Our Guide to Costa Rica 2021

Christmas in San Jose

I spent one christmas in Costa Rica, it was beautiful, delicious, colorful, and fun. Here I want to talk about Costa Rica, their unique sites that I visited, and beautiful culture, food, and festivals.  I might not cover the whole country, but I will talk about the places I saw and would like to recommend.

There are many festivals in Cost Rica, but I will talk about the San Jose Festivals during Christmas season.

Where is Costa Rica?

Costa Rica is a small country in Central America, with Nicaragua from North and Panama from south. From East the Caribbean Sea and the West the Pacific Ocean which gives Costa Rica around 800 miles (1300 Km) of coastal beaches. The total length of the country is around 285 miles and 170 miles of width. The total Area is around 22,000 Mi2 (only double state of Maryland in the US).

The population of the country is around 5 million, and the capital city of the country is San Jose with population of 335,000 (the population of metro San Jose is around 1.4 million).

Their money is Cost Rican Colon (CRC) and it is around 600 (plus minus) for one US dollars.

Visa Requirements

North Americans and most Europeans do not need pre applied Visa to enter the country, visa is issued free on arrival for 90 days, most other countries 30 days visa is issued upon arrival and some countries like Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq, North Korea, and few others have special restrictions. Some countries from South America and African Sahara need yellow fever vaccination before entering the country. There is the official Costa Rica Visa requirement site you can visit. The link is http://www.costarica-embassy.org/ , you click the English language on the top right side, then the “Consulate” button above then on the left the “Visas” link.

How to move around in Costa Rica

There are many ways to travel around Cost Rica, and from San Jose Airport to your hotel in San Jose or to other cities.

1. Taxis are available from the Airport to San Jose. The airport taxis are orang taxis, and these are the official Airport taxis. You can find the RED taxies, but they operate more in the city and between cities. There are pirate taxis (privet cars owners drive as taxis), I would avoid them as much as possible. Taxis have meters and ask the driver to use it (mandatory by law). The tip is not necessary but 10% is common. Taxis do not operate on addresses, so better know the name of the hotel, or a big business close to it. In my case, my phone provider offers roaming, so I can use my Google Map to show the driver the location. If you don’t have a roaming service, you can buy a prepaid cheap SIM card from the airport to be better connected and check if the driver is going the correct way.
2. UBER: Uber works in Cost Rica, and it is my preferred choice. You can pay in cash or card. You need to have connectivity, to order Uber of course, and having a prepaid SIM from the airport will help. However, I was told not to take Uber from the airport, because the taxi drivers do not like them and in few cases, there were confrontations. If you still want to take Uber from airport, it is recommendable that you walk a bit down the street (close to coffee shop) and get the Uber from there to make it look like a friend picking you up.
3. I did not want to deal with the Taxi hassle and the issues with Uber at the airport, I called the hotel (it is a small hotel, I will talk about it later in the blog), they did not have their own car pick up service, but they have privet people they work with and act like the hotel taxi. Very friendly driver and the lady translator next to the driver, I paid them direct (not through the hotel), but the driver was going to get into an accident three times during the 20 min drive from the airport to the hotel. The trip from the hotel to the airport, I took an Uber, and it was fine.
4. In addition to the above, there are public transports from the airport, within the Capital and between cities. There are many types of transports, some are more direct to major points and some are more used when trying to go to a specific place within the city because they have more stops. I found the four following public transportation methods,
   a) City bus, they go no stop (or minimum stops between cities)
   b) Intercity Bus, they are the ones that have many stops and used by people to commute within the city.
   c) Regional Bus
   d) And others more specific type like going long distance and some to neighboring countries crossing the border.You can ask the hotel, use google map (or similar apps) or you can ask at the bus operators to know which bus goes where. There are many sites online can help, I never used the public transports during my travels, maybe next time I will try and update this post.
5. For visiting touristic locations, I used tour busses through agencies. They were small vans, picking me up from my hotel and drop me back to the hotel. You can reserve them from your hotel receptionist or visit the many tourist shops around the city. It seems there are only few main tour agencies that organize these tours, the rest are selling agents. The prices looked to me almost standard.

   

The Carnivals in Costa Rica

The major Carnivals in South America usually are associated with Catholicism. It is usually in month of February and March before the Lintel season (when Christians stop eating meat for 40 days). The word carnival seems been driving from the Latin “carne vale”, meaning “remove or goodbye meat”. It seems it originally was a food festival where worshipers prepare for the 40 days of Lent that started on Ash Wednesday by feasting. Then it seems became what is know today with all the music, floats and dancing.

