The Tico Times recently posted a survey asking readers for their favorite vacation destination in Costa Rica. Keep in mind this is “vacation spot” which is not necessarily the same as “best place to live” in Costa Rica. Here are the results when I last checked the website:
25% Central Pacific – which includes Jaco and Manuel Antonio
24% Guanacaste Beaches (northwest Pacific coast)
14% Osa Peninsula (southwest Pacific coast – more remote)
12% Arenal
11% Caribbean coast (including Puerto Viejo and Tortuguero)
10% Nicoya Peninsula
3% Monteverde (Cloud Forest)
For those wishing to view the spectacular and varying landscapes from a higher vantage point, a number of airlines offer private charters over the region. Each of the following reputable companies include the latest aircraft maintained to the highest safety standards with pilots who have logged in more flight hours than the busiest commercial pilots.
Nature Air
Nature Air, the country’s largest private charter company, also includes the only twin-engine aircraft fleet in Costa Rica. In addition, it is also the world’s first carbon-neutral airline dedicated toward a sustainable environment. It offers 74 daily charter flights on three types of aircraft: the DeHavilland DHC-6 Twin Otter Series 300 with a maximum seating of 19 passengers, the seven-passenger Beechcraft King Air E90, and the Cessna 208-B Grand Caravan, which can accommodate up to 12 passengers. The destinations include all of the major tourist areas from Arenal to Tortuguero as well as flights to Managua in Nicaragua, and Bocas del Toro in Panama. In regard to safety, the company is the only certified Part 121 airlines in the country, which is the highest certification level for both commercial and charter flights. The company also operates its own aviation-training school where each pilot is trained to these high aviation standards. The private charter rates vary by the type of aircraft, number of passengers, and final destination.
Macaw Air
Macaw Air, based at the Liberia International Airport in northwest Costa Rica, has offered private charter flights for sightseeing over a number of major destinations since 2004. It includes a single-engine Cessna 206 that seats up to five passengers with a cruising range of up to approximately 700 miles. The flights depart from either Liberia or Tamarindo to a variety of destinations such as Tortuguero, Arenal, Drake Bay, and the beautiful Quepos region on the Pacific Coast. It also includes flights to Bocas del Toro and Panama City in Panama, and the beautiful colonial city of Granada in Nicaragua. Rates vary by the overall length of the flight, the number of passengers, and the amount of luggage.
Aerotec Costa Rica Airplane Charters
Aerotec Costa Rica Airplane Charters provides both business and private charters to 34 different public and private airports throughout the country. Its large fleet of aircraft range from single-engine Cessnas that seat up to five passengers to the latest 12-passenger turboprops. The company also maintains a business partnership with several jet charter operators, which offers flights on additional aircraft such as a four-passenger Cessna Citation and a 15-passenger Global Express. Through this network, flights can be arranged to any destination in North and South America. Each of the aircraft are regularly maintained to the highest FAA safety standards at the employee-owned COOPESA company located just outside of San José.
HeliJet
HeliJet offers a variety of charter flights for everything from business touring, private sightseeing, and aerial photography. Its fleet of four, single- and twin-engine aircraft include a Cessna Caravan, Piper Seneca, Cessna 206, and a King Air E90. The climate-controlled aircraft includes seating for up to 12 passengers and travels anywhere in Costa Rica. The company was established by Juan Carlos Arguedas, who was a former commerical pilot for TACA Airlines, and each pilot is FAA licensed and trained to the highest international safety standards. The rates vary by the type of aircraft, number of passengers, length of the flight, and the amount of luggage.
These four, air charter companies provide a wide variety of destinations for your next trip to the exciting and beautiful country of Costa Rica. With some of the highest safety standards in the region, all you have to do is sit back, enjoy the view in the climate-controlled cabin, and see why the country is the top tourist destination in Central America.
I’m floating in a natural hot spring under a black velvet sky sparkling with a million sundry stars. I’m savoring the luxurious feeling of the rich revitalizing minerals as they wash over me, relaxing and invigorating my mind, body and soul.
I can feel the occasional deep earthly vibration from Arenal Volcano’s rumbly tummy. I think to myself, “Is this real? This is perfect. This is living.”
The next morning I step outside onto the terrace to enjoy my morning cup of Costa Rican coffee while wild blue morpho butterflies float and flutter about the garden. Iridescent hummingbirds buzz around an array of exquisite flowers.
