Six years later, I still can’t believe I said it. There we were, bouncing along a bone-jarring dirt and gravel excuse for a road south of the sleepy Costa Rican surfing town of Tamarindo. We had just crept warily across a ravine navigating planks not much wider than two-by-fours and were slamming up the hill on the other side, dodging potholes and ricocheting off rocks, when a large, well-kept house surrounded by a hedge of flaming-red bougainvillea suddenly appeared. Amazed, I shouted above the roar of the engine, “Who would be crazy enough to live out here?”
Soon I would have my answer. The weather was perfect—low 80s, light breeze, only a few puffy clouds in the sky—and I finally stopped concentrating on the road and began to pay attention to our surroundings. Long sweeps of tawny gold dry pastureland, a kind of Central American savanna studded with dark green canopies of elephant’s ear trees, stretched off toward the mountains jutting up from the horizon. Soon the trees grew denser and closed in on the road. Tantalizing flashes of sparkling blue ocean appeared and disappeared through the low woodland, the dusty green foliage regularly punctuated by cascades of brilliant blossoms in yellow or orange or coral, like swarms of miniature butterflies.
This is ranching country, and periodically we had to stop for horse-riding Ticos (as Costa Ricans are called) driving small herds of gaunt white cattle. The beasts failed to see the importance of moving aside for us, and the cowboys simply smiled, waved, and called out “Pura vida,” the all-purpose Tico greeting. Their attitude was contagious, and before long these annoying roadblocks had become pleasurable exchanges. Then we got to the tiny town of Paraíso and discovered that the “gas station” we had been told about was really a kind of convenience store. Yes, you could buy gasoline from the large barrels stored out back, and you could pour it through a funnel into your gas tank—but not until the owner came back from lunch. By now we were bemused rather than irritated. Where were we really going, anyway?
Good question. We filled our tank, headed off again—and came to an abrupt dead end at the ocean. Giving in to the spirit of the day, we downshifted and drove right out onto the beach. The tide was low, the beach wide, flat, and hard, and soon we were racing along in the brilliant sunlight, not another human in sight. To our right, long lines of stubby brown pelicans undulated just above the waves; to our left, a pair of hawks plied the currents above the trees. It was what I have now come to recognize as a true Costa Rican moment—giddy in its freedom, at once relaxing and profoundly exhilarating. It was also a triumph of Tico mentality, taking each event as it comes and enjoying it for what it is, not for what you had planned it to be.
I guess this helps explain why, when we returned to Tamarindo that evening, we had, quite unexpectedly, become the new owners of a little plot of land overlooking a fine rock-reef point break in nearby Playa Negra.
This ability to inspire spontaneity (not to mention fiscal irresponsibility) is one of the things I love most about Costa Rica. Another is that there is nothing to do. Or, more precisely, nothing you must do. No museums that you will kick yourself for not wandering through, no boutiques with hyperstylish clothes at bargain prices, no ancient ruins that will enlarge your sense of history, no world-class restaurants to seek out. There is only the countryside and the people. But that, it turns out, is more than enough.
Though only about the size of West Virginia, Costa Rica has an amazing geographical diversity, from rolling plains to sultry tropical rain forests, serene mountains, and active volcanoes. With its modified monsoon climate (there are eight different words for rain in the Tico vocabulary), the country also has an incredible range of flora and fauna—more species of birds than the U.S. and Canada combined, more butterflies than the entire continent of Africa, more plant varieties than all of Europe, including over 1,400 types of orchids.
Decades ago, the government realized that this natural wonderland was a more likely source of income than industrial development would be and has worked hard to preserve it. Despite a scattering of the hideous oceanfront resorts that have spoiled so many tropical paradises, the country’s conservation efforts have been more successful than most.
Even more appealing than Costa Rica’s natural beauty, though, is its collective national mind-set. This, after all, is a country that abolished its army in 1949 so it could devote the money saved to social services and education (today, it has a 95 percent literacy rate). Even the smallest villages have electricity and potable water, and democracy, peace, and stability are primary national values. In spite of some problems (rampant cronyism, an all but impenetrable bureaucracy, lingering poverty) most Ticos have a profound sense of national pride and self-identity: This is their country, not some offshoot of the United States, and they are happy to be here. As a result, you feel almost none of the angry resentment toward the U.S. that pervades much of the region and indeed, these days, much of the world. It’s also an engagingly informal culture in which remaining amiable at all times and making a good impression on strangers are core values.
There is an occasional downside to this national desire to be accommodating. Once, for example, I asked for grilled shrimp in a little seaside restaurant, and the waiter politely wrote down my order and disappeared into the kitchen. Forty-five minutes later, further inquiries revealed that they in fact had no shrimp; the waiter just did not want to be rude by saying so.
This is not the only reason, mind you, that Costa Rica can be a challenge to food lovers. For the first couple of years, we crammed our luggage with the necessities of food-obsessed Americans traveling to the tropics: enormous frozen pork chops and rib-eye steaks, luscious stinky cheeses from France and Spain and Italy needing only a day or two to achieve perfect ripeness, bottles of aggressive red wines and delicate whites carefully swathed in bubble wrap.
But with each visit, the percentage of our bags devoted to such provisions has dwindled as we have adapted to cooking with the abundant local fruits, roots, and seafood. This transformation began the day we came to the aid of two fishermen as they struggled to drag ashore one of the small wooden fishing boats called pangas. They insisted on giving us one of the snappers they had caught; we insisted on buying a second at three times the asking price. An hour later we had a deliriously good supper, the fish grilled over driftwood on the beach, squirted with lime, and accompanied by a spicy papaya salsa.
