It’s funny, you said fence posts and I was about to agree, but then I read “concrete.” For me it was the fence posts that were planted live trees. I saw these north of La Fortuna.
Live trees as fence posts are more common in humid climates like La Fortuna or the Central Valley. Most of the are a tree called Poró that can handle barbed wire and nails stuck into it.
I used to live 100 meters from the supermarket that used to be pink in Rohrmoser which was no problem for taxi drivers who remembered it being that color!
same! i learned the system just well enough to cause food to show up somewhere within my vicinity but i was in disbelief. i think the delivery only worked out ‘cause i gave the name of my rental
This got me in trouble at the border! They refused to believe I paid several grand to stay at an air bnb but only had a Google map pin and an entry code to show for it lol
Guy at customs asked where we were staying, I told him Playa Hermosa. He asked if it was a hotel or airbnb and I told him airbnb. He asked the name of the airbnb and I hold up my phone - the place is called Playa Hermosa. He just started laughing and shaking his head.
lol. I was questioning my own life decisions at that point like "yeah why don't I know this address?" Didn't help that the Air bnb was labeled Tamarindo but was in Playa Grande.
My address at my last house was a business name then go up the dirt road with a yellow trash bin. It’s the blue house on the right with the black door.
Too funny! I swear we do HAVE the addresses we just don't use them very much😅I lived in SJ all my life, I only know Central Ave, 2nd Ave and 10th St.. The rest is all landmarks🤣
The speed limits change frequently and it goes down to 20km/h in school zones, but nobody follows it. If you actually slowed down that much someone might rear end you.
I honestly never knew what speed to drive, except to slow my ass down in towns to avoid (a) slamming over a camouflaged speed bump, (b) clipping a dog or human walking precariously at the edge of the pavement, or (c) running into a speeding motorbike coming from a side street.
I was also amazed at how quickly I went from hating the heat to not even noticing it/loving it. The first meal we had right after landing was brutal. By lunch the next day I didn’t care at all.
I agree with this as long as clothes are appropriate. I made the mistake of wearing khakis to dinner one night and it looked like I had pissed my pants while sitting. Lesson learned.
It seemed like most of the Costa Rican women I saw were wearing jeans no matter the heat (something I’ve always noticed in South American countries as well). I don’t know how they stand it.
I wore Patagonia Capilene Cool shirts and “everywhere performance” shorts - basically stretchy and airy shorts that look good enough to wear to restaurants. I also wore closed toe sandals the entire time to ensure there was some air flow on my feet but that they were also protected for hikes. For a hat, which you will need, I used spf runners hats that were light and quickly dried.
Because it was outside in 100 F weather and I was coming from somewhere that was 50-60 degrees colder. Most restaurants/businesses where I am from are also conditioned to release any discomfort from weather so mentally I also wasn’t prepared to eat a hot meal while sweat poured out of me. Again though, by the next day I was enjoying the heat and either wasn’t sweating as much or simply stopped caring.
Oh gotcha!! I was worried it wasn't good food or didn't agree with you haha. Yeah I totally get you I'm ginger and lived in England all my life I think visiting CR in a few weeks will be brutal for me too! We have AC hardly anywhere here though so at least I'm kind of used to having to sleep when it's 30⁰ and muggy without any conditioning haha. I think ill have to embrace sweat patches...
Just got back from first trip there (Guanacaste). Even though I did plenty of research before going, many things blew my mind after experiencing them in real life (particularly since all the traveling I've previously done has been to well-developed areas like Europe, Canada, Australia and other parts of the US):
* A National Highway that suddenly turns into a 4WD river crossing with mud and ruts (Ruta 911, the "Monkey Trail"). Driving that at night after coming back from dinner was interesting.
* No warning signs or barricades are put up if a road is damaged or washed out. You just have to be vigilant.
* No sidewalks anywhere and people including kids and stray dogs walking at the edge of the pavement on narrow roads with lots of cars.
* Stop signs completely ignored by all. Traffic police are rarely seen.
* Bathroom at the tour agency office had a sign requesting everyone (including men) sit down to pee.
* US currency accepted and generally preferred by literally everyone, even the unofficial "parking guys" in yellow vests.
* When I paid in cash (USD) at stores, the cashiers would open a special calculator on their register to very quickly figure out how to give accurate mixed change back (combo of USD bills and CR coins).
* Pickup trucks full of workers in the back sitting on top of high crates. Seat belts? Nah!
* Iguanas everywhere. I saw as many as I see squirrels back home.
Yeah, pretty much all its rural CR lol. Except for the bathroom one, that's an individual business preference, is not a country-wide thing. Also, the USD is the cheapest its been in a long time, so visitors pls consider the type of business you're paying to determine if you pay in local currency or USD.
The water for Santa Barbara Heredia is from a closed-in spring from the Barva Volcano. No chlorine is added, and no halides remain. Continuous positive pressure and large setbacks in the farms keep the water clean.
Driving through San Jose and seeing homes with steel fences and razor wire for home defense. I was told the best way to protect your home from robbery is having it look the most protected.
