Sleeping Withthe Toucans
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100 GREAT PLACES TO STAY IN COSTA RICA Web Edition v. 2.0 February, 2009; Copyright © 2007 - 2009 HayFields Science Inc. All Rights Reserved. |
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West of Alajuela, Highway 1 descends to cross the Colorado River on a spectacular high bridge then ascends again to San Ramón and the final mountain passes between the Central Valley and the Pacific coastal plains. The tangled ridges and deep valleys of the Rios Colorado and Grande are rich agricultural lands with sugar cane growing at lower elevations and coffee and vegetables on the higher slopes. Early in the colonial period these hills were the frontier, an area where the indigenous Huetares Indians held out against Spanish encroachments from the Central Valley to the east and Puntarenas to the west. Fragments of colonial-era walls still stand overlooking the Rio Grande gorge at La Garita, once the guarded western gate between the wild lands and the populated Central Valley.
The little town of Atenas sits on a ridge high above the Rio Grande, not quite half way between San José and Puntarenas. Highway 3, which follows the path of the old ox-cart road that carried coffee from Central Valley plantations to Puntarenas for the long voyage around Cape Horn, passes through Atenas. A monument on the highway celebrates the boyeros, the ox-cart drivers who made the long trek on foot. Today Highway 3 is the fastest way from the San José area to the long string of Central Pacific beaches from Jacó down to Manuel Antonio, and legions of city-dwellers pass this way every weekend. For those in the know, Highway 3 is the preferred route to Nicoya and the northern Pacific as well, as it bypasses the agonizingly slow, perpetually foggy stretch of Highway 1 between San Ramón and Esparza. A new highway is scheduled to go from Santa Ana to the central Pacific, but it’s been on the books for about 12 years now.
On the northern side of Highway 1, the slightly larger town of Grecia is the center for the farming communities on the western slopes of the Cordillera Central. Grecia is the gateway to the furniture-making town of Sarchí and the string of small traditional towns, each sporting an unusual 19thcentury church that extends up the mountain to Zarcero. West of Grecia is Palmares, site of annual festivals every January and February that draw thousands of people, mostly young, for outdoor concerts, horse events, and fireworks.
Expats from many countries live in the hills, valleys, and towns between San Ramón and Alajuela, but you’d never know it; unlike in the beach towns or Escazú, extranjeros around here blend in with the local population. If you’re in these parts and looking for company, your best bets for finding compatriots are the local cafés. In Atenas, try Kay’s Gringo Postres (i.e. desserts), Alida, home of the best pizza in the area, or La Trilla, our favorite restaurante tipico.
We have a special fondness for Atenas. It’s small, it’s friendly, and according to National Geographic magazine, Atenas has “the best climate in the world,” never cold and never very hot with afternoon rain in the rainy season and sunny days the rest of the year. It says so on the side of every Atenas bus, and everyone in Costa Rica seems to know it. Besides, we live here. You can check us out on VRBO (# 117923).
Photo © Kelly McGinley
Atenas
Keyword: Relax/Get Away
Photo © Alison Tinsley
Contact Information:
506-2446-4244 (voice); 506-2446-7582 (fax)
infohcs@hotelcolinasdelsol.com
www.hotelcolinasdelsol.com
Essentials:
8 Rooms
English, Spanish, German, French
All major credit cards accepted
Secure parking
Swimming pool
Restaurant, Bar
Room Amenities: Ceiling fan, Kitchenette with refrigerator, Cooktop,
Coffee maker, Toaster, and Kitchen gear
How to get here:
Coming from the San José area on Highway 3, turn left into Atenas at
the Farmacia and drive six blocks to the corner in front of the school.
Turn left for one block, then right for one block, then left. Follow this
road 600 meters; Colinas de Sol will be on your left.
