planning to book a night flight from California (SJC/SFO) that will arrive in San Jose, (CR) at 7:30AM. (That way I can save a day in travel. plan to sleep on the flight)

How does this look.
1) Arrive at 7:30AM. take shuttle (or drive ??) to Arenal volcano area. stay the night
2) Spend some more time in Arenal area/hike and take shuttle Montverde Cloud Forest. Stay for the night.
3) Orinigal Canopy tour/rain forest hike. take shuttle to manuel antonio. stay night
4) releax in beaches around MA. stay night
5) rain forest/monkey hike in the AM. take shuttle to San Jose (SJO). stay in SJO.
6) morning flight back to San Jose, california.

please provide inputs on this itenerary or
suggest other places. is this too hectic, unrealistic ?

I basically want to do nature stuff. I dont want to spend any time in a bif city doing city stuff. Maybe 1 day or half day of beach
and the rest nature/birds/rain forest/wildlife.

Thanks a lot for your time.
TB

I'm exhausted just reading that. You would best off cutting Monteverde. But just say you left it in.....you would depart Arenal taxi/boat at 3pm, arriving in Monteverde at 6:30. The latest Interbus departs Monteverde to MA at 2:30, arriving at 7pm. That's a lot of traveling for only 20 hours. I would hit Arenal & MA, and fly back from MA to San Jose.

You should check out http://www.interbusonline.com to get a better, realistic view of time it takes to travel. Plus look into schedules at Sansa or Nature Air for flying. Have fun planning & don't try to see it all in one trip, it'll end up as one big blur.

Tully nailed it! Save Monteverde for later--you don't have enough time. So much to enjoy at both Arenal and MA. You'll have a wonderful trip just doing those 2 locations. Even then you'll see that you could easily have spent 5 days at either! Enjoy!

thanks folks. Between Monteverde and MA
which is better ? Monteverde seems to be cloe to Arenal. As I said earlier, I would love to see nature/rain forest - birds, animals and also do a canopy tour.

Thanks a lot
TB

You can easily do a canopy tour in Arenal. By jeep/boat/jeep Monteverde is still 3 hrs away. It is a common mistake that it is really close. I would spend an extra day in Arenal. That will give you a chance to get up to Cano Negro.

Manuel Antonio has all of the other things you are looking for.

I hate going home from a vacation feeling like I need a vacation. This less hectic itinerary will give you everything you are looking for plus you can take your time and enjoy it!

Have a wonderful trip

im with the above posters- skip monteverde for another time.
youll see more wildlife at cano negro- and easier to get to!

http://costa.rica.typepad.com/cano_n...ome/index.html