As I enjoy a delicious plate of fresh cut papaya, pineapple, and mango, I can hear monkeys playing in the nearby trees. I look up to see baby howler monkeys swinging from branch to branch in a lively game of chase while their parents watch from close by.
It’s time for me to return to my home in the city. As I drive back to the Central Valley, I promise to return to Arenal’s hot springs soon…but not too soon. First, I need to continue my goal of visiting new places in Costa Rica every other weekend.
Costa Rica is the land of biodiversity and microclimates and it’s possible to drive 15 minutes in any direction and experience completely different climates and landscapes. White-sand beaches, black-sand beaches, deserts, volcanoes, national parks, rivers, waterfalls, jungles…it has everything.
Even in the Central Valley, the most populated part of the country, you are never too far away from secluded nature. It’s easy to find yourself surrounded by lush green jungle, a kaleidoscope of flowers, and a menagerie of animals. You can have this in your backyard if you wish. For me, this is a huge part of the magic of Costa Rica and the main reason I chose to live and work here.
A second factor in choosing Costa Rica as my international home was the proximity to the United States, my previous home. Trips back to the southeast to see friends and family are easy, short, and relatively inexpensive.
In order to live in Costa Rica and afford this type of lifestyle, I teach English at a local university, 30 hours per week. I have no prior experience teaching English, but had no problems finding a job here in Costa Rica. I even found a company here who were willing to sponsor my English-teaching certification.
Most companies require certification to teach English in Costa Rica and some will even offer a work visa.
The average monthly salary for an English teacher in Costa Rica is $1,000. This doesn’t sound like much compared to a normal wage in the States, but it is 2.5 times the normal Costa Rican salary of $400 per month. For $1,000 a month, I get a nice place to live, groceries, transportation money, and a budget for frequent trips to the beach, hot springs, or other areas of the country.
For my next trip, I’m planning on going to the Osa Peninsula to explore Corcovado National Park and to swim with the dolphins.
A recently discovered species of crab is one of the weirdest farmers you will ever meet. Kiwa puravida, a species of “Yeti crab,” lives near undersea methane vents and cultivates bacteria on its hairy arms and then eats it.
Andrew Thurber, a marine ecologist with Oregon State University, first discovered the crabs near Costa Rica in 2006. He and his colleagues’ research appeared recently in the journal PLoS One, in an article entitled “Dancing for Food in the Deep Sea: Bacterial Farming by a New Species of Yeti Crab.”
Nature reports that Thurber initially set out to research undersea methane and hydrogen sulfide seeps, and encountered the crabs waving their claws over the vents. The Yeti crabs, named for their unusual white arm covering, have claws that are covered in a bacteria that “derive energy from the inorganic gases of the seeps.” The crabs then use their “comb-like mouthparts” to eat the bacteria from their claws.
Thurber said in a press release, “We watched the crabs wave their claws back and forth in fluid from a methane seep, and rather than trying to capture bacteria, it appeared that they were providing food to the bacteria already growing on their claws.” He added, “There isn’t sufficient food that deep that is derived from the sun’s energy, so vent and seep animals harness chemical energy released from the seafloor.”
Scientific American reports Kiwa puravida is the second named species of Yeti crab after Kiwa hirsuta, which was discovered in 2005 near Easter Island.
Below, check out a video of the Yeti crabs in action.
SAN JOSE, Costa Rica — After Costa Rica’s Turrialba volcano awoke last year from more than a century of sleep, Jorge Andres Diaz reckoned it was a fine time for a picnic on the slopes of the 11,000-foot gas-spewing mountain.
His wife, Ana Gabriela Chaverri, thought the idea was a bit mad — but, then again, Diaz always likes to get what seems a little too close to the hot mouth of active volcanoes.
“In situ” volcano measurement — a hairy endeavor that involves sampling gases and particles right as they shoot out of a crater — is a life study for the Costa Rican physicist. The closer he gets to the volcano, he believes, the closer he comes to the data that can ultimately predict eruptions.
Material emitted from volcanoes hints at what’s going on down below, says Diaz. If hot magma is stirring underground, he says, that changes the composition of gas and ash flowing up above. Better understanding of the makeup of those signals would perfect prediction capabilities, helping authorities warn nearby residents when to evacuate and airlines when to reroute their planes.
