Sarapiquí
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Sarapiquí

Sarapiquí

Rainforest lowlands on a working river, with the best-value wildlife in the country

Puerto Viejo de Sarapiquí — not to be confused with Puerto Viejo de Talamanca on the Caribbean coast — sits where the Sarapiquí and Puerto Viejo rivers meet in the northern lowlands. It was a banana port and the head of river navigation to the Caribbean before the roads came, and it has the slightly left-behind feel of a place that used to matter more.

For visitors it is one of the cheapest places in Costa Rica to see a lot of wildlife. The rivers are run for gentle rafting and for wildlife floats — caiman, sloths, river otters, and birds in quantity — and the private reserves nearby are serious: La Selva, run by the Organization for Tropical Studies, is one of the most-studied patches of lowland rainforest anywhere and takes day visitors with a guide.

It is about ninety minutes from San José over the Braulio Carrillo road, which is itself one of the more dramatic drives in the country.

Guide

Activities

The Sarapiquí is the beginner's whitewater river: a class II–III section that families run, and a class IV stretch below it when the water is up. The banks are forest the whole way, which is the difference from most rafting.

The other trips here are gentler — wildlife floats for caiman, sloths and birds, and the private reserves like La Selva, which takes day visitors with a guide.