Arenal for the water, Monteverde for the canopy. Then pick a coast.
Which hanging-bridge walk is worth the drive. What the La Fortuna waterfall ticket actually buys. Whether Manuel Antonio or Tortuguero suits the days you have left. Reviews of every tour you can book in Costa Rica.
The waterfall, the bridges, the island boat, and the night the turtles come in.
Four bookings a first Costa Rican route hangs off. What each one costs, and what the people who took it say.
01The first morningSkip-the-Line La Fortuna Waterfall Admission TicketA staircase cut down the gorge to a pool you can swim in. Admission is the whole cost, and the climb back up is the part nobody photographs.
02The canopy daySelvatura Park Hanging Bridge Tour in MonteverdeBridges strung across Monteverde cloud forest at the height the birds use. Mornings are clear; the cloud usually rolls in after lunch.
03The day on a boatTortuga Island Full Day Tour from San José with LunchOut through the Gulf of Nicoya to Isla Tortuga for white sand and lunch on the beach. The long day that breaks up all the driving.
04The night watchNight Turtle Nesting Tour from TamarindoTamarindo beach in nesting season, walking on the guides’ radio call when a turtle comes ashore. Red torchlight only.
Arenal, Poás, Río Celeste: the volcano day, four ways.
Every route through this country crosses a volcano. One walks you over an old lava field into thermal water, one drives you up to a crater lake before the cloud shuts it, one ends at a river the colour of paint.
La Fortuna, Monteverde, Manuel Antonio: the three bases most routes are built from.
A volcano town with thermal water running under it, a cloud forest on a ridge, a national park that ends on the sand, a crocodile river, a surf coast and the capital you land in. Six bases, and the best day out from each.
La Fortuna: the waterfall early, the hot springs after dark.
Everything in La Fortuna →
The town sits under Arenal with hot water running beneath it, which gives the day an obvious shape. Walk in the morning while it is still cool, get in the water once the light goes. These three carry more travellers than anything else in the north.
The waterfall, and the steps back up
The fall drops into a green pool at the bottom of a staircase cut into the gorge. Admission covers the whole thing. Go at opening, before the vans arrive from the hotels.
Bridges over the Arenal rainforest
Walkways strung across the canopy on the old lava flow. The guide is the point: sloths, eyelash vipers and a toucan you would have walked straight underneath.
Thermal water under the volcano
The river runs hot off Arenal and the resorts have terraced it into pools. Evening tickets cost less and the place empties out once the day groups leave.
Costa Rica turned its own rainforest into a ropes course.
Cables strung ridge to ridge above the canopy, rivers with a rapid every hundred metres, canyons you go down on a rope and a warm brown river you float in an inner tube. The country invented most of this and still does it better than anywhere.
Costa Rica’s most popular days out.
Every Costa Rican tour we have reviewed →The days more travellers take than anything else between the two coasts, and what earns each of them the slot.
1
Skip-the-Line La Fortuna Waterfall Admission Ticket
Reserve entry to La Fortuna Waterfall and explore at your own pace without a guide. Walk through the Río Fortuna Ecological Reserve, descend roughly 500 steps, and reach a powerful 70-meter waterfall where swimming may be allowed. Admission costs $20, with parking, restrooms, changing areas, and rest stops near the top.
From · $20
Read our review →
2
Tortuga Island Full Day Tour from San José with Lunch
from $115
3
Selvatura Park Hanging Bridge Tour in Monteverde
from $56
4
Hanging Bridges Walk in Arenal Volcano
from $39
5
Hacienda Doka Coffee Experience Tour
from $35
6
Catamaran Ocean King Manuel Antonio
from $86
7
Extreme Zipline tour in Monteverde
from $72
8
San Jose By Night: Sights & Culture Tour with Local Dinner
from $80
Manuel Antonio is a national park with three swimming beaches inside it.
The smallest park in the country and the one with the most in it: capuchins working the trail, sloths overhead and white sand at the end of the path. The catamarans go out of Quepos, ten minutes back up the road.
Every Manuel Antonio day →
Sloths overhead, and a hundred things on the trail that only move at night.
Half of what this country is famous for is asleep while you are awake. A guide with a scope finds the sloth you have been staring past for ten minutes; the same trail after dark turns into frogs, vipers, kinkajous and beetles the size of a hand.
What a day out in Costa Rica actually costs.