Sunny Colinas del Sol is about a mile east of the center of Atenas on the back road down to Rio Grande, the road that will one day connect Atenas to the long-promised new, fast highway from San José to the central Pacific coast. If you’ve been price shopping around the Central Valley, then Jürgen’s room rates at Colinas will seem like a real find. Where else this centrally located can you find a nice room with its own kitchenette plus a nice pool and gardens for so few colones? It’s no surprise that most of the guests here come back year after year, or that some change their travel plans the day they arrive. One couple booked at Colinas for a week and ended up staying for almost three months!
The four duplex cabins at Colinas del Sol stair-step down the hill in front of the pool with dense plantings in between for privacy. The rooms aren’t fancy, but are large and well-furnished and have half-cathedral ceilings so they stay cool. Each has a full-wall picture window looking out into the garden and its own porch with table, chairs, and hammock. Best of all, every room has a well-equipped kitchenette with all the tools you need for basic cooking. Not up for kitchen work on vacation? The restaurant at Colinas serves all three meals in an open-air dining area looking out over the Rio Grande valley. The food is simple but wholesome and the ambience is great.
It’s a quick walk or quicker cab ride into central Atenas, with its markets, tipico restaurants, and local color. Busses leave downtown Atenas hourly for Alajuela or San José; the fare is about one dollar. You can catch the San José to Jacó bus at the stop across from the Farmacia to get to the beach. You can also arrange for tours with a multi-lingual guide to almost anywhere from Colinas del Sol. Actually, Colinas del Sol is a great place to just park yourself for your time in Costa Rica. Atenas is smack-dab in the center of the country and relatively easy to access from almost everywhere. English-speaking taxi drivers can also take you anywhere in the country; we recommend Walter Taxi Tours at 873-4266.
Jürgen has built several houses on the six-hectare Colinas del Sol property which he manages as rentals for their owners when they’re away. It’s an ideal situation. Your own Costa Rican retreat, but when you’re ready to go home you just lock-and-leave. Watch out – Atenas is just about a perfect place to live. Let your guard down for even a minute and Jürgen is likely to be building your house in Costa Rica next.
Update (February, 2008): Jürgen has built a new 2-story building with nine new rooms, doubling Colinas del Sol's capacity. The gardens are still blooming, the pool's still beautiful, and the price is still one of Costa Rica's best deals.
Atenas
Keyword: Downtown
Photo © Alison Tinsley
Contact Information:Essentials:
8 Rooms, 2 Suites with kitchenettes, One 2-BR apartment
English, Spanish
All major credit cards accepted
Secure parking
Swimming pool, Massage pavilion
Breakfast included, Dinner can be arranged
Room Amenities: Ceiling fan, Guest kitchen (by pool; shared), Private
outdoor space (Garden rooms, Suites, Apartment)
How to get here:
Coming from the San José area on Highway 3, turn left into Atenas at
the Farmacia and drive four blocks to the corner behind the church.
Turn left and drive three blocks. Ana’s Place is behind the gate on
your right.
It’s Sunday morning and we’re enjoying a lazy brunch of eggs benedict in Ana’s garden surrounded by conversations in soft Canadian English and occasional squawks from the three resident macaws. Ana’s is only three blocks from the central plaza in Atenas, but Atenas is small enough and Ana’s old family property is big enough that the feeling in the garden is of a stately country inn. Sunday bunch at Ana’s is a good time to meet people; we know North American ex-pats who come here every week for a Sunday-morning get-together. For us, it’s a special-occasion place where we take friends visiting from the U.S.
Ana’s Place is the closest lodging to central Atenas and also the oldest; it’s been here almost 20 years. Ana started with four colorful rooms in her house, then added two duplex cabins in the garden, and finally the two-story house with two suites downstairs and a two-bedroom apartment with a wonderful balcony upstairs. Ana’s place is very popular for long-term stays. Many of her guests come for several weeks and one couple rented her apartment for two years. Atenas is a good central location for tours north and east to the farming and craft towns and the volcanoes, or west to the central Pacific beaches. But we also see guests from Ana’s at the town market or walking the back roads around Atenas with their birding binoculars. Whenever we’re there, we see plenty of folks just relaxing in the garden, talking to the macaws or reading their books.