Diaz’s wife may take solace in his latest strategy.
He has begun sending small, unmanned aircraft to hover over Turrialba, keeping him at a safer distance from the volcano, still fuming since its ash eruption in January last year.
The Vector Wing 100, Diaz’s 8-foot-by-5-foot aircraft, is a high-density foam wing that contains an advanced computer system that can be programmed to cruise the volcano, snap photos, take video in color or infrared, and collect data on the composition of the volcanic plume.
Coupling the in situ data collected by the Vector with analysis made by remote sensors and satellites in space, Diaz aims to map out a clearer picture of plume activity and composition. The study could greatly improve the way scientists predict which way volcano plumes will move, potentially saving lives and money.
In April 2010, the menacing cloud that spread from Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull Volcano grounded some 100,000 flights across Europe. Airlines said that they lost over 1.3 billion euros (then $1.7 billion), according to The Economist.
“The Icelandic eruption demonstrated the lack of validation that they have on satellite information,” said Diaz, who believes that some of the flight cancellations might have been avoided with the right technology in place.
“The images showed part of the volcanic plume, but they were worried about what they could not see. What is the concentration of that plume? At what point does it fall below the detection limit of the instrument? The only way to know is by in situ measurement,” he added.
Diaz’s seeming obsession with on-the-ground data has roots in breakthrough research he conducted in 1998 at Kilauea, Hawaii.
It was common practice for investigators to bottle up gas samples and take them back to a laboratory to be examined, but ferrying samples around provided incomplete results, Diaz explains.
Helium, which could be a key indicator for predicting eruptions, is so light that it slips through the container seal before reaching the lab.
Diaz’s stroke of genius: bring the lab to the volcano.
He took the concept of the mass spectrometer — an instrument that measures the composition of samples and weighs up to 100 kg — and built a miniature, portable version. Bringing it to Hawaii’s Kilauea Volcano to sample chemicals at the site, Diaz wowed volcanologists, won awards and even caught NASA’s eye.
After earning his PhD from the University of Minnesota, he took on post-doctoral work in 2000 with the Kennedy Space Center, using the device and his plume-savvy to detect hazardous gases at a spaceship launch site.
“There were very few ‘post-docs’ at NASA from this area of the world,” he said proudly during a recent interview at his lab at the University of Costa Rica.
Diaz was determined to bring his fine-tuned knowledge back to Costa Rica, home of hundreds of volcanoes, about a half-dozen of which are active.
He began studying his country’s volcanoes from above, first on the NASA WB-57 that flew about 12,000 feet over the mountain, and later on a smaller aircraft known as a Cessna that came within 5,000 feet.
But Diaz wanted to get closer.
When Turrialba erupted last year, dozens of nearby residents were evacuated.
Diaz put on a protective mask and went along with a team of researchers, including a NASA investigator, to monitor the activity near its vent.
“It was very dangerous, you could see the ground shaking,” Diaz said. “It’s like a jet engine, in terms of the noise you hear, and it’s just degassing from the magma. And you say, if that’s the amount of gas coming out, imagine how much magma is below that.”
“He’s very brave,” David Pieri, investigator of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said of his Costa Rican volcano research partner. “It comes with the territory of being a volcanologist. You want to get the data, and it’s always a calculated risk.”
At that point, Diaz knew the risk had grown very high. He wanted to continue to monitor the volcano but without having to set foot so close to a potentially damaging ash eruption, or worse. Pilots refused to fly him near the plumes, afraid of crossing through particles that could wreck their aircraft engines.
Diaz needed smaller, inexpensive aircraft — and a way to cut out the pilot.
He unveiled his robotic VW-100 in October and put the video of its test flight to the Top Gun theme “Danger Zone”:
The university purchased the UAV from Maryland Aerospace for $40,000. Now Diaz is working on a new model that would slash the price to $2,000.
That’s probably a good thing. Diaz has crashed his plane 20 times already, so destroying the current model would put a serious dent in his research budget.
At the very least, perhaps there’s some reassurance in knowing that no men will have been harmed during the study of that volcano.
Costa Rica is fulfilling its commitment to be friendly to the environment! Anyone who has visited the Central Valley knows how strong the wind can be and now Costa Rica has decided to harness that wind and turn it into energy.
