Rental cars
 

We are leaving for CR on 1/23 and are looking to rent a car while we are there and are having a hard time deciding who to rent from. Anyone have any suggestions on rental companies?

Tricolor gets good reviews here and we use Toyota. We've been renting a Corolla from Toyota for years with good results except when we had them deliver to our hotel and the tires were too worn on the edges and then an extra charge for gas when we got home.
Last year no problem with pick up at their office next to Hampton Inn. They dropped us off at our Hotel with no charge when we returned it last year which was very nice of them.

The Corolla can climb steep, rough, rocky side roads/driveways and has the trunk to hide our luggage and much more economical on gas and rental than a Rav4 which we used the year we went to Monteverde.

Have a wonderful journey!

Toyota as per EarthTraveler sounds like a good deal. We've not found a company to beat Tricolor's prices and service. Quotes are always all-inclusive, no hidden costs. We usually rent a Suzuki Ignus or similar such as Diahatsu Terios. . .

I would avoid Toyota due to a bad experience that I had a few years ago. I reserved an automatic RAV4- I specifically called them twice to make sure that the RAV4 had an automatic transmission and they assured me that the answer was yes. I did not know how to drive a manual transmission. Needless to say, when we arrived at the office in San Jose, they told me they had no automatic transmission vehicles. They had one of their employees give me an impromptu lesson on driving a manual transmission. It was not pretty- I would say that I probably destroyed the transmission within a couple of days. When I got back to San Jose I demanded an automatic transmission vehicle but was charged extra for the switch. Just a cautionary tale.

Hello 2CR:

You are leaving in a couple of days! I am so jealous. We rented from tricolor. Very conveniently located near the airport, a short wait at the airport for the pickup van. The pick up guy's Tricolor sign didn't have our name on it, but he was Easy to find.... on way out of customs..."

My only advice is to be picky about the vehicle before you leave the lot. There were new Suzuki Jimny's on the front lot. We got an old one from "the back?" Within a mile, we realized the wheels / tires were really out of whack. We could have turned back, but we were ready to get on our way. We made it fine for the next 9 days driving, and we got used to the "wobbly - wobbly".

The Suzuki Jimny looks bigger than it is. There were two of us and our luggage--- any more than that, we would have had trouble. It was a manual transmission.

BTW, the people at Tricolor are wonderful. If you rent from them, please tell them that you heard that... I don't know how any car rental company would "respond" to someone asking for a "front lot" vehicle. That might be offensive. I guess, just be nice about it? And then don't fret it. Costa Rica is wonderful.

Have a terrific time!

They've upgraded for us before--free of charge. Excellent group to work with. Very personable--all of them.