After that we began to settle into a regular dinnertime routine. In the hot air, after hours at the beach or on the road, what we really wanted was whatever fish was available, simply grilled and accompanied by a classic Costa Rican cabbage salad; the Tico version of rice and beans, known as gallo pinto; perhaps a side of boiled yuca; and a couple of beers. Anything much more than that felt heavy and somehow alien, out of sync with our surroundings.
We were also able to leave behind most of our Euro-American ingredients because of changes in the local restaurant scene. When we first came to the country, restaurants basically fell into two camps. One served typical Costa Rican food, usually the platter called casado (“married man”) because it is what married men are said to have for lunch every day: rice and beans, fried plantains, a thin pork chop or piece of steak, and chopped cabbage. Satisfying, yes, but not what you go out to dinner for.
We preferred this, however, to the second option—white-tablecloth dining rooms specializing in the dreaded “Continental cuisine.” At one expensive restaurant uniformly raved about in guidebooks, for example, the harsh, tinny canned lobster bisque I had as an appetizer reappeared in the next course as the sauce on an overboiled seafood platter. I’m not exaggerating.
But the situation is improving. Within a few miles of our little plot of land, there are now restaurants serving up not only beautifully prepared seafood but also elegant crisp-crusted pizza, imaginative vegetarian dishes, even high-end, high-flavor Italian. Desserts still lag behind, but after dinner you can wander down to the ocean, perch on fishing boats, and watch the moon make tracks on the waves.
As the years have gone by, our foolish notion of buying land in paradise has come to seem more like a moment of enlightenment. We return every year to the same place, and every year we learn more: where the best snorkeling is at what hour of the day, how to intercept the truck that brings fresh shrimp from down south for a local resort, which beach is most favored by the giant sea turtles. Each year, too, it becomes easier to slip into the rhythm of the place.
On the first morning of our most recent trip, I was awakened just after dawn by the cries of the ubiquitous howler monkeys, which sound like particularly noisy humans growling and inhaling at the same time. On the beach, the young Tico fishermen had already taken up their positions on the wave-splashed rocks, ferociously whipping their handlines around their heads, lariat fashion, before shooting them far out into the surf. I padded across the cool sand to the tidal pools in the lava rock outcroppings and watched swarms of tiny fish, a startling bright blue, sketch the water with neon. Ready for coffee, I headed slowly back to our land, where, against all odds, the foundation of a small house is actually in place. As I walked through the gate onto the property I was suddenly engulfed in a cloud of yellow butterflies. At that precise moment I realized that I had switched, without even noticing it, from hora americana to hora tica, in which showing up for an event an hour or two after the specified time is just fine, and a shower of butterflies is plenty of reason to sit down and ponder.
I also realized that I now hope the cursed roads of Costa Rica stay just as they are; they are perhaps the only thing that will keep this country from being overrun by people like me.
Staying there
Tamarindo has plenty of choices, from surfer funky to deluxe. Top of the line is the Swiss-owned Hotel Capitán Suizo(011-506-653-0075; from $125), one of the finest beachfront hotels in all of Costa Rica. Perhaps the best option, though, for those who plan ahead, is to rent one of the town’s private cabins or villas (tamarindo.com). Casa Cook (from $135; 011-506-653-0125), for example, has cabinas on the beach, a pool, and a wonderfully genial host. In Playa Negra, the Hotel Playa Negra (from $55; 011-506-658-8034) is an international surf haven with simple but exquisite circular cabinas; its large open-air restaurant is also the main location for local gatherings. (The pool here, with its deep blue tiles, bougainvillea border, and view of a world-class surf break, is one of the top hangout spots in the entire country.) Farther south, the isolated Hotel Iguanazul (from $70; 011-506-658-8123) is great for anyone in search of peace, sun, good burgers in an open-air restaurant, and spectacular ocean views in a breezy cliffside location. Get one of the air-conditioned rooms.
Eating There
The Lazy Wave Food Co. , currently the best upscale restaurant in Tamarindo, is open for dinner only. South of Tamarindo at Playa Avellanas, Lola’s on the Beach (658-8097) has first-rate smoothies and pizzas (they grow their own basil and tomatoes) in a hip, Euro-minimalist oceanfront spot dedicated to torpid tropical loitering. Reef (658-8289) , on the beach near San José Pinilla, is genuine Tico minimalist—a corrugated roof with a few bare lightbulbs and an open-sided kitchen. But it has the freshest seafood for miles around, beautifully cooked to order. At Mono Congo Lodge (658-8261) , just around the corner on the coast road, the glacial service is compensated for by dishes such as grilled marlin with mango pineapple salsa, fresh-dug carrots, and haricots verts. La Puesta del Sol (658-8442) , in Playa Junquillal, is that extreme rarity, a top-flight Italian restaurant in the tropics. Owners Alessandro and Silvana are from Rome, and their homemade ravioli al tartufo are as good as any in the Eternal City.
Being There
It’s all about nature. Kayak up estuaries or down the coast, explore the rain forest canopy, go deep-sea fishing, ride horseback along mountain trails or in the surf at sunset, watch giant leatherback turtles lay their eggs, swim under steaming hot waterfalls near Arenal volcano, stalk rare birds or iridescent butterflies, surf awesome waves, or just walk along near-deserted beaches for miles under the tropical sun or in moonlight as bright as day. Almost every hotel can arrange tours and activities or steer you to an organization that can. The best idea, though, is to buy a guidebook, rent a car, and hit the road.