In Costa Rica there many festivals and carnivals, but these two are the most famous.

Puntarenas Carnival, also known as “Carnaval de la Reina” or Carnival of the queen.

It is not as big as “Carnaval de Rio” in Brazil, but for Costa Rica it is one of the biggest ones and draws millions of people every year. It is usually in month of February and lasts for 10 days this Carnival is celebrated in the Pacific Costal city on “Puntarenas”.

The second biggest Carnival is celebrated in city of “Limon” on the Caribbean Sea coast of Costa Rica and is called “Carnival of Limón”.

This carnival is a celebration of the arrival of Christopher Columbus, who landed in Puerto Limon in 1502 during his exploration of the new world. Also, in the modern years, it celebrates the arrival of immigrants from the Caribbean and the African Sahara (and all other immigrants) that came to Costa Rica from port of Limon or other ports.

There are many more carnivals in Costa Rica in different cities and regions, but these two stand out. I will talk below about other carnival that are celebrated during the christmas holidays in the capital San Jose, which I think they are worth mentioning.

San Jose in Christmas Season

In San Jose there are festivals and Carnivals celebrating Christmas, they are not as big as the two previous ones, but they are in the capital and during Christmas, so they were additional motivation for me to visit San Jose during Christmas. Most of the Carnivals in San

Jose it seems take place in or starts from “Avenida Segunda” or in English “the second street”.

I witnessed these two carnivals during my stay in San Jose during the holiday seasons:

• “Canaval de luz” (Carnival of light), held the evening of the second Saturday of December, marking the official start of the Christmas holiday season. It is celebrated with white floats and lights and of course lot of music and dancing.
• Then there is carnival “El Tope” or “El Tope Caballos, or El Tope Nacional”, in Costa Rica the word “Tope” is related to equestrian parades (Horse riding parades). It is held on December 26th around noon time and till sunset. You will have the 2nd street closed form the national museum (where my hotel was located). There will be hundreds if not thousands of horses and bulls on the streets guided or mounted by their owners), lot of music, dancing and street foods.
  
• On the 27th, exactly the next day, there is “Carnaval de San Jose”, it is located the same location of the El Tope parade and also starts around noon time and until sunset. It starts with big truck parades, then demonstration of old cars, then motorbikes, then bicycles and then the famous floats. Of course, like any carnival, has lot of bands, and dancing people in costumes some are fancy costumes, and some represent the sponsor, or symbolic characters from the culture.
  

What to see in San Jose beside the Carnivals?

Most of the places I visited were walking distance from where the hotel was. The below are some of the places I saw and worth seeing:

National Museum of Costa Rica: originally established May 1887 in a different location, then moved to the current location in 1950.

It was established originally to classify, preserve, and study nature and artifacts. Not it is Costa Rica’s National Museum and very touristic place. It is located on 2nd Street, as part of the Bellavista Fortress, which was built in 1917, and witnessed the 1948 CR civil war. was used as a fortress, military barracks and you still can see many bullet holes in the walls of the fortress.

National Theater of Costa Rica

It was finished construction and opened to public around 1897, and at the time it was the second to “Teatro de Mora”, which was destroyed due to earthquakes and this theater became the only national theater. It is relatively small because when it was constructed the population of San Jose was much less than what it is today.

Metropolitan cathedral of San Jose

It was originally built in the beginning of the 17th century, then destroyed due to earthquakes the rebuilt. It is a big cathedral and on the 2nd street and Calle Central.

Pre-Columbian Gold Museum

It is an underground building with concrete finish, and close to an extremely busy street (no car traffic, just pedestrians). The Museum contains thousands of archaeological artifacts and gold pieces including the first Costa Rica gold coin.

San Jose Central Market

It is on a very busy street full of shops and restaurants and office 2 or 3 story office buildings. The Central Market itself is a closed market, with many shops sell all type of merchandise and food and souvenirs.

Spirogyra Butterfly Garden

If you like butterflies, this small but beautiful garden with many waterfalls, contains more than 40 different live butterfly species in a environmentally controlled space.

Other places to see in Costa Rica

Costa Rica is truly amazing country, has many festivals, and Carnivals, all around the year and in different location of the country and also have beautiful national parks, dormant Volcanoes and many outdoor activities, some of the locations I would recommend are as follows:

Basílica de Nuestra Señora de los Ángeles

This comes on the top of my list because it has an amazing story behind it. It is called Basilica of our lady of the angles because the legend or the story goes that a peasant girl from Cartago region (where the Basilica was built) found a small stature of a woman carrying a baby on a rock in a remote area, she took the statue and went home only to find out that the statue was gone. On her path she found the statue exactly where she found it the first time.

