Canopy Tours

An intriguing way to explore the Santa Elena Cloud Forest Reserve is by ascending into the forest canopy on a Sky Walk (tel. 506/645-5238, fax 506/645-5796, www.skywalk.co.cr), which offers a monkey’s-eye view of things. You walk along five suspension bridges and platforms and 1,000 meters of pathways permitting viewing from ground level to the treetops, where you are right in there with the epiphytes. Open 7 a.m.–4 p.m. daily. The two-hour walk costs $17 adults, $13 students, $11 children, including boots and poncho; it’s $10 extra for a guided tour offered 8 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. A jeep-taxi leaves the bank in Santa Elena village for Sky Walk at 7:15 a.m., 9 a.m., 11:15 a.m., and 1:15 p.m. ($1 pp).

The same company offers a two-hour SkyTrek (www.skytrek.com, $44 adults, $35 students, $31 children) for the more adventurous. You’ll whiz through the canopy in a harness attached to a zipline that runs between three treetop canopies, spanning two kilometers. Tours are offered at 7:30 a.m., 9:30 a.m., 10:30 a.m., 11:30 a.m., 1:30 p.m., 2 p.m., 2:30 p.m., and 3 p.m. daily.

The Aventura Canopy Tour (tel. 506/645-6959), on the road to the Sky Walk, has 16 zipline cables (tours at 7:30 a.m., 10:30 a.m., 12:30 p.m. and 2:30 p.m., $35 adults, $28 students/children) plus rappelling.

The canopy tour craze began at Monteverde Cloud Forest Lodge, where The Original Canopy Tour (tel. 506/645-5243, www.canopytour.com, $45 adults, $35 students, $25 children) was created. Zipline tours are offered at 7:30 a.m., 10:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. A thrilling beginning is the forest hike and a clamber up the interior of a hollow stranger fig to reach the first platform.

Horseback Riding

The following have stables and rent horses (usually about $7–10 per hour) and offer guided tours: Meg’s Stables (tel. 506/645-5052); La Estrella (tel. 506/645-5075); Sabine’s Smiling Horses (tel. 506/645-6804, www.smilinghorses.com); and Terra Viva (tel. 506/645-5454, www.terravivacr.com), which gets good reviews from readers and also has an organic dairy farm and a private cloud forest reserve with trails. Terra Viva also has rustic accommodation—a reader raves about the delicious breakfast.

Horseback rides are extremely popular, especially to/from La Fortuna in the central highlands, often as a one-way, four-hour horseback ride transfer between Monteverde and La Fortuna. There are three different routes.

Several tour operators compete. Some have been accused of working their horses to death — literally — on the arduous “San Gerardo” trail, on which often poorly fed horses exhaust themselves in thigh deep mud on the steep hills during wet season. The Río Chiquito route can also be tough on horses in wet season. The “Lake Trail” is the easiest on the horses. Check to see that the horses are not used both ways on the same day. If you choose to make the transfer on horseback, I recommend Desafio (tel. 506/479-9464, www.desafiocostarica.com, $65).

© Christopher P. Baker from Moon Costa Rica, 6th Edition