Puntarenas began life as Costa Rica’s premier Pacific deep-sea port and popular seaside destination for Costa Rica travel (particularly for Ticos!). A short ferry tour across the gulf now brings much better beaches within reach, so most foreign tourists find themselves just passing through. But the Spanish Conquistadors who settled here in 1522 found the protected Gulf of Nicoya ideal as a port city. It was to here that, on Christmas Day, 1843, the English captain, William Le Lacheur, sailed looking for cargo. His success at transporting coffee beans to Europe fueled the Costa Rica’s huge – and prosperous – coffee boom. Good times for Puntarenas and Costa Rica. Named after the long six-kilometer/3.7-mile peninsular strip of sand that houses the city, Puntarenas (Sandy Point), grew rapidly after 1846, when an improved overland road to the Central Valley was constructed for coffee exports, hauled down in oxcarts. The harbor lost much of its importance in 1890 when work crews finished the Atlantic Railroad, opening the closer-to-Europe city of Puerto Limón, Costa Rica for coffee exports. In 1910, a railroad was completed to Puntarenas, which relieved some of the economic sting.
As the closest town to the central highlands, it soon became a popular beach resort, nicknamed the “Pacific Pearl.” Over the years, wealthy businessmen, prostitutes, workmen, families, vacationers, fortune seekers, tourists, as well as seasoned sailors of the town’s fishing, freight, and mother-of-pearl fleets, gave Puntarenas a unique rough-and-tumble seaport ambiance – and some vestiges remain today. In the early 1990s Puntarenas took an economic hit after the opening of Puerto Caldera, a port better suited to larger vessels and cruise ships, about 20 km/12.4 miles south. It’s still trying to recover. The long beachfront was cleaned up in 1999, and Puntarenenses (what locals call themselves), as well as Josefinos are returning to the downtown again. Tourists used to dread getting “stuck” in Puntarenas overnight, but with the revitalization effort, reasonable prices and few tourists, it now makes a pleasant stop for savvy Costa Rica travel hounds, just a two-hour drive west of San José.
The long Paseo de Turistas malecón is the city’s pride and joy – and so it should be. Seaside, the sandy beach stretches for several kilometers. Lined with palms, helado (ice cream) vendors, playgrounds, picnic areas, soccer players, swimming dogs and frolicking families, the beach and the paseo feature a broad sidewalk that attracts joggers, strollers and lovers walking hand in hand during Costa Rica tours. Along the way there are some seaside restaurants and crowded gift shops, a favorite of passengers from small cruise ships, which stop at the refurbished waterfront pier. On the Saturday closest to July 16th the town comes alive for the Fiesta del Virgin del Mar, a celebration rooted in Costa Rican folklore. According to the legend, four fishermen were caught in a bad storm at sea in 1913. In their prayers for deliverance they promised to organize a feast and boat procession in honor of their patron saint, St. Carmen. Since then all the boats in the harbor string decorative lights and colorful banners on their masts during festival time. Sailing regattas and bike races give way to evening dances, fiestas and lots of drinking. A fun spot to be at during Costa Rica travel.
Adventures on Water
The docks of Puntarenas are the embarkation points for several entertaining boat tours into the Gulf of Nicoya in Costa Rica. The cheapest way to get a boat ride is to take one of the ferries as a walk-on passenger. But more fun are day-trips to Isla Tortuga, a private island where passengers have lunch, swim, snorkel or explore.
Along the Cerro de la Muerte
The bird of paradise alights only upon the hand that does not grasp.
~ Flight of the White Crows, John Berry
The intimidating name, Ridge of Death, refers to a section of the Inter- American Highway that climbs across the Continental Divide near Mount Chirripó, Costa Rica’s highest point. It’s not called that because of its modern driving record – although its sharp curves, sudden fog and sheer drops on the side of the road have taken their toll – but because among the early settlers who made the difficult mountain crossing, several died from the cold en route. The nickname solidified during the building of the Inter-American Highway when a number of workmen met their maker.
This drive offers breathtaking views of the surrounding green mountains and deep valleys. As the altitude rises, the winds pick up and the temperature drops – it is not unusual to fall to freezing. Above the tree line, the vegetation becomes windswept with heather, grasses, gorse and gnarled brush. Along the route are the Tapanti-Macizo de la Muerte Cloud Forest and several comfortable cloud forest lodges that specialize in finding quetzals (the bird of the gods) in the wild.
Symbiotic Relations
The quetzal, which lives at altitudes between 5,000 and 10,000 feet, depends on the laurel tree, and the tree depends upon it for propagation.
