Cost Rica 3 wk Hiking, Rainforest and Wildlife Trip

Costa Rica | Jan 13 - Feb 5, 2025

Overall Comments.
We had a fabulous three weeks holiday due very much to the quality of Kim Kim’s itinerary planning, logistics organization, the quality of the operators and tour guides employed and the on-going communication and support to us throughout the trip by Kim Kim.
Trail damage and mud due to heavy rains prior to our trip or on several days during our trip, forced some limited rescheduling of tours but in all cases tour operators (and we) adapted without problems.

Kim Kim Organization
Kim Kim organization of our itinerary and communication with us was first class. Gustavo was very responsive to our concerns and suggestions in crafting our itinerary. Greg did a fabulous job of attending to the details and building this into our on-line itinerary. The scheduling of a Skype type call with us just shortly before our trip was very helpful in our preparations.

Kim Kim Support.
Greg’s availability throughout the trip to clarify issues was reassuring.

Locations Visited.
We were very happy with all locations visited and, with one exception, the amount of time spent in each. With advanced information on the closure of the Tortuguero Hill trail which evidently had been closed for around two months because of a fallen tree, a day less in Tortuguero would have been appropriate.

Tours.
All the tours organized by Kim Kim and the guides they employed were first class. Of the self guided days that we had built into our itinerary as efforts to cut down on costs or take a break, the Day 1 Cahuita Park trek and the three days in San Jose worked out well. Because of the mud situation with the jungle hike in Gandoca Manzanillo Refuge the Exploradores guide, Rodriguo made an excellent substitute by taking us kayaking. We loved that experience. The Tortuguero Hill trail was closed so we organized our own water taxi to San Francisco and that was perfectly fine. Making a self guided trek to the Arenal Volcano proved impractical because of the isolated location of the Lost Iguana Resort so we took a tour of the Arenal Volcano through the hotel. The English language skills of the guide were nowhere near as good as the other guides we had. In Santa Elena we decided taking a tour for the Curi Cancha Reserve was a good investment both for the guiding services and transport to get there. We booked this through Ocotea, the same company as Kim Kim engaged for the Cloud Forest Reserve, and it was a good tour. The San Pedrillo tour in Corcovado was much better for us than the Sirena tour but this was largely because of the fantastic wildlife sightings we made at the first compared with the second (a tapir and a puma up close) and also because of the shorter trip and easier sand beach access of the first. Our sightings on the second day in Sirena were slim and disappointing by comparison but from what we heard about prevalence of wildlife at each location our sighting experiences could easily have been the other way around. The beach embarkation at Sirena at low tide on large rocks as well as long rock slippery shelves had its difficulties for us and the wet shoes we had didn’t help our experience. Flip flops are not an option particularly at Sirena. Unfortunately for Susan one of her Keens’ water shoes had separated at the sole so weren’t usable so she was making do with flip flops which were not advised.

The zip line experience in Santa Elena turned out to be quite a highlight for us. We were nearly going to pull out but after our two test runs and encouragement from the staff, we went ahead with all five more.

Transfers.
The transfers operated and coordinated by Ride CR (almost all) all went off very smoothly. So did our Sansa flights.
The boat trip from Puerto Sierpe to Drake Bay was an hour and a half later than expected (the boat departs at 4pm as opposed to 3pm) and possibly not with the boat and skipper we were expecting. We are not even sure we even met Captain Licho 😊 But it all worked well in the end and we enjoyed the experience. We certainly were happy to have taken this method of getting to Drake Bay rather than an extra two and a half hours by road.

Accommodation.

Hotel Santo Thomas - San Jose.
This proved a great choice for us. The location relative to downtown, to a number of excellent restaurants and a bank was superb. The room was spacious and comfortable with all the amenities we needed. The breakfast was perfectly adequate. The staff were all cheerful and helpful. The price was also excellent.

Umami Hotel - Puerto Viejo.
This hotel was also excellent. A well appointed and nicely decorated room although the mattress on the main bed was not as firm as I would have liked. The staff were friendly and helpful. The location was great. We really enjoyed Puerto Viejo.

Mawamba Lodge - Tortuguero.
This lodge is well located in reasonable proximity to the village and ocean beach. It is well laid out and the pool is great. The ability to walk into the village of Tortuguero was very good. However the hot water in our room was intermittent. Some of the staff could have been more friendly and enthusiastic.

Lost Iguana- Arenal.
This hotel was excellent and staff were universally helpful, friendly and enthusiastic. The food at the property was good and our room excellent. However it was very isolated from La Fortuna and because we didn’t have our own car it cost us US$40 each way to go to La Fortuna and didn’t allow us to eat dinner anywhere else other than the hotel’s restaurant.

Mar Inn - Santa Elena.
This motel, though modest in services and appointments met our needs very well. It was located close to the centre of Santa Elena village.

Rancho Corcovado- Drake Bay.
This motel was a real mixture. We were in a beautiful and huge room that seemed only partially furnished. It had no chairs or tables (other than recliner chairs on the balcony) and no hangers of any description either for clothes or towels

Possible areas for Improvement might be two or three page printed spreadsheet itinerary that was more easily referenced in off-line locations (we created our own). Also, better information on things like the trail closure on Tortuguero Hill would have been good.