smartin

We are headed to Costa Rica later this week-staying one night Peace Lodge, 2 nights Tabacan Resort and 6 nights Hotel Captitan Suizo- any suggestions on how to pay for dinners and hotel stays? My understanding is that Visa/Mastercard now charges- a percentage of the charge? Hate to think of taking enough cash to cover all this- including the rental car...any insights would be grateful! Susan

faithie

Larger hotels will not usually charge any extra fee , nor restaurants .... We used credit card for the majority of restaurants / hotels . Cash elsewhere (u.s.$, lots of small bills ) . We took travellers checques as back-up , and went to the bank machine every 3 days approx. and took money out ( never having TOO much cash on us ) . It worked out very well ....

dncee11

You are correct, some smaller merchants may add on the cost of using a CC but most tourist hotels businesses have it built into their rates. Visa cards with access to the "Plus" system work best at the ATMs. You can change some $$$ for Colones at the airport; they work best as most prices are posted in the local currency. Travellers checks are ok but even the banks charge a small fee to cash them. Many hotels will accept them and some will even cash them but most other merchants will decline - too much fraud! ATM access has made things a lot easier; they are usually located outside the banks in secure areas and seemed to be open mostly during banking hours, IOW, not 24hrs! I think they remove the money at closing time. Good luck and have fun!

MCarCab

We just got back from a wonderful trip that consisted of stays at both the Tabacon Resort and Capitan Suizo. We brought a combination of credit cards, cash and traveler's checks. Credit Cards (Visa mostly) are good for the rental car, hotel and some restaurants, but we found a number of places that didn't take credit cards so we were happy to have other options. In fact, if you book any trips through Captian Suizo they ONLY take cash or traveler's checks! The traveler's checks came in handy since ATM's are few and far between and when you find them the lines are incredibly long. Also, the one at the Best Western in Tamarindo seems to always be broken. When we cashed traveler's checks at Capitan Suizo the exchange rate was pretty good, but at Tabacon, they did not have enough Colones to cash them. They reassured us that "everyplace" takes American money, but that was not always the case. Lastly, if you wait to change money until you arrive at SJO, the booth is right by the baggage carousels. Very convenient! Have a great trip and let me know if you need some restaurant suggestions.

ucsbalum

I just returned from a week in Costa Rica. My advise: take a lot of American Dollars -- in 20s or less, and preferably a lot in 1s.

Get Colones from ATMs when you find them, but they can be few and far between.

Charge what you can on the credit card, because you don't want to get stuck without cash (Dollars or Colones). And most places take VISA only -- I learned this on this board before I went, and I was glad I did, or I really would have been stuck.

Have a great time!

smartin

attn: Mcarcab
Suggestions on restaurants/ tours or anything your would like to advise?? Did youlike both the hotels? Thanks alot! Susan