Workers are constructing the first wind farm in the country’s Central Valley near Santa Ana, just south of San Jose. The project is expected to become operational in August 2012, according to CNFL, a subsidiary of ICE, and will produce enough electricity to power about 6,000 residences.
Meanwhile, Blue Power & Energy has signed a US$80 million financing agreement with Banco Internacional de Costa Rica (Bicsa) for completion of a wind energy project in Nicaragua. The farm will be able to generate 39.6 MW of clean energy, providing annual savings of $22 million, said Energy Minister Emilio Rapaccioli.
Passengers on American Airlines flight to Miami, Florida were the first to open the brand new Daniel Oduber airport facilities, at 6:50 am on Thursday, a new gate to access the country and enjoy your travel vacations.
The tourists were quite surprised because they did enter the country by the old terminal and exited via the new one.
The shops at the airport are operating regularly, as well as immigration services. “Coriport S.A. is working with government organizations to ensure that the new terminal meets all technical and contractual requirements” according to Francisco Cordero, general manager of Coriport S.A.
The first airplane that landed at the terminal was a Nature Air local plane at 07:00 coming from Pavas Airport in San Jose.
The new terminal investment was around $ 35 million. The terminal is managed by Coriport consortium, in concession for 25 years. It is a new way to get to this beautiful country, ready to be included in your vacation package deals.
According to Costa Rican Tourism Board 225,224 passengers arrived at Liberia’s airport on 2010. Back in November 2011, only eight international and two domestic airlines operated out of the previous terminal, which accommodated only about 900 passengers at the same time.
Guanacaste and especially Liberia have become the most visited places in Costa Rica for celebrities and millionaires. The beaches and the costa rica vacation house rental are amazing to have a great time in this piece of paradise.
Madam President, Laura Chinchilla was the main public character at this historical launch event this Thursday, next to many government and tourism representatives.
A statue of the Beatles star sits in a plaza in San Jose, reports the Tico Times. Designed by Cuban sculptor Jose Ramón Villa, the statue is titled “Imagine all the people living life in peace.” It was unveiled on Friday.
“It’s been said a million times that a city without culture doesn’t have a soul,” said San Jose Mayor Johnny Araya. “We’re working to attract tourists to more than volcanoes and beaches but also to our capital. Now people can come here to have their photo taken with John Lennon whose message of peace identifies with our country.”
Some people questioned why Costa Rica should build a statue that didn’t replicate a Costa Rican and that wasn’t designed by a local artist.
But that didn’t stop hundreds of Ticos and tourists from climbing all over the statue this weekend, reports the Tico Times, as their parents smiled and flashed peace signs.
Costa Rica-based Undersea Hunter Group, one of the world’s preeminent adventure dive operators, is supplying its DeepSee submersible and her mothership Argo for the voyage, making two dives a day to depths of up to 1,800 feet. The subs will allow OWOO to provide its audiences with an unprecedented look into the biodiversity of Cocos Island.
Following a 36-hour trip from San Jose, Costa Rica to Cocos Island, the OWOO team successfully completed three days of diving. They are joined by filmmaker Howard Hall and ichthyologist Dr. Richard Pyle aka the “fish expert.”
Shaun MacGillivray, producer at MacGillivray Freeman Films and managing director of One World One Ocean, provided insight into the beauty of Cocos Island and the first day of diving at the Everest wall, a unique seamount teeming with marine life.
“Cocos Island feels and looks like the setting of Jurassic Park. Uninhabitable. Prehistoric. Natural. Lush. While the island itself is beautiful, its underwater world is even more stunning,” said MacGillivray. “As filmmakers, we’ve been amazed at the process of launching a sub, which is a mammoth structure weighing more than 15,000 pounds. It’s definitely given us a whole new appreciation for scientists who do this on a routine basis.”
Beyond the idealized capsule of the resorts, there lies a whole other side of Costa Rica as filmmaker Todd Bieber discovered when he and his girlfriend visited the Nosara Wildlife Rescue, a side not dressed up by the tourist industry but where those devoted to wildlife do their part to rescue animal victims of modernity.
Many of the monkeys in Bieber’s short film, Encounters with Orphan Monkeys, are left to fend for themselves when their mothers mistake the many uninsulated power lines in the country for natural features and die. Though many of the babies can’t be saved, they do what they can for those who survive.
hours than the busiest commercial pilots.