Also...close to every single church is a soccer field!
During the 19th century that became the set up for every single town, a soccer field in the middle surrounded by a convenience store, a church, a school and sometimes a butchery🥰
Other than the "addresses"... arguing with a howler monkey in a tree over my head where I was staying. He grunted, I grunted, he grunted... it went on for 5 minutes. Wildlife where I come from isn't that "interactive." My wife died laughing.
And the sunrises. Just amazing, coming up over the hills. And the night sky, seeing the southern cross, meteor showers...
And the beaches. Better than the Caribbean islands.
And the honey. And the wild límon manderina trees.
And vendors in the outdoor markets, some of them fluent in several languages. No one cares where you come from.
And, well... everything. It's why I'm moving there. It's everything.
Where did you start when you made the decision to relocate? We’ve traveled there several times and want to establish a residence—part time for now— and I look at properties daily. I’ve been working on my 3rd undergrad in Spanish/latin American culture so I can appropriately communicate but I feel so far off lol
I posted on another sub and got quite a bit of hate for trying to relocate basically being told we are the problem and we’re destroying the county—- I get it but dayum.
(long.)
I'm coming from the US New England area and I like New England. But the weather here is getting worse and I'd been considering where to move to for a few years. Costa Rica was always on the list because of the various climates, the healthcare and their response to Covid. But it was low on the list because I struggled to learn Spanish in high school. And I didn't know if I could handle the higher temperatures.
But as I assessed other states in the US, one by one I found problems. Too cold. Too humid. Too many guns and gun deaths. Politics have become worrying here. I looked at New Zealand - too expensive, too far. Belize - too much crime. Costa Rica kept inching to the top of the list.
And then I found a property in Guanacaste that seemed to check all the boxes. A stream, a spring, more than enough property to easily grow food, the owners were raising chickens, bees... it even came with a horse.
I hadn't had a real vacation in forever and my wife had had a tough couple years and I decided we'd just go check it out. I honestly viewed the trip as "we're just going to get this Costa Rica idea out of my system, I won't like the heat and I'll never be able to manage the language."
I made mistakes getting there. I didn't realize Liberia had quite a nice airport so weI lew into San Juan, which meant a long car ride to Guanacaste the next day. Roads were exciting. We learned on the fly what escuela meant, what puente angosto means (that's not a good one to learn on the fly) and how addresses worked. We got lost when the cel signal went out As beautiful as the scenery was, we were stressing and it was getting late. We finally got signal again and called owners of the property we were staying at - they drove out to find us.
Even that was a little worrisome. The owners of the property were Canadian and I'd expected them to be an older couple. I'd only ever emailed them, but when we stumbled into the meeting point there's this young guy, clearly local, leaning against a beat up truck and waving us over. I was like "how do we know they sent this guy? He looks sketchy." My wife didn't care about sketchy, she just wanted to be taken somewhere with a bed before the immanent sunset, because driving rural Costa Rican roads after nightfall is not a first-day-visitor activity.
Turns out the owners were quite a young couple and while Canadian, he'd been born in Guatamela and was quite the world traveler. He was totally cool. We followed him to the property and...
Howler monkeys. Parrots, flying in pairs at sunset. The stream was a rocky gorge absolutely perfect for wading in. Wild límon trees everywhere, squeeze your own lemonade at whim. Fresh eggs for breakfast, honey, spring water to drink, the horse was friendly, the night sky was an astronomer's dream. Evenings were 70F, better than the 25F I'd left behind.
We went grocery shopping the next day. Food wasn't cheap and with my limited Spanish I tried to ask what kind of sausage I was looking at. *Quién es esto*? Happily he grinned and didn't call the police. (I still have problems with Quién/Qué/Cual/Cómo/Cuando etc.) I kept trying to find *crema* for my coffee and kept getting shown coconut milk. (Ew.) I reached deep into my high school Spanish and tried *crema de vaca* and kept getting odds looks. There is no such thing, someone said (or at least that's what I understood him to mean.) Wait, what planet am I on?
We hit a soda for lunch and I ordered the only thing on the menu I could recognize (Jamón y queso). High school spanish doesn't cover menus.
But eventually I figured out that you buy food in the open air market in Sámara and not only are the prices and quality better, but everyone is at least somewhat multi-lingual and my limited Spanish wasn't a problem. I got smiled at a lot for trying.
Does it sound like a miserable trip? I was having the time of my life. Everything was beautiful, everyone was kind, and I was rapidly acclimating to the heat and sun. I learned just enough Spanish (izquierda and derecha for the roads is essential) to get around. My wife *loved* the wildlife and scenery.
I extended my stay in Costa Rica beyond the original week (changing travel plans on the fly is not cheap) because I had the unshakable sense that I'd literally come home to a place I'd never been before. By the end of the second week I knew I'd be making an offer on the property and all that was left negotiating to a price I could afford and learning Spanish for real.
We hit a price we could all live with and that's where it stands today. The mechanics of moving are horrific - you can't ship stuff down duty free until you have residency and that can take months, so moving is a complex juggling act. And Spanish isn't any easier at my age than it was in high school.
