Arenal/La Fortuna

Over 90% of all tourists coming to Costa Rica visit this area,  expecting to see the Arenal Volcano erupting lava. Unfortunately The volcano  has not been active since July 2010, you won’t be told this by any of the hotels there and the Costa Rican Government has been uncharacteristically quiet about it.  so we really don’t know if this is just a “pause” or something more significant. I think the lack of information has a lot to do with the tourism for that area.  When I first came to Costa Rica 12 years ago the population of La Fortuna was around 260 and there were only 6 hotels in La Fortuna, now there are over 8,000 people living in the area and over 100 hotels and resorts with more being constructed. Should the volcano stop erupting for an extended period of time this could be devastating for the tourism in this area. I will not recommend an overnight trip to La Fortuna until Arenal is active, almost everything you can do in that area can be done much closer to the beach area and not require a long drive and an overnight stay. So if the volcano is the main reason you are going there you might want to reconsider this. Also  it is in the rain forest and the operative word is RAIN.  

There are over 100 hotels in the area, we will be happy to recommend some of our favorites.

Other tours / activities in La Fortuna are:

Natural mineral rich hot springs

La Fortuna Waterfalls, a 270 mt waterfall where you can climb to the bottom of the falls (542 steps) and swim in the pool there.

River Float Tours

White water rafting on class 3-5 rivers

Hiking the lava fields

Hanging Bridge Tour