Input on Costa Rica itinerary!
 

Hi, we (me, husband, and three boys ages 14, 11, 9) will be traveling to Costa Rica in April. In order to make this trip affordable since we typically need 2 hotel rooms (and 5 plane tickets!), I am trying to use Marriott points where possible. I want to spend as little time driving from one location to another. Would appreciate any input on this proposed itinerary. If anyone can give me accurate driving times between locations, I would really appreciate it. I've tried different online calculators, and the times vary wildly!

Day 1: Arrive SJO, rent car, and drive to Treehouse Hotel (just before Santa Clara) near La Fortuna. Stay 2 nights

Day 3: Transfer to Los Lagos for 2 nights. My kids will enjoy this place as they love waterslides. How close together are these two properties?

Day 5: Drive to JW Marriott Guanacaste, spend 3 nights. HOW LONG IS THIS DRIVE?
Thoughts on this hotel?

Day 8: Drive to Marriott San Jose for 2 nights. HOW LONG IS THIS DRIVE? Want to do a tour of coffee plantation, maybe chocolate tour, so thought one full day here would be good. Thoughts on this?

Day 10: Flight leaves SJO at 6:00 am. Ouch.

Would have preferred to fly out of Liberia from the JW Marriott, but we booked the flights using miles and could only get SJO.

Is it worth going to Guanacaste? I suppose we could go to Marriott Los Suenos, or even Manuel Antonio and stay somewhere not on points. Would SJO - Arenal - MA - SJO be significantly less time in the car than SJO - Arenal - Guanacaste - SJO?

Any suggestions or comments would be greatly appreciated!

I would first ask: What dates in April? Does any of your trip straddle Holy Week (for tourism purposes, Sat. Apr. 12 through Sun. Apr. 20)? Things will be very busy. I'd try not to be on the road either weekend.

That is exactly when we are going. Spring break for the kids. I know things are crazy, but we have no choice!

We've stayed at the Marriott Costa Rica before. If it's the one where we stayed, it had nice colonial architecture, a nice pool area, and restaurants. We had parrots right outside our room. We stayed there because we had points, but I was pleasantly surprised.

I haven't stayed at your specific hotels, but the driving times we've experienced are about three hours from SJO to Arenal, and about five hours to go between Arenal and Manuel Antonio. Manuel Antonio is a little under three hours back to SJO. If you go between Arenal and MA, be sure to stop at the Rio Tarcoles bridge to see the big crocs. The kids would enjoy it. I'd expect driving times to be a lot longer during Holy Week.

Make that Marriott San Jose. :)