Tortuguero - Poas Volcano - Monteverde - Tamarindo
9 days / 8 nights
From $2,037 per person, double occupancy for 2013

Day 1: San Jose
Airport reception and transfer to your hotel. Overnight at the Hotel Grano de Oro(or similar), breakfast included.

Day 2: San Jose - Tortuguero
This morning you will be picked up at your hotel and driven through the dramatically scenic forested mountains of Braulio Carrillo National Park on your journey to Tortuguero National Park in the northeastern lowlands. Descending from the mountains into the lowlands, you will have a short breakfast stop, and then continue on passing brahma cattle grazing in pastures, banana and pineapple plantations. Arriving at the docking area you will board a boat and travel through 50 km of rivers and canals before entering rainforest at the entrance of the park. Your boat will bring you to an area lodge where you will enjoy lunch and spend the night. In the afternoon you are able to optionally visit the Tortuguero village (we recommend visiting the small natural history museum there), walk along the beach, or take an optional fishing tour with a local fisherman. Many residents here are of Jamaican and Honduran-Caribbean descent, and speak a distinctive Patois and fish the canals in small boats or sometimes duggout canoes. During July to September, green sea turtles come ashore at night to nest on the beach and guided tours to observe them are available in the nesting season (at extra cost). (B,L,D)

Day 3: Tortuguero
Today you will take a two to three-hour boat ride touring side canals of Tortuguero National Park with a local guide to observe the spectacular flora and fauna. Using a system of natural and man-made canals you will travel in a lowland tropical rainforest with arching palms and massive trees with giant buttresses. With its abundant wildlife Tortuguero is one of the best areas in Costa Rica for viewing wild animals!! You will have the chance to see everything from a variety of bird species, howling, white-faced, and spider monkeys, sloths, crocodiles, iguanas, basilisk lizards and more from the comfort of your boat. The other half of the day is free for you to enjoy optional activities. Overnight at your Tortuguero lodge. (B,L,D)

Day 4: Tortuguero - Poas Volcano - Monteverde
After breakfast you will be transferred by boat to the Tortuguero airstrip for a 30-minute flight back to San Jose. Upon arrival you will be taken by a Sun Tours driver/guide to Poas Volcano National Park. A high elevation park at 9,000 feet, it is often chilly so bring a jacket! The active volcano’s main crater has a turquoise-colored hot-acid lake, which you can see from the fenced-edge or a viewing platform at the crater’s rim. Bring binoculars for a closer look at the yellow sulphur deposits at the base of steaming fumaroles in the crater walls above the lake. The vegetation is in places dwarfed by winds and the effects of volcanic acid rain! If time permits, an ancient extinct crater lake in the park is worth seeing following a 20 to 30 minute uphill hike on trails within an “elfin” forest. After exploring the Park continue to Monteverde, where you will arrive in the afternoon after stopping en route for lunch. As you journey to Monteverde you will pass through small Costa Rican villages and coffee and dairy farms. A cheese factory, live exhibits of butterflies, frogs, orchids, numerous restaurants, and more can be found in the communities near the reserve. Some tours may include lunch with local families or share time with Quakers to hear how they settled Monteverde back in the 1950´s and built a community out of a wilderness. You will spend the night at an attractive area hotel such as the Hotel Fonda Vela or similar. (B,L,D)

Day 5: Monteverde
In the morning visit a private reserve to explore a set of trails and canopy walkways amidst cloud forest. The treetop walkways are suitable for people of all ages in good physical condition. After, enjoy lunch in the Monteverde area at a local restaurant before the afternoon hike through the Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve, characterized by trees densely covered from top to bottom with moist “carpets” of epiphytes including mosses, bromeliads, ferns and orchids. This rare type of rainforest is also seasonal home of the legendary crimson and iridescent green Resplendent Quetzal as well as many resident endemic mountain birds. Overnight at your Monteverde area hotel. (B,L,D)

Day 6: Monteverde - Tamarindo
In the morning depart from the Monteverde mountains and travel through the drier northwest Guanacaste province lowlands. This is beef country and you may see Costa Rican cowboys riding behind herds of massive long-eared brahma cattle as you pass through large savannas on your way to the coastal beach community at Tamarindo on the north Pacific Coast. Playa Tamarindo is a long beach, with excellent waves for surfing near the mouth of an estuary. Currents can be strong, especially on a falling tide. The breaks offer possibilities for advanced surfers as well as beginners. Close to Tamarindo is the beach of Playa Grande where a small number of Leatherback SeaTurtles come to lay their eggs at night. The leatherbacks nest approximately from November to March, digging deep holes in the beach to lay their eggs which they then cover with sand before returning back to the sea. You will stay at a Tamarindo hotel like Capitan Suizo or similar. (B)

Days 7, 8: Tamarindo
In the morning depart from the Monteverde mountains and travel through the drier northwest Guanacaste province lowlands. This is beef country and you may see Costa Rican cowboys riding behind herds of massive long-eared brahma cattle as you pass through large savannas on your way to the coastal beach community at Tamarindo on the north Pacific Coast. Playa Tamarindo is a long beach, with excellent waves for surfing near the mouth of an estuary. Currents can be strong, especially on a falling tide. The breaks offer possibilities for advanced surfers as well as beginners. Close to Tamarindo is the beach of Playa Grande where a small number of Leatherback SeaTurtles come to lay their eggs at night. The leatherbacks nest approximately from November to March, digging deep holes in the beach to lay their eggs which they then cover with sand before returning back to the sea. You will stay at a Tamarindo hotel like Capitan Suizo or similar. (B)

Day 9: Int'l departure
Hotel pickup and transfer to the Liberia International Airport for your departing flight. (B)

*If departing from San Jose, you must fly Tamarindo-San Jose and connect with your flight.