MCarCab

Hi Susan-
We were pretty happy in both hotels...although I preferred Capitan Suizo to Tabacon. We stayed at Tabacon at the urging of friends and while I liked the access to the Hot Springs, I felt the hotel was overrated. Our room was nice enough, but the restaurant was a big disappointment (although desserts were better than the entrees). We booked our tours through the hotel for the convenience, and they worked out really well. They use Jacamar tours and the guides were incredible - knowledgeable, great English and terrific guys. I'm sure you could book through them directly. As for restaurants there - we were only there for two nights and our first dinner was at the hotel. The second night we ate at the Mirador Arenal Steak House which has great views of the volcano when it's clear. Unfortunately it was really socked in while we were eating, so we saw nada! The food was okay. I'm sorry we didn't go to Il Novillo which one of our guides recommended and has gotten great feedback on this site. We were going to go there until someone told us about the great view from Mirador...oh well, next time for Il Novillo!
Capitan Suizo is another story. We loved the hotel and the staff is amazing. We were there over spring break with a number of families and the guys at the restaurant and bar were so wonderful to all of the kids. Maxwell and Melvin are two of the wonderful bartenders. Also the staff at the front desk are very accommodating. We only ate breakfast and lunch at the restaurant there since dinner was a little too European (very rich sauces) and we didn't feel it went well with the heat. We had good to great dinners at Nogui's (you must get the chocolate or pineapple pie for dessert...excellent!), Stella's (which is off the beaten path, but good), and Zully Mar (the camarones were delicioso!) We never made it to Gecko's at Iguana Surf down the road from the hotel since the wait was really long one night and then they were closed for some renovations. We had a disastrous meal at Copacabana, but some friends had been there a few days before us and said it was good, so go figure.
Regarding day trips, we booked two through the hotel. Rosa, who runs the tour desk and the gift shop, was very helpful. The Palo Verde boat trip was long and hot, but we did see Scarlet Macaws, lots of water birds, crocodiles and capuchin monkeys. I preferred the Estuary tour which was five minutes from the hotel, and while it was from 6-8am, we saw some amazing birds. If you care about such things, I really recommend it. I'm sorry we didn't go to Rincon de la Vieja, but the thought of the drive there put us off. If I were going to do this again, I would try to book the excursions directly and not go through the hotel. The guy the hotel uses was on both of our tours, and while he was fine on the estuary tour, I was disappointed in him on the Palo Verde trip. One morning, we drove to Guaitil (about an hour away from Tamarindo) which is known for its indigenous pottery. Don't take the "short cut" which is over a very rocky dirt road - it seems that the longer route through Belen was just as fast and the roads are relatively good. It was a nice break from the beach and we were back just after lunch.
If you have any other questions, let me know. Have a great trip, Melissa

smartin

Melissa- Thank you so much for your helpful advice!! Can't wait until Friday! Susan

dcmalia

Take a VISA. I have a Mastercard and NONE of the ATMs in CR worked for me until my last day! As for cash - Take it. Not much, maybe a couple hundred, but in small bills. You'll have to go to the bank to cash traveler's checks and they have very long lines, so you might as well have well-hidden cash. Note that most places do take credit cards (Visa or Mastercard) or U.S. dollars or colones or a combination, but it's hard to use large bills ($20 is large, fyi). Also note that there is a great ATM upstairs at the San Jose airport that dispenses both colones and U.S. dollars from either a VISA or Mastercard.

Good luck! Have fun!

Malia

oldermom

HI! We just returned. When I called American Express to check on fees they told me there was an extra charge to use the card in another country (3% is what I remember). We decided to pay for most of the hotels with travelers checks but contacted them first to be sure they accepted them. We would get change from travelers checks in colones. We also took about $700 in cash for the nine days (in different denominations but a lot of singles and fives). Our change in colones was enough to get us by since American dollars were excepted most of the places we went. We only used our credit card for the rental car. Worked fine for us.

shillmac

We do the very same thing as oldermom, but take less cash (no more than $200--ones, fives, tens). Also, we get colones from an ATM within the first day or so of arriving, and use colones for nearly all transactions. Like her,
we use traveler's cheques at hotels that take them (ask ahead), and bring just enough for that purpose.

RufusTFirefly

All credit card companies add a percentage fee for foreign currency conversion. Visa and MC are 1%. This has been the case for years.

In addition, the issuing bank for the credit card can, if it chooses, add an additional fee. Some add up to 3% on top of the 1%. One of our card issueing banks (USAA) does not, the other (Chase) does. So we use the USAA card overseas.

Until recently, no ATM card issueing banks added a percentage, some have no started to do so.

So, check with your credit card and ATM card and debit card issueing banks to see what %, if any, they add for foreign currency transactions.

Under NO circumstances allow a merchant in another country to make the conversion for you and charge you in dollars "to save you the conversion %." 99 times out of 100 they'll give you such a bad conversion rate that you'd be much better off paying the extra 3% that your issueing bank might charge.

sbromber

Is your USSA card a Mastercard or VISA...we have USAA Mastercard and many posts indicate only VISA is good in CR.
Thanks.
Dolly

KNJ

We have a USAA MasterCard. We had no problems using it at ATM's (airport, Marriott in SJO, bank in Monteverde). I was worried before we left because many posts on this board say that only VISA is accepted. We did not find this to be the case. The only place that did not take our MasterCard (or any CC) was in Drake Bay.