Hello all.

I'm new here and just posted my intro.

We are a family with 5 children and heading to Costa Rica in May for three months. We have rented a house just north of Heredia in Santa Barbara.

The rental car is lined up and things seem to be falling into place.

We would like to travel around from there of course and plan on hitting beach areas, arenal, and various other sites.

Any recommendations of kid friendly places to eat and stay and see would be appreciated as well as any tips for making things easier.

Is there anything hard to get there that we should take with us?

Thanks in advance. Kate

Hi Kate and Welcome to Slow Travel,

It sounds like you have a great trip planned. We have a couple of members who have traveled to Costa Rica. I was there many years ago and loved it but no recent experience. Maybe one of members will have some suggestions for you.

Happy travels,

Perhaps you already know this but finding addresses in San Jose is an art and definitely not a science. The ideas of street signs and street numbers hadn't seemed to have caught on the last time I was there.

Perhap you should invest in a good GPS and a good set of maps with lat/lon coordinates.

Good Luck

Bill

Hi Kate,

You will love Costa Rica. It will be a wonderful sociology lesson for your kids.

It is a peaceful country with no standing army.

It is a country with an amazing commitment to ecology and the largest percentage of its total land mass devoted to national parks and preserves than any other country on earth. Wildlife is treasured, yet it is a country where neglected street dogs are a serious problem and cats are considered to be no better than rats.

Costa Ricans call themselves - Ticos. The universal greeting is "Pura Vida" which translates as Pure Life.

The upper class are predominately of European decent. The lower classes are predominately of local indigenous decent. There is a lot of class stratification.

San Jose is a city with one of the widest gulfs between the haves and have-nots in the western world.

You're best source of information, in my opinion, is the local English Language newspaper - "The Tico Times". You can get it online at http://www.ticotimes.net

We have friends in the city. Their daughter (now aged 30) lived with us as an exchange student in high school.

If you go to my blog, the header photo is me zip-lining through the Santa Elana Cloud forest in Monteverde.

It has been a few years since we were there, but I'll dig out some of my old information and come up with some specific recommendations if you want.

Thanks Bill. Luckily my husband is a geographer so pretty handy with GPS -- we lived in Abu Dhabi for three years and it was the same situation. You had to be able to tell taxi drivers things like "electra street" which was called something different but was nicknamed electra because 10 years prior had some electrical stores on it!

Crazy making but guess it adds to the fun.

Thanks Deborah -- neat information. We actually got our house that we are renting from the Tico Times. It has some good leads in it.

My 18 and 13 year olds were just discussing which zip line they want to do first and Monteverde was on our list. I want to go there shortly after we arrive (May 13th) because of the rain. We are renting a 4 wheel drive (gasp I am actually driving an SUV for 3 months) mostly because we need 6 to 7 seats and there are no minivans. But I am hoping May won't be too difficult driving conditions.

I'm wanting to go to a beach area. Thinking of Manuel Antonio first?????

Thanks again Deborah.

Kate, You will want to do the Monteverde zip line. It is higher and longer than any of the others. The company is called Sky Trek. In the same town, they have a horseback ride service that takes you through a coffee plantation.

Manuel Antonio, definately the best first stop for beaches. Some great hotels there. We stayed at Villas Nicholas. http://www.villasnicolas.com/

We stayed at the Hotel Finca Valverde in Santa Elana. http://www.monteverdeinfo.com/hotel/finca-valverde/

The first couple of days of our trip we decided to do a spa package at Hotel Martino in Alajuela. I know you already have a place rented, but you may want to pamper yourself with a day at the spa. It is great.
http://www.hotelmartino.com/

The drive up to Monteverde is a white knuckle adventure. Intimidating and exhilarating at the same time! You will be on an unbelivably rutted rocky road with a sheer drop off on your passenger side as you drive up the hill. It is only wide enough for a two small cars, yet you will be meeting big delivery trucks coming back down from town. My one piece of advice is to plan you drive for full daylight hours. DO NOT try to drive up to Monteverde in the dark.

Do you have a blog? If not, you might consider setting one up here on SlowTrav. Then you can blog about your trip. Just send a PM to moderator, KIM and she will help you get up and running.

I'd love to be able to follow your adventures.

Thanks Deborah (I think -- am getting slightly car sick at the Monteverde drive already

That's on our list but we certainly will not be driving at night and I guess will aim for morning when, fingers crossed, it shouldn't be raining as much.

I think I will need the spa after these trips so good to know about it - and we are comparatively near as we are renting a house just north of Heredia.

I am planning on setting up a blog and received great information. I had a NY business trip and then am stumped on a title and heading photo. Isn't it the small things that can impede progress at times (smile).

I really appreciate the links.

Kate

Deborah we did the Monteverde trip and you are right about that road.

I posted some pictures and things about our experience.

Kate

http://www.slowtrav.com/blog/kateg/

Kate,
I'm glad you didn't waste any time getting to Monteverde. I'm also glad you survived the road. Welcome to the Survivors Society.

Kate, I'm enjoying your blog. It sounds like you are doing well. Your posts on Monteverde were fun. I'm looking forward to reading about your time at the beach.