Your Costa Rica Travel Guide!

Here you'll discover the best Costa Rica beaches and learn all the essential facts needed for planning unforgettable Costa Rica vacations.

With a little research you can effectively plan your time in country whether it be one week or one month. Whether you want adrenaline or relaxation, you can find it all here.

Read on, or check out the quicklinks below...

On the other, Costa Rica faces the Pacific and boasts long expanses of white sand, world-class surfing and a beach culture that features both international nightlife and tiny, tucked away beaches and towns. Between these two coasts lie miles of dense rainforest, thousands of different species of animals, a series of towering volcanoes and adventure activities waiting around every bend.

This Costa Rica travel guide is just the place to start planning your trip. There's plenty of useful info and tips, including my first hand knowledge as a former resident. I’ve thoroughly researched the places and topics on this site and I've even enlisted the help of my friends who live there to help come up with other relevant Costa Rica tourism information.

My tips and info on Costa Rica travel will help you make the best of your vacation in this jewel of Central America. But first a little background on me.

I’m an avid traveler – I’ve been to Europe, the Caribbean, throughout Southeast Asia (lived in Bangkok for a few months), lived in Mexico for seven months and have been to every country in Central America. Even took a boat to Colombia.

I’d wanted to travel Costa Rica's beatiful countryside for years, and then it finally happened. I had quit my job in the States and already been to Mexico and back, so I decided to improve my Spanish while diving and studying to be a divemaster. I just so happened to come upon an offer for a divemaster internship on the northwest coast of Costa Rica in a little pueblo called Playas del Coco.

I needed little motivation to travel again. I LOVE to travel!

Anyway, I arrived with a plan to spend three months.

I came back almost exactly one year later.

So, be careful, the Costa Rican lifestyle can be a bit addictive. You might end up like I did…living there for a year and enjoying every second of it!

I’m putting my time spent there to good use by compiling a Costa Rica travel guide to help prepare potential travelers like you. I’m sure when you're through reading you’ll be chomping at the bit to hop a plane travel down here. Lets see why...

Why should you travel to Costa Rica?

Because Costa Rica has SO much to offer:

• Cheerful and friendly people – they call themselves Ticos (Ticas for the ladies)
• 26 National Parks – teeming with amazing flora and fauna (5% of all documented species on earth call Costa Rica’s 12 distinct ecological zones home)
• Water sports galore – diving, snorkeling, surfing, white-water rafting, kayaking
• World-class fishing
• Volcanoes (including active ones that light up the night more dramatically than fireworks)
• Pacific and Caribbean beaches
• Golf courses
• Spas
• Honeymoon spots
• Great coffee
• And it’s closer to some US states than Hawaii and MUCH cheaper to travel here!