our trip report website!
 

We had an awesome vacation in Costa Rica Feb. 2004. Starting with a 2 night stay at Pura Vida Hotel in Alajeula (highly recommended!) An 11 hour tour by Ecoscape Nature Tours, very informative, we saw SO much. Experienced a super 50 min. flight with Sansa to Drake Bay in the Osa Peninsula. Hiked through the rain forest in Corcovado seeing sloths, monkeys, macaws, coatis and more. Swam with over 500 wild Spinner Dolphins in the Pacific Ocean with Delfin Amor. Enjoyed snorkelling and exploring Cano Island. Hiked over lava rocks at the base of Arenal Volcano. Soaked in the Tabacon Hot Springs surrounded by gorgeous tropical vegetation, watching toucans fly over us. Lounged on deserted palm treed beaches. CR is a magnificent country!
I read frequently from this Travel Talk Forum before our trip and found it very helpful. But it seemed difficult to find informative websites by "regular people" about travel destinations. Its just specific resort/travel company websites etc. So I created a website with our photos and our experiences to hopefully help others going to Costa Rica.

http://www.fluffytails.ca/costarica.asp

Enjoy!

fluffytails (love the handle!): Your website is terrific, as are your photos. It contains so many wonderful reminders of the things I love about Costa Rica. Thanks for sharing!
Terri

Hi
Great website, thanks so much for putting it together! Great pictures and comments! Others should check it out.

What an awesome website!!!!! Wonderful pics and descriptions. I am lucky to be able to do this nevermind put a whole website together.
Thank you so much for sharing your trip with us and I am glad to hear you had a good time.
Pura Vida

Fantastic!!!!!!!! Answered many questions that I had about Tabacon. This was a great idea and I know that I truly appreciate your effort. Thanks for taking the time to put it together.

Wow, what an incredible, beautiful and thorough job you did on your webiste! Thank you SO much for sharing... it brought back wonderful memories of my trip to CR.

Everyone... check this site out!
Lots of great info!
Thanks again!
Carol

I loved your website! Just got back from CR myself & loved the trip. We plan to go back.

Loved your website. You did a great job on it. I can't wait to go this June! Question-a tour company called Costa Rica Expeditions says Tabacon Resort in high risk area for Volcano. Did you hear anything about that while you were there?

That web site is awesome and you did it sooo fast! Do you design web sites for a living? If not, you should :)

Thank you for the nice comments on our Costa Rica website, I was hoping it would be helpful - sounds like it is! I've received nice emails as well.

For the Tabacon Resort question "is it in high risk area for Volcano?"
They monitor the volcano VERY carefully, so I would say you'll be fine. The most recent evacuation of Tabacon was in Sept. 2003 but only for a couple hours, to be safe and everyone was fine. Check this for more info.
http://www.arenal.net/arenal.htm

For your question "LA FadeAway" I've only designed a couple websites, I need to learn more of the fancy stuff before I do it "for real". Thank you for the encouragement. I really enjoy my Paint Shop Pro 8 to create the backgrounds and my graphics.

Suzie2 - this Travel Talk wouldn't be half as good without all your time spent adding your insights!

I'm looking out a window & see nothing but snow! I want to be back in CR! :)

Chinahart.....It doesn't make sense to me but the lodge at Tabacon is across and down the street a little ways from the Tabacon Hot Springs. It is the actual Hot Springs as well as much of that side of the street that CRE as well as a couple of other tour companies have an issue with. I believe that the government had a hand in the safety sectioning of the area and that is what they go by (don't know why it would be safer on the other side because the lava, etc, really won't know where it is supposed to stop). Maybe someone else would have more insight into this if you are really nervous.
As Fluffytails mentioned, it is very well monitored.
I am still in awe of that web site! I may have to look into purchasing Paint Shop Pro.

Just another compliment on the fantastic web site, reporting and pictures. Excellent.

Wonderful website. I have emailed the URL to a number of people this morning. They too were quite taken by your photos. It vividly brought back memories of my 2 weeks touring CR. Well done.

Message to Fluffytails,
I love your website!
Also really like your photos and description of Pura Vida Hotel. Sounds like it might be a good place to stay for 1 or 2 nights before we leave for home from San Jose. What was the cost? There will be 4 of us. How long was the ride from there to Poas & La Paz? How far from Arenal?

Thanks.

Hi Kwoo, Pura Vida has private individual casitas. There are 3 casitas that sleep 4 people with varying set ups, such as the Katydid Casita which has 2 bedroom suites with bathrooms (queen, 2 singles, futon), living room, kitchen, fridge, sun porch for $95 a night including breakfast & airport shuttle. The other casitas are $70 a night. Check their website to see which will best fit your family. http://www.puravidahotel.com/
The gardens & grounds are very nice. Its about 3 hours and 15 min. from Tabacon (Arenal). As for Poas & La Paz we saw those on one of those "Highlight Tours" which included a coffee plantation -(breakfast), Poas volcano, La Paz waterfalls, Hummingbird gallery - (hot snack), Selva Verde Jungle Lodge - (buffet lunch), Sarapiqui River Float, and a drive back thru Braulio National Park. Its an 11 hour process. There are a few versions of these types of tours. It was $65, but considering that was no pressure on us to drive & find all these things & gas, all our park entrance fees, food everytime we turned around! And an excellent guide that was a real chatter box making it very educational. We thought it was worth the money. Since this tour involved so much activity we just stopped for about 20 min at the bottom waterfall of La Paz. If you are more interested in actually walking around the La Paz waterfall gardens then another tour is better for you. Revisit our "Highlight Tour Page" to see
http://www.fluffytails.ca/costarica.asp
I know I had asked about this tour on this forum before we went to CR and Susie2, Iza, and Jean (maybe a few others?) all enjoyed it & recommended it as well. Do some research and it might be an option your family agrees on too.

ttt

Thanks for all the great information and the wonderful photos you have posted on your web site.