Valentine’s Day & Caribbean Spring Holidays In Costa Rica

St. Valentine’s Day is not only a time for cards, flowers, candy and dinners. It also is time for romantic getaways. With spring at our doorstep, why not escape to Caribbean Costa Rica for a romantic vacation on the beach in the rainforest. With dozens of flights to Costa Rica available from the U.S., Canada and Europe, getting to Costa Rica is easier than ever. Come enjoy the fun-in-the-sun Caribbean lifestyle at the best value travel destination for 2016, resting in luxury at one of the best Costa Rica luxury hotels: Hotel Le Caméléon.

Picture yourself lounging on a day bed under shady palm trees with soft white sand and the brilliant turquoise Caribbean Sea just steps away. Order a frosty fruit cocktail from your waiter, or nip up to the bar at the Le Caméléon Beach Club for some social time and a quick bite to eat. Go for a swim in the pool and cool water Jacuzzi, or get a couple’s massage in the spa. Elegant dining in the balmy tropical nights can be had at Le Numu Restaurant at Hotel Le Caméléon. In the area, you can see sloths, go snorkeling, learn how to make chocolate – there is so much to do in Puerto Viejo, Costa Rica.

Call it jungle love in the rainforest by the beach at Playa Cocles, just south of Puerto Viejo, at this Enchanting Hotel of Costa Rica. Take advantage of the Hotel Le Caméléon special offer of 20% off all rates midweek from Sundays to Thursdays during February and March. Since Valentine’s Day falls on a Sunday this year, you have the makings of fun Caribbean spring holidays in Costa Rica.

On Feb. 14 you can dine romantically Under the Stars at Hotel Le Caméléon’s special Valentine’s Day dinner from 7:00 to 10:00 p.m. at the Le Caméléon Beach Club at Playa Cocles. The three-course gourmet dinner features such mouthwatering specialties as Lobster Thermidor, beef tenderloin in a truffle demi-glace, Portobello mushrooms in a red wine and garlic sauce, and chicken breast in a champagne, lime and herb sauce. Dinner is $50 per person (taxes included). You can make reservations by calling +506 2750+0501, or email reservations@lecameleonhotel.com.

There are easy daily flights from San Jose to Limon on the Caribbean Coast with Nature Air and Sansa Airlines. Article by Shannon Farley

Related articles

• Have a holly, jolly Caribbean Christmas in Costa Rica
• Canada to Costa Rica Flights; WestJet Adds Calgary - Liberia Route

The swimming pool in the ocean at Santa Teresa Costa Rica

I slipped from the rocks into the cool placid water, refreshing even at 7:00 a.m. compared to the heat and humidity beginning to rise from the beach and rainforest. I couldn’t believe how clear and still the water was, especially when big, frothing waves pounded only a dozen or so yards away.

I was swimming in the giant tide pool between Santa Teresa Beach and Hermosa Beach – better known as “Playa Hermosa” – on Costa Rica’s southern Nicoya Peninsula. The larger-than-Olympic-sized shallow sea water swimming pool is one of the best-kept secrets of the area.



Since Santa Teresa and Playa Hermosa – listed by TripAdvisor as Top 10 Beaches in Central America and Top 10 Beaches in Costa Rica for 2015 – are better known for being some of the best surfing beaches in Costa Rica, the tide pool often gets over-looked for great waves. Also, you can only find the tide pool at low tide, when the long, flat beach widens immensely. It is located between Pranamar Oceanfront Villas & Yoga Retreat and “El Peñón,” or the big rock, where Santa Teresa Beach turns into Playa Hermosa.

The sun-warmed clear water ranges from knee-deep to about chest-deep and is filled with all kinds of interesting sea creatures that get trapped when the tide goes out. You can find sea anemones, sea stars, crabs, mussels, hermit crabs and lots of little brightly colored fish. Rocks and volcanic reef create the structure around the tide pool. Since the water is shallow and it’s right off the beach, this is a perfect swimming and snorkeling site for families with kids.



You will want to wear water shoes, or strap-on beach sandals that can get wet, to be able to walk and stand up on the rocks. Keep in mind when you are snorkeling in Costa Rica that the country is located very near the equator and the tropical sun reflecting off the water will fry your skin faster than a fish over fire. Wear a T-shirt or nylon shirt, a hat, and a generous layer of SPF 30 or 50 waterproof sports sunscreen.



