Costa Rica 2015: A little background info

If my memory is correct, which generally it is not, it seems it was back in the ’80s that Costa Rica was “discovered’ as a place where the cost of living, and property, was cheap, the scenery beautiful and the people friendly. So, a flood a retirees and escapees began to head in that direction.

By that time Costa Rica itself was undergoing its own transformation. In 1949, following a civil war common in that part of the world, the new government took the extraordinary step of becoming the first nation in the world to abolish its army. By the eighties the economy had moved from being primarily a coffee and produce exporter to becoming a center for Eco-tourism. Much of the land was protected either by the government or privately and by the nineties tourists became the primary economic engine.

For many years we have come across people who have been there and loved it, and it has long been on our list of places to go. However, it did not become high on that list till it came time to cash in some expiring free Southwest air miles.

We started accumulating those miles with an Air Tran credit card some years ago. Then Southwest bought Air Tran. The miles, although computed differently, did transfer, but the process hit a little turbulence and it wasn’t clear that  those hard-earned miles had arrived at their destination safely until early this year. When they did arrive, they brought their October, 2015 expiration deadline with them. So, we had some planning to do.

At the time the all this was going on the farthest destination Southwest flew was Aruba. And, while we would have been plenty happy going back there again, we are always looking for something new. That’s when Southwest announced they would soon begin service to Costa Rica! Yay! For various reasons, including the arrival of our new granddaughter, we could not travel much before the dreaded miles expiration date. So, I slowly began looking into everything Costa Rica had to offer, which was a LOT!

As is my custom, I started with Tripadvisor. They had all kinds of fabulous beaches and national parks as destinations, mostly on the Pacific coast. So Dianne and I looked over the list and settled on a few places. We decided it would take about two weeks to see all this stuff and avoid a mad rush from place to place. I was able to confirm that our flight would indeed be free. So, we booked October 1-13. Now it was time to fill in the details.

I started looking a You-Tube videos about Costa Rica. To my surprise, one of the first videos was from a couple guys who live down there and who strongly advised against renting a car. WHAT??? How are you supposed to get around? People on TripAdvisor had mixed opinions of the subject, but they all agreed on one thing: it would be pricey. The cost of renting a car down there is a little high, BUT the government requires you to buy insurance, regardless of what your own policy and/or credit card might cover. This       required insurance would be, at least, $55/day. Hmmmm. Not good. Sounded like the kind of racket you run into some times. Still, I had a hard time nailing down an alternative. The whole country is no bigger than West Virginia. Surely it can’t be that hard to get around.

Earlier in the year one of my Facebook friends, Amy Kutschbach, had posted pictures from her trip to Costa Rica. Making no progress on my own, I messaged her about car rentals and getting around generally. She replied with some good advice and sound reasoning which was, a) DO NOT rent a car because roads are awful and signs are few, AND, b) let the locals arrange both your vacation and your transportation. She recommended a site called “Anywhere Costa Rica”.  They give you good suggestions to choose from and the service is free! OK. Now we were getting somewhere!

I got on the Anywhere Costa Rica site and got to work. First the give you a nice checklist of things you want to do down there. Then they ask for your budget and how many days you plan to stay. You send them that info and they assign one of their staff to work with you. Sure enough, almost instantly, I received a reply with suggestions for places to visit and things to do. Following Amy’s pictures, comments from TripAdvisor people and our personal preferences, Dianne and I soon had it narrowed down. We replied back and soon received a phone call from Yuliana, our guide for this experience. She agreed that we had picked some excellent spots, but she pointed out that October is still the rainy season in Costa Rica. For that reason some of the places on the Pacific side actually close and regardless, we might well spend considerable time in the pouring rain. OK. This was good to know. She said we would still be alright in the mountains, but would be much drier on the Caribbean side. She suggested some places to visit there, which sounded just as good. Soon we were narrowing things down again. Before long, we had a plan.

Not only did this plan include the properties, it also included all transportation from the airport, to every destination and back to the airport. And all within budget. Here is the final itinerary: