Barrio Escalante has transformed over the past decade into the centre of San José's restaurant and creative scene. The neighbourhood's residential streets, lined with medium-sized houses and old trees, now host an implausible concentration of good restaurants, cocktail bars, specialty coffee shops, and boutiques per square kilometre. Calle 33 — locally called Paseo Gastronómico La Luz — is the main strip, but the side streets offer equally good options with fewer crowds.
The scene here is local and cosmopolitan in equal measure: Costa Ricans who want somewhere better than the chains, expats who require decent espresso, and a creative class that appreciates the scale of the neighbourhood. The streets are walkable in the evenings, and the density of options makes it easy to drift from dinner to drinks to dessert without planning.