Our favorite room in Ana’s main house is Quetzal, which overlooks the garden and is somewhat quieter than the rooms in the front of the house. Colobri and Rohaila, the two smaller main-house rooms, share a bathroom. The Monkey-Jaguar duplex in the garden has lots of privacy and is perfect for families; Jaguar has a queen bed while Monkey has two singles. Each of the rooms has its own theme and color so check the web if you’re partial to vivid or tranquil, elegant or whimsical. All the rooms share a well-equipped guest kitchen in the garden’s central rancho by the pool.
If you’re planning a longer stay and want to be able to cook, the suites have kitchenettes and the apartment has a full kitchen. There are plenty of places to get groceries within a short walk, and you’ll be only two blocks from the fabulous Atenas Friday market where every kind of fresh fruit and vegetable as well as some meats and prepared foods are on offer. So move in. Ana’s Place can be home.
Update (August, 2008): We hear that Ana's is now only taking long-term rental guests.
Santa Eulalia
Keyword: Relax/Get Away
Photo © El Cafetal
Contact Information:Essentials:
14 Rooms, 1 Casita
English, Spanish
All major credit cards accepted
Secure parking
Swimming pool, Massage pavilion
Breakfast included, Restaurant, Bar
Room Amenities: Ceiling fan
How to get here:
Coming from the San José area, take the Grecia exit off Highway 1
just before the Rio Colorado bridge. Take the first left off the Grecia
road and follow this narrow paved road under the Highway 1 bridge,
down to the river, across the one-lane bridge, and back up the other
side. Turn left over the next bridge, after the “Y Griega” bar. El
Cafetal is at the top of the next hill on your right.
A cafetal is a coffee field and you’re surrounded by them in Santa Eulalia among the narrow ridges and deep canyons of the Rio Grande and its many tributaries. We didn’t know what a coffee plant looked like when we arrived here on the third day of our first trip to Costa Rica. We’d been cooped up near Escazú, fighting the traffic and having some real second thoughts about our choice of vacation spots. When we got off the Interamericana (Highway 1) and dropped down into the Rio Colorado canyon, we thought, “this is more like it!” Then we walked through El Cafetal’s high front entryway and saw the sweeping view from the back garden. We knew that we’d arrived. This was the real Costa Rica, what we’d come all this way to see.
El Cafetal sits high on a ridge over one of the little rivers feeding the Rio Grande, looking over the cafetals and citrus and mango plantations that patchwork the hills and valleys of Santa Eulalia. There is coffee growing on the property – you’ll be served the Inn’s own “La Negrita” brand of dark roast – as well as oranges, bananas, and avocados. Trails wander through the plantings down to the river. We followed one our first morning and wandered a mile or so up the river itself, splashing through the shallow rapids in our hiking sandals. Howler monkeys had greeted the dawn. We'd seen a toucan. We'd swung in the hammocks under the arbor of brilliant magenta bougainvilleas. The perpetually-snarled traffic in Escazú was a distant memory.
Since our first visit, El Cafetal has added an open-air restaurant,
Rincon Llanero, and four bungalows down by the clover-leaf pool.
The new rooms are larger and a bit fancier, but our favorites are still
the corner rooms in the main house with their floor-to-ceiling half-cylinder
windows looking out over the valley, private balconies and
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Breakfast at El Cafetal is a feast with fresh juices from the property’s fruit trees and an interesting variety of vegetable dishes in addition to the usual Costa Rican fare. The breakfast tables are each on their own little terraces in the garden, so you have your meal in the dappled sunshine surrounded by the morning birds. We left El Cafetal for the Pacific utterly refreshed and very happy with our decision to come to Costa Rica. Best of all, Alison had a fabulous massage from El Cafetal’s local masseuse, Norma Bolaños, who we still call whenever we’re feeling creaky. Let them know when you’re coming to El Cafetal, and they’ll arrange an hour of bliss with Norma in the garden. Don’t hit the road again without it.