The girl took the statue to the priest of the village, and they locked the statue in the church only to find it gone and reappear on the rock again. That was sign enough to order to build a church for the statue. The church was destroyed everything they want to start due to earthquakes. So, the village decided to build the church at the rock the statue was found. That is where the church now and the statue in a gold box next to the altar of the church.

Due to the dark color of the stone, the statue is called the “black virgin of Cartago” La Negrita Reina de Cartago (little Black Queen of Cartago).

Outside the church there was a small statue representing the original statue in the original location found and next to it a natural potable fountain that stories of healing powers were told. People come to the fountain to drink and wash their hands and feet to be blessed by the healing water.

Every 2nd of August, when the statue was first found, more than million people come to the church for pilgrimage. Locally the pilgrimage is known as the “Romería” and is one of the most important events of Costa Rican traditions.

Irazu Volcano National Park

It is 1.5-hour drive from San Jose (35 miles), I included here since it is a half day trip. The tour I took stopped many viewpoints worth vising and taking pictures. But it was very cold and windy and high altitude. Coming down my water bottle collapse due to air pressure.

Mirador Sanatorium Carlos Durán

This is an old hospital for patients with tuberculosis. It was built by Dr. Carlos Duran Cartin in 1918. He was a physician and served for one year as president of CR (1889-1890). His daughter had the disease and at the time there was no known medicine, so the location gave a good environment for at least 50% patients would recover. In the 50s medication were introduced, so there was no need for the hospital anymore and in 1963 was abandoned.

Mirador Sanatorium Carlos Durán – 1915 Hospital famous for the paranormal activities

The touristic part comes due to its reputation of having ghosts of a priest, and a little girl appear even when the hospital was occupied. The picture I took was the closes I got to the hospital, but there are tours that can take you there and the entry is around $2.

There are many other remarkably interesting places full of beautiful nature, outdoor activities, hiking, rock climbing and diving. Some of these places are.

• Puerto Viejo
• Cahuita
• Torguguero
• Corcovado National Park
• Arenal Volcano
• Manuel Antonio National Park
• Monteverde national Park

The Small Hotel I stayed in

I cannot finish my Blog without talking about the Hotel I stayed in (I am not been sponsored by them, they do not even know I exist). I found them via Booking.com. the way I choose a hotel is as follows:

• • I place “want to go” flag on all the places that I want to go on one of the map applications.
  • I locate a place where if I stay, I would achieve my goal most efficiently.
  • I start searching for 3- or 4-star hotels which are not known international chains. In 5-star hotels I will pay for Gym, pool, and other amenities I will never use. The smaller local hotels usually have a different character. Of course, if I am going to a place that is a bit dangerous, I would stick to 5 star international hotel providing Taxi services, and security protection.
  • Then I start check the rating of the hotels and compare the prices, the distance form where I want to go, also I try to choose a place close to malls, food areas and shops that I can walk and not feel deserted during night or days I just want to relax and not tour.
  • The pictures are overrated, I would use different apps to check different pictures, and the most I read are the 1 and 2 star comments. Because these sometimes (not always) might reveal something that I dislike. Most of the time these are angry people that they would use rating as a revenge to a person they did not like in the hotel. So, I be careful when I read these comments. I usually would trust comments from locals and not European or American comments. The local will compare the hotel based on local standards.
  • In places with good weather I also check for outdoor restaurant, a nice sitting areas and a bar if possible in the hotel.
    

After my research, I found this place called “Fleur De Lys Hotel”, it is on the opposite side of the national museum, 2 minutes’ walk to the 2nd street (where all the Carnivals stat from), 10 minutes’ walk from the biggest closed market they have, and found many activities around it. It has a beautiful outdoor restaurant/bar and live music on weekends.

The hotel was not expensive and the most beautiful thing in the hotels are rooms, they have character, and each room has a name and not a number, I thought it was cool.

Conclusion

Costa Rica’s trip was not well planned, but it ended up being a great christmas holiday. The hotel, the market, the food, the carnivals then the trips I made was perfect. the people are very friendly, mostly everyone speaks English (to some degree).

The Carnivals were amazing, lot of fun people, music, dancing, and things I have never seen before. The market and the food were amazing, and cheap. You need to haggle when you buy souvenirs from the market, they are friendly open to bargaining.

The country and the city has many activities and carnival seasons and it is as much fun to visit any other month of the year in my opinion.

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