Tortuguero

As you probably know by now, I'm a budget traveler.  Not a shoestring budget traveler, but a budget traveler nonetheless.  Most of my research goes into finding the most economical way to do things, without sacrificing too much comfort.  For Costa Rica, I wanted to keep my total trip budget to less than $1000CAD, not including flights.  While this sounds like a healthy budget, in a country that uses the American dollar extensively, it doesn't go THAT far.  Nevertheless I'm pretty confident I managed to stay within that budget.

The town of Tortuguero from the river.  Tortuguero is a thin strip of land sandwiched by the river on one side and the Carribean sea on the other.

Tortuguero was our 2nd destination.  To get there, I booked a tour package from a highly recommended local guide.  I priced out transportation and tours independently, and found that the package ended up being a bit cheaper.  Looking back, it was 110% worth it to book the package, as he took care of all of our transfers.  It was also convenient to have a local contact.

Rivers are brown with sediment

To get to Tortuguero, we needed to cross half the country to get to the Carribean coast.  We took a shared shuttle, then a boat.

View from the hammock on the front steps!

In Tortuguero we stayed at an oceanfront hotel owned by a Korean lady who lived in Spain for 30 years.  While her English wasn't great we had a good time chatting with her.  I think she was intrigued by us Canadians.  She may have tried to set us up with her son ;)  [although he's only 24... but speaks 5 languages!]

The baby turtles got confused and ran away from the water

We helped round them up and release them back into the ocean!

We went on a night turtle tour and saw a green turtle laying eggs!  Since it was the end of turtle season, there were about 60 people rotating in and out to see this turtle lay eggs.  Apparently it was the only turtle on the beach that night.  I was impressed by the crowd control and restraint that the guides have.  It was fairly orderly and no one was allowed to harass the turtle.

Blurry nighttime pic.  I wish I took a video.  Sloths really do move in slo-mo!

Also went on a canoe and a jungle tour.  Our guide Victor was amazing at spotting animals!  Definitely worth hiring a guide.  We saw 3 types of monkeys (spider monkeys, howler monkeys, and capuchin monkeys), sloths, frogs, snakes (ew!), lizards, and a caiman.

Jungle!  I almost expected to see a dinosaur!

My favourite part of Tortuguero was the beaches.  Endless sandy beaches and warm ocean water.  As you know, I love being in the ocean.  There's something so awesome about floating in salt water (I sink horribly in fresh water).  The weather was HOT while we were there.  The internet said around 41 degrees including humidity!!!  While the ocean water was very warm, it was at least cooler than the air.

Sunrise at the beach

Tortuguero was my favourite Costa Rican destinaton.  You can probably see why!

Picture perfect paradise!