Every tour on the site, grouped by what it costs. Park gates and waterfall tickets sit at the bottom of the ladder; the boat days and the overnights into Corcovado are the top of it.
Waterfall tickets, park entries, tubing runs and the short guided walks out of town.
The full-day standards: bridges and volcano combos, rafting, catamarans and the cloud forest.
Private guides, Corcovado overnights and the long transfers that cross the country.
Three things that happen in Costa Rica and almost nowhere else.
Rainforest and beaches exist all over the tropics. A river that turns opaque turquoise where two streams meet, a beach that thousands of turtles climb on the same tide, and a forest that gets busier at midnight do not.
The Río Celeste blue
Two clear rivers meet on the flank of Tenorio and everything below the junction runs opaque turquoise. It is mineral particles catching the light rather than dye, so the colour needs a bright day to read properly; after heavy rain the river runs grey and the walk is still three hours either way.
- 1Rio Celeste Waterfall Plus Sloths and wildlife Sanctuary★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 110 reviews
- 2Sloth Discovery & Swim in Rio Celeste★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 80 reviews
- 3Tubing Adventure in the Río Celeste★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 78 reviews
The nesting beaches
Olive ridleys come ashore in their thousands on the Pacific beaches, green turtles on the Caribbean side at Tortuguero. Groups go out at night on a guide’s radio call, in small numbers, under red light, and nobody is promised a turtle.
- 1Night Turtle Nesting Tour from Tamarindo★★★★★★★★★★ 4.0 · 206 reviews
- 2Turtle Nesting Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 132 reviews
- 3Turtle Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 71 reviews
The forest on its night shift
Red-eyed tree frogs on the underside of a leaf, an eyelash viper coiled at head height, a kinkajou crossing overhead. A guide with a torch and twenty years on the same trail finds in ten minutes what you would miss in a week.
- 1Monteverde Night Tour with a Certified Tour Guide (6 PM or 8 PM)★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 112 reviews
- 2EXCLUSIVE Night Tour with Night Vision- small groups 8 people max★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 98 reviews
- 3Small-Group Tortuguero National Park Night Walk in Costa Rica★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 91 reviews
Four Costa Rican bookings that will not wait.
Most of this country can be arranged over breakfast the day before. These four run on park reservations, nesting seasons and boats that leave once.
- 01Poás Volcano and Coffee Tour with Tasting and La Paz FallsThe crater park runs on timed entry with a cap on each slot, and shuts outright when the gas readings climb. The clear early slots go first.
- 02Pacheco Tours – 2 Days 1 Night in Corcovado Sirena From Drake BayCorcovado admits nobody without a certified guide and a permit bought in advance, and the bunks at Sirena station are counted.
- 03Night Turtle Nesting Tour from TamarindoNesting runs to a season rather than a calendar, and each night’s beach patrol takes a fixed number of people.
- 04Small-Group Tortuguero National Park Night Walk in Costa RicaThere is no road in. You arrive by boat or by small plane on somebody else’s timetable, and the transfer is booked with the room.
When the rain arrives at two and stays until six.
From May to November the mornings are usually clear and the sky opens after lunch. The answer is not to stay in. Do the walking early, then put the afternoon somewhere with a roof, or somewhere you were going to get wet anyway: a chocolate kitchen, a coffee mill, thermal water, or a night walk that starts once it has passed.
By place, coast to coast
By kind of day: canopy, crater, water or wildlife
San José, La Fortuna, Monteverde, Manuel Antonio: the loop almost everybody drives first.
The newest Costa Rica tour reviews.
More new Costa Rica reviews →
Observation of Turtles in their Natural Habitat in Tortuguero
Read our review →
The best of Tortuguero: Canoe, hike and night tour (turtle in Jul-Oct)
Read our review →
Canoe experience exploring Tortuguero National Park
Read our review →
Vandara Hot Springs & Horses+ Zipline+ sugarmill+ waterslide
Read our review →
2-Hour Private or Group Surf Lesson in Tamarindo!
Read our review →
Sloths in their natural habitat & Blue river waterfall
Read our review →
Rio Celeste, Tenorio Hike, Sloths Sanctuary & Meal
Read our review →
PUBLIC Pacific Lounge Catamaran – Tamarindo SUNSET experience
Read our review →
ATV and Zipline Combo Tour from Tamarindo or Conchal or Riu Hotel
Read our review →