Playa Hermosa by Santa Teresa, Costa Rica The long, curving beach of Playa Hermosa is known to be the most beautiful beach of the Santa Teresa area. Officially called “San Martin,” visitors to the beach commented so often on how beautiful it was that it became known as Playa Hermosa, or “beautiful beach” in Spanish. Playa Hermosa recently was honored once again with the Costa Rica Ecological Blue Flag Award by the Costa Rican Tourism Board for being one of the cleanest beaches in the country. Walking down the pristine beaches of Santa Teresa and Playa Hermosa, you see no high rises or crowds, only trees, jungle, sand and surf.

Where to stay at Playa Hermosa, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica

Very near the giant tide pool and also the great surfing breaks of Playa Hermosa is award-winning Pranamar Oceanfront Villas & Yoga Retreat. The beautiful Bali-style beachfront hotel in Santa Teresa is a wonderful place for a relaxing Costa Rica beach vacation. Pranamar Villas specializes in Costa Rica yoga retreats, and Costa Rica surfing vacations, with daily yoga classes for hotel guests and the public.

You can’t go wrong with these recommendations: Pranamar Villas received TripAdvisor’s 2015 Certificate of Excellence, and was named a Top 5 Yoga Retreat in Costa Rica by Travel & Leisure Magazine. Santa Teresa Beach was chosen one of the Top 15 Places to Go in 2015 by Condé Nast Traveler.

Article by Shannon Farley  

 

Santa Teresa Costa Rica beach communities win Ecological Blue Flag

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has." Margaret Mead

Walk down the Pacific beaches of Santa Teresa, Costa Rica and you’re likely to see long, empty stretches of white sand, beautiful blue rolling waves, multicolored crushed seashells and interesting rocks and pebbles. What you won’t see so much is trash.

The southern Nicoya Peninsula beaches of Playa Hermosa, Playa Santa Teresa, Playa Carmen and Mal Pais all were honored once again with the Costa Rica Ecological Blue Flag Award by the Costa Rican Tourism Board for being some of the cleanest beaches in the country. A record 108 Costa Rica beaches received Ecological Blue Flag Awards for 2014, presented at a ceremony in March 2015. Award-winning Santa Teresa Beach in Costa Rica also was chosen one of the Top 15 Places to Go in 2015 by Condé Nast Traveler.



Costa Rica’s Blue Flag award is an honor for a community to earn. It means that community’s beach has near-perfect ocean water quality, potable water quality, coastal sanitation areas, treated waste and run-off water, garbage containers and very little litter.

At Playa Hermosa, it all started four years ago when hotel owner Tara Shaw encouraged her business neighbors to join her in cleaning the beach. “I used to go running on the beach and used to cry about all of the plastic trash. My family and I used to go out there and clean up,” said Shaw, who owns the small hotel of Villas Hermosas at Playa Hermosa with her husband, Brad. “Now, Hermosa has grown enough that a lot of people are really supportive.

” Playa Hermosa – aptly named “Beautiful Beach” – keeps its beauty thanks to the hard work and dedication of Costa Rican Maxfred Moraga and the committed business owners who sponsor him in the community beach cleaning program. Nine businesses at Playa Hermosa cooperate to pay Moraga’s salary and the cleanup expenses. Moraga works six days a week all year – with vacation time – to pick up trash brought in on the Pacific tides, that is left behind by beach-goers or washed out from nearby rivers. The rubbish is collected in extra-large garden-size trash bags, separated between garbage and recycling, and brought to a municipal trash collection spot.


“Such a proud moment today! Our beach, Playa Hermosa, has been given the honor by the respected Blue Flag program of the cleanest beach in the entire (large) province of Puntarenas,” wrote Shaw on the Villas Hermosas Facebook page. “Several Northern Santa Teresa / Hermosa businesses (Batik, Pranamar Villas and Yoga Retreat, Zopilote Surf Camp, The White House, Florblanca Resort, Latitude 10º Resort, Purasonica, Rancho Cielo, and us at Villas Hermosas) have been contributing for a full-time worker to pick up garbage 6 days per week for the last 4 years in our part of town, and it has obviously paid off! Thanks so much to Maxfred, our cleaner the last three years, and all contributors who help us with this program. Best. Neighbours. Ever.”

