Automobile travel in Costa Rica
Costa Rica is a very small country, it is approximately the size of West Virginia. While planning a trip here in Costa Rica it would be easy to assume one would be able to drive from the Caribbean coast to the Pacific coast in an hour or 2 at the most, and from the Guanacaste Region to the wild Osa Peninsula in trip that does not consume an entire day in paradise. This assumption is far from the truth. Costa Rica has features which rank the country’s HDI (Human Development Index) higher than any other in Central America, highway systems are not a feature which increase the country’s HDI.
Costa Rica is home to incredible diversity of land, plant life, and animal life; the country has the pursuit of preserving the natural sanctuary it has been given, this commitment has also slowed the development of many industries and infrastructures. Roads and Highways are most definitely in need of improvement. For a person in San Jose, Costa Rica to drive to the closest beach town (Jaco) it would take approximately 2 hours, to go to the Carribean side the city of Limon would take 2 and a half hours, to drive to the Guanacaste region nearly 7 hours. This small country really does a good job of making itself feel like a large one.
The hassle of driving can be overted by a couple ways; the first and most plausible way of traveling quickly throughout Costa Rica is by taking domestic flights which can take you anywhere throughout the country in a matter of minute, the other way to get around Costa Rica and avoiding the highways is by boat which can quickly get you from Tamarindo to Manuel Antonio.
In some parts of Costa Rica roads are in bad condition due to lack of funds or politics, the roads leading to Monte Verde Cloud Forrest are in poor condition for another reason. The organization in control of tourism and the protected lands of Monte Verde have purposely left roads leading there in poor condition. Why have they done this? One of their plans to limit the amount of tourists and business developments around the cloud forest area is to leave the roads in poor condition, by making Monte Verde hard to get to they hope to keep big business out and preserve the natural beauty of the area.
| Written by Lewis |
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Filed under: Travel on August 14th, 2007
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My wife and I will be honeymooning in Costa Rica Dec. 8-17. We are flying into San Jose and staying at La Mariposa for the first two nights. Since my wife will not fly in a small plane, we are planning on driving to the Arenal area for the next three nights and then Hotel Punta Islita to finish our trip.
Do you have any tips on rental cars for that period of time and the logistics involved in getting to each of these places?
Manuel Antonio to Arenal is approximately 4-5 hr. drive. The road to get there is drivable, very senic, but slow through the mountainous parts. I suggest getting a map from the car rental agency, you should have no problem getting there and if you do just stop at a shop and people will be more than happy to help you. Thrifty and Adobe are two good car rental companies in Costa Rica.
Lewis,
Thank you so much for the info. One more question, what about the drive to Punta Islita from the Arenal area?
Thanks again!
this is a website that has the travel distances and times, but always err on the longer side as there can be heavy rain, traffic, or an accident that would delay the car ride.
http://www.govisitcostarica.com/travelInfo/travelTime.asp#114
Perfect, thanks!