Grecia - Rincon de Salas
Keyword: Kid-friendly
Photo © Alison Tinsley
Contact Information:Essentials:
4 Rooms, 2 Suites, 1 Cabin, 2 Houses
English, Spanish, German
All major credit cards accepted
Secure parking
Swimming pool
Breakfast included, Dinner can be arranged
Room Amenities: Ceiling fan, Refrigerator (by pool; shared), Full
kitchen (Suites and Houses)
How to get here:
From Juan Santamaria Airport, get on Highway 1 going west away
from San José. About 15 minutes from the airport, exit towards
Grecia; the exit is just before the deep Colorado River canyon.
Continue about two km; across from the factory turn right. If you see
the San Cipriano church, you’ve gone too far. Follow this road three
km then turn right following a sign to Posada Mimosa. The driveway
is on your left. Ring the bell at the painted gate.
The first time we drove up to Posada Mimosa, we were a bit concerned. We’d been on the road all afternoon from Arenal, it was getting late, and there were big “Perro Bravo” (aggressive dog) signs on the first gate down by the road and again by the brightly-painted main gate up the arbor-shaded driveway. We rang the bell, the gate opened, and we proceeded cautiously. Then we saw them: Hansi, Suzy, Fritzi, and Max, tails all wagging – the Dachshund welcoming committee. They escorted us to the office, showed us to our room, and then guided us down to the pool where our host, Martin, was waiting with a bottle of wine and – how nice! – three glasses. We talked about living in Costa Rica, watched a fine sunset, and even saw some toucans. It was our first trip down from the States, and we were really liking this country.
Everyone in Costa Rica has a story, and Martin and Tessa tell theirs in Potholes to Paradise, Tessa’s book about moving to Costa Rica and building Posada Mimosa. The area around Grecia is still traditional central valley – small towns, twisting roads, acre upon acre of coffee or sugarcane, hardy cattle grazing slopes too steep to plant. Except for the furniture town of Sarchí, it’s not very touristy, and you have to learn Spanish and get along with the locals. A sense of humor helps. We learned something about Martin’s the next morning when he showed us his exercise trail with an array of weight-lifting machines constructed of ropes, strong sticks, wire baskets of rocks, and convenient overhanging tree limbs. Local ingredients and ingenuity: the basic tools of pioneers everywhere.
Posada Mimosa spreads out down a broad hill, the main house with its brilliant gardens at the top, the pool in the middle, and guest cabins and a few private homes below. We stayed in the main house in one of the three rooms on the deep south-facing verandah. What a place to just sit in your rocker, watch the hummingbirds, and smell the flowers! The rooms have windows and doors on both sides, antique furniture, and black-and-white family pictures on the walls. Grandma’s house in the tropics. Walk down to the pool and the scene changes; you’re looking out at the mountains south and west of Escazú across the valley. Martin will point out the “sleeping lady,” with her ridge of wavy hair stretching out to the east. The guest cabins on the slope below have kitchens and anywhere from one to three bedrooms and often rent by the month. Our favorite is the “small cabin” with its great mountain view, private deck, and “paintings” made from dried Owl and Morpho butterflies by Richard Whitten, the tireless insect collector and conservationist whose Jewels of the Rainforest museum awaits you up in Monteverde.
Be prepared to be enchanted. Posada Mimosa is where we decided to get serious and make another trip to Costa Rica to look for real estate.
Rosario
Keywords: Honeymoons, Hiking, Horseback riding
Photo © Vista del Valle
Contact Information:Essentials:
10 Cabins, 6 Condos, 2 Houses
English, Spanish
All major credit cards accepted
Secure parking
Swimming pool, River access
Breakfast included, Restaurant (with room service), Bar
Room Amenities: Ceiling fan, Free WiFi, Private outdoor space. Ilan-Ilan
casita is wheelchair accessible, Mango Manor, Exotic Woods,
and El Nido have kitchenettes, Condos can be rented with or
without full kitchens.
How to get here:
From the San José area, take Highway 1 west toward San Ramón,
then take the first exit after the Rio Colorado bridge. Continue west
about 200 meters along the frontage road, then turn left following
signs to Vista del Valle. The hotel gateway will be on your left in
about one km.