“I am happy, not only that we got the award for being one of the cleanest beaches in the country and being able to enjoy it every day, but by the fact that my kids are growing in a community where people do care,” commented Mario Matarrita, manager at Pranamar Oceanfront Villas & Yoga Retreat, which contributes to the community program. “After all, this is for our future generation, and these kinds of actions will hopefully set them on the right path.”



Being right on the beach at Playa Hermosa in Santa Teresa, Pranamar Oceanfront Villas also uses its own staff to keep its area of the beach well-groomed and free of trash and debris. The Santa Teresa Costa Rica hotel specializes in Costa Rica yoga retreats and Costa Rica surfing vacations, with daily yoga classes for hotel guests and the public. Pranamar Oceanfront Villas was named a Top 5 Yoga Retreat in Costa Rica by Travel & Leisure Magazine.

Article by Shannon Farley

Santa Teresa businesses work together for Blue Flag.

I’ve been reading about ocean pollution, and the facts are really quite shocking. Apparently, it was once a common practice to “get rid of trash” by dumping it into the ocean, and there was even a positive catchphrase: “The solution to pollution is dilution.”

People assumed that the oceans were so vast and deep that the trash would simply be swallowed up and we’d never see it again. How very wrong. All of that trash – pesticides, herbicides, chemical fertilizers, detergents, oil, sewage, plastic bottles, plastic bags, and other solids – dumped into the ocean from land or by ships is consumed by or ensnares marine mammals, birds or fish with often fatal results, endangering the entire ocean ecosystem.

 It swirls around in thousand-mile-wide swaths of decomposing plastic and garbage. One in the North Pacific, known as the Pacific Trash Vortex, or North Pacific Garbage Patch, is estimated to be the size of Texas and thought to contain 100 million tons of plastic. A new, massive patch was discovered in the Atlantic Ocean in early 2010. So far, five trash gyres have been found in the world.

Walk down the beaches of Santa Teresa, Costa Rica, however, and what you won’t see along the white sand is trash. The Pacific beaches of Santa Teresa – Mal Pais, Playa Carmen, Playa Santa Teresa and Playa Hermosa – on Costa Rica’s southern Nicoya Peninsula hold the honored Ecological Blue Flag status for having near-perfect ocean water quality, potable water quality, coastal sanitation areas, treated waste and run-off water, garbage containers and very little litter.

Businesses on these four beaches have taken it upon themselves to keep the beaches clean. Since 2011, they have worked together to pay for two workers to clean each beach every week, all year long. They pick up trash brought in on the Pacific tides, or washed out from nearby rivers or that is left behind by beach-goers. The rubbish is collected in extra-large garden-size trash bags, separated between garbage and recycling, and brought to a municipal trash collection spot.

The business owners take turns in rotation to pay for the two workers and the cleanup costs. “We started in 2011 with only five or six sponsors, and now we are up to 50-60 sponsors,” said program coordinator Roberto de la Ossa. “The more business owners there are, the easier it is for everyone to maintain the program.”

De la Ossa, who is general manager at sponsor Hotel Tropico Latino, said he works with a small team of business owners to run the program. In turn, they work with the Environmental Committee of Santa Teresa, which coordinates the Blue Flag program.

“We’re trying to promote consciousness in the area,” de la Ossa explained. “We are blessed that we have very clean water here – 75% of the criteria of the Blue Flag Program is that we have clean water. We’re still in time to conserve the environment here. If we tackle these issues now and put programs in place, the new generations coming up will be better equipped to handle these issues and we can grow sustainably.”

In 2011, beach cleanup efforts collected approximately 5,200 kilos of trash, and that was starting mid-year, de la Ossa said. In 2012, they cleaned up an incredible 10,515 kilos of garbage during the year. The program hopes to grow with more business sponsors in 2014.

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has" - Margaret Mead

Hotel Tropico Latino

Hotel Tropico Latino is a small, intimate and welcoming beachfront hotel in Costa Rica in the Playa Carmen-Playa Santa Teresa area of the southern Nicoya Peninsula. The charming hotel offers a variety of accommodations spread throughout natural organic gardens. Hotel Tropico Latino is an ideal Costa Rica beach vacation destination for couples, families, surfers, yoga retreats, and well-being and health retreats.

Article by Shannon Farley