The Talamanca area offers pleasant lodges or B&Bs for Costa Rica travel, either for a single night or as a productive eco-alternative to farther destinations such as Monteverde. The area also offers a ton of chances to cast your line into private stocked trout ponds. For a small fee, the owners loan you tackle and you can catch your supper.
So get on a bus or rent a car and head south from Cartago. However, the caveat that applies to all major mountain crossings in Costa Rica is to try and do them in the mornings before clouds, fog and rain obscure the view and make for white-knuckle driving.
At about Km 64 the Tapantí-Macizo de la Muerte National Park (macizo@sol.racsa.co.cr), a combination of two parks, back to back. This high-mountain section is obviously the cloud forest, located on the east side of the highway. Down a short gravel road, the park entrance features dormitory accommodations and a big welcoming fireplace. A walk in the woods here is a real treat. Cold clouds sweep up and obscure the tall soaring trees, dripping with epiphytes and thick with moss. Several wellmarked trails provide fascinating walks into this unique ecosystem. Worth a stop on your way – or even as an extended exploration. Look for the small sign along the road.
Isla del Cocos
It is, it is a glorious thing to be a Pirate King.
~ Pirates of Penzance, Gilbert and Sullivan, 1879
Costa Rica travel is cloud nine for water lovers and SCUBA divers. It is from Puntarenas that the dive adventure ships head to sea for Isla del Cocos, 535 km (335 miles) out in the Pacific. Besides being a natural wonder and fabulous dive spot, its modern fame came as the supposed island that housed Steven Spielberg’s dinosaur playground, Jurassic Park. The island was misnamed for the type of palm trees growing along its shores; the palm is the Rooseveltia frankliana, named in honor of Franklin D. Roosevelt, who visited the island three times. Chatham, one of its two protected bays, has rock-carved graffiti left by ancient mariners who stopped here. Years ago Isla de Cocos was a safe offshore haven for pirates and corsairs preying on Spanish galleons. Sir Francis Drake and the Portuguese pirate Benito Bonito are two of the many buccaneers said to have anchored here. The isolated isle is said to have inspired Robert Louis Stevenson’s novel, Treasure Island. In 1684, pirate William Thompson is believed to have buried the wealth looted from the coffers of Peru, known as the fabulous “Treasure of Lima,” somewhere on Cocos. The entire island is rumored to be riddled with buried treasure – gold bars and pieces of eight – although centuries of treasure hunters have failed to unearth the secrets.
“Pieces of Eight” coins were called that because they could be broken into eight pieces.
But the secret is out about its underwater treasures – Cocos may offer the best deep-sea diving in the world. Hammerhead sharks are as plentiful in its clear waters as hammers in a hardware store. On the island, sheer cliffs line the shore, sliced by cascading waterfalls from the evergreen forests that cover its rugged terrain. Hiking trails cross the inland rainforest, home to two endemic species of lizards and three endemic bird species: the Cocos cuckoo, Cocos flycatcher and the Cocos finch, related to the famous Galapagos finch that lives off the coast of Ecuador. It is common to see the unusual Holy Spirit dove, a white bird that comes to nest here. It stands out because it hovers over visitors’ heads while they’re enjoying Costa Rica travel.
Carara Biological Reserve
The way down to the beaches of Pacifica south of Orotina, one of the biggest fruit growing areas of Costa Rica, passes the important 5,242-hectare (12,952-acre) Carara Biological Reserve. This reserve straddles the transition zone between tropical moist forest and tropical wet lowland forest, with a diverse flora mix that attracts a wide variety of wildlife. The famous and colorful harlequin poison dart frog – solid black with stripes of fluorescent green – can be seen often in daytime. But the most spectacular resident is the scarlet macaw, whose brightly colored feathers are most easily seen from the Tarcole River bridge, early morning or late afternoon when the birds flock to and from the nearby mangroves and the reserve. You can’t miss the bridge; it always has cars parked along its side. Gaping people look down, not for macaws, but for American crocodiles. The big (up to four meters/13 feet!) ugly prehistoric beasts often sun themselves on the muddy banks below the bridge. This is a required stop for Costa Rica travel and should be for you too. Remember to lock your car, or take turns staying with it; luggage theft occurs here. The ranger station and entrance is three km/1.9 miles south of the bridge.
Over 135 species of neotropical birds migrate between North America and Central America each year.
Carara is a bright spot in a part of the country that has been pretty well deforested for agriculture. It was once part of a huge ranch, known as El Coyolar – a ranch so vast that the owner never needed to cut down the tropical wet forest that later became the biological reserve. Before that, evidence points to settlements as early as 300 B.C. Lomas de Entierro is a partially excavated village with funeral zones, dating back to somewhere between 800 and 1500 A.D. on a hilltop facing the Tarcole River.