Do you want to be half an hour from the San José airport but feel like you’re really in the country and have luxurious digs and a great restaurant to boot? Vista del Valle, on the other side of the Colorado River only about ten minutes from San Ramón and the road to Arenal, is the place for you. Keep your schedule flexible; you won’t want to stay here just one night.
Vista del Valle hangs over the edge of the Rio Grande canyon within shouting distance of the confluence of the Rio Grande with the Colorado. These are fast rivers off the encircling mountains and there’s some serious white water down there. The canyon and the slopes to the west are part of the more than 3,700 acre Rio Grande Canyon Nature Preserve. You can walk down into the canyon straight from Vista del Valle, but be advised: it’s steep. Especially coming back up.
We visited Vista del Valle in foaling season, and the resident walking-horse herd had just been enriched by frolicsome new colts. Horse tours are a Vista del Valle specialty with the most special being an evening full-moon ride up over the mountains for a late picnic, usually with local riders from the village of Rosario and the countryside around. Hard to beat for traditional festive ambiance.
Vista del Valle offers ten artfully-constructed cabins, two of which are duplexes with shared central kitchens. All are tucked into the garden on the upper slopes above the river and have private decks or porches with great views. Our favorites are the honeymoon cabins, Mona Lisa and Ilan-Ilan, which are more secluded than the others and have spectacular views. In addition to the cabins, Vista del Valle manages six contemporary-styled duplex condos with separate living room and kitchen buildings. You can rent one or both bedrooms, with or without the living room and kitchen. If even the condos aren’t large enough for your taste and budget, there are two houses for rent when their owners aren’t there.
We shared lunch in Vista del Valle’s spacious new open-air restaurant which overhangs the canyon for a lovely view to the west, with Johanna who built this place with her husband Mike. Like many of the better hotels in Costa Rica, Vista del Valle is not just a lodging; it’s a social and environmental project. The 25 hectare property itself is mostly forest reserve contiguous with the Rio Grande Preserve. Most of the staff is from Rosario and many have learned their trades here. Mike is a former Peace Corps volunteer and trainer, and he and Johanna have food and micro-credit projects in neighboring Nicaragua. So when you’re staying here, you’re contributing to many people’s lives, as well as to the local environment. Sustainability at its best.
Update (April, 2009): Mike and Johanna are working with their Rosario neighbors to develop organic growing systems that can be managed by families or small cooperatives. Production from the model greenhouse and adjacent open-air fields is served in Vista del Valle's restaurant. For a sample, catch the jazz lunch every Sunday, featuring musicians from Grecia and other nearby towns.
Set in a high valley on the north slope of Póas volcano, El Silencio is Costa Rica's newest ultra-luxury ecolodge. The atmosphere is that of a retreat center designed for gentle contemplation. Well-groomed trails wander into the cloud forest, past the spa and the organic gardens, then turn to follow the clear-flowing Gorrión river. Magnificent waterfalls await you at the end of the trail. Someone has carefully constructed a medicine wheel of water-polished stones at the base of the highest waterfall, La Promesa, which pours over a cliff face at least 200 feet high.
El Silencio is a sister property of Punta Islita on the central Nicoya coast, and is managed with the same strict attention to priciples of sustainability. The 16 exquisitely-appointed casitas support a 500-acre private reserve. Most of the staff are from the neighboring town of Bajos del Toro. The lodge's gardens produce much of the food that is served; the rest comes from local organic suppliers. There are no televisions. After just a few minutes here, you can feel yourself walking a bit more softly.
El Silencio will be less than an hour north of Sarchí once the earthquake-damaged road is repaired; the best route now is through Zarcero, following signs to Palmira and Bajos del Toro. The route winds through high valleys of rich farmland before entering Juan Castro Blanco National Park, an undeveloped cloud-forest wilderness. Ten minutes north of Bajos del Toro, stop by the amazing Catarata del Toro, at 400 feet one of Costa Rica's highest.
Reviewed April 7, 2009