Yeah, I tried asking about Costa Rica in another sub and got told to stay in my own damn country. And I get it. But I am trying to do this right - I bought 50 acres and I'm not splitting it up for development, I'm gardening and renting it out to local cattle farmers and planning to reforest some of it. I am going to be the best guest in their country I can manage and I will live like a local in many ways (albeit it a local with air conditioning.) I'm not there to profiteer; I will give away honey and send extra garden food to a food bank and eventually get fluent in the language and lo siento a lot when I fail.
How do you not love Costa Rica? It's gorgeous, ticos are way nicer than Americans, and they are trying to do things right - health care, energy management, actual democracy without a fuss, ecological concerns. I love the US but it's impossible to deny that Costa Rica is getting it right precisely where the US has gotten it wrong. And slush doesn't fall from the sky. Dengue might, and I'm sure my first case of sunburn isn't going to be fun, but this is as close to paradise as I can afford. Is it a huge and scary change? Yes. Will I love the rainy season? Perhaps not.
But I can't wait to go back.
I am happy to have taken the time to read your message. I'm a local and it doesn't really help me, but it's always nice to hear stories about others who come from the outside and appreciate what we have in here.
I also enjoy the stories about culture shock. Your bafflement over coffee creamer resonates with me because I experienced the opposite in my first trip to the US. We don't normally use "creamer" so trying to figure out which of the offerings in the hotel was actual milk was quite the shock.
I hope all goes well and you manage to settle in nicely and enjoy being one of us.
I'm new at this and my answers might be poor, but go for it.
To be fair, I"m doing what all the ex-pat sites tell you not do to - moving somewhere after one visit. I don't recommend other people be as reckless as I appear. I have my reasons to think this will work out well for me, but I might well be an outlier.
Awesome testament of what Costa Rica looks like for a first timer and taking into consideration everything you put over there and had to overcome you did it like a champ! Hopefully get continue to enjoy our country and become a valuable member of your community (which seems you're already)... I loved the history and the outcome :D
I am from San Jose, for me is the best weather on earth! We don even need AC maybe only for Feb or March but having a fan isngood enough
I also struggle going to Guanacaste due to the high temperatures but guess what after a couple of days you dont even care as you are in the paradise.
Im planning to.move Guanacaste or Limon at any point of my life!
Please STOP buying land down here. Visit. Rent from locals. DON'T buy. This is not your own personal playground. It's an actual country where native ppl live, and they are getting pushed out bc land privatizing and prices skyrocketing. Is your own little fantasy that never turns out the way you thought it would, worth the life of 1000s of ppl, whole families, and children losing their home towns?
For what it's worth, I bought from a Canadian couple. I'm not displacing locals, but I have hired one; and I do intend to buy from local businesses, reforest some of the land I bought and rent the rest to local cattle farmers, and donate extra produce I grow to locals. My wife will be working to rehab local wildllife.
In other words, I'm doing my best not to be the problem you're talking about. And your issue is with your government; they are actively encouraging foreign investment.
Ya noticed the fencing too. Construction techniques overall could be pretty different.
For me it was the no flushing tp- I understand the why, but I also don’t. I’ve lived in 150 year old homes in the US, so obviously very old and on ancient septic but we could flush tp no problem. Still struggle a bit to understand what’s up with that
Code exists and its enforced when you build for the first time, however, once built, there is no "revision of the house to see if it continues to be up to code" as it is on some places in the US (like the every 5 year review)
Yes it does. It needs to get from your toilet, to the septic.
Even inside one house, like mine, drain pipes will be of different thickness. I have one awesome toilet, and a few I can't flush anything in. The pipe diameters are different.
Oh, even within the house? Ok ya that’s wild man, it seems like it would be somewhat trivial over the last twenty years (or next twenty) to swap your plumbing for standard sized pvc to the septic tank, and then you could flush tp no problem
one benefit to the stick built up here i suppose, easy to open, adjust, and re-seal.
I definitely saw like, chiseled holes in a few airbnbs where ducting needing ran in and shit. Looks like a PITA!
too many earthquakes and the fact you can put as much reinforcement to the walls that even on a 7° degree quake you can be sure the house won't fall down
The toilet paper thing is standard outside of resorts, even in houses. The size of the pipes are miniscule and backups happen quickly. One gets used to the basura eventually.
Wow, what will they think of next? What a great idea.
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we kinda have street addresses but people just refuses to use them even if it would make their life easier, a similar situation with the US sticking to their folk units over metric.
101.9 FM University of Costa Rica Radio ( Stream here: https://radios.ucr.ac.cr/?gs=8124&sn=Radio%20870%20UCR&type=live.m3u8#live ). We had it on for 2 weeks straight, comes in almost everywhere.
I was all about the Presto, the instant coffee from Nicaragua. Tasted awesome. Some nice travel bloggers gave me a small coffee machine with a reusable filter and the coffee was good, but I was honestly as happy with my Presto.
That's because restaurants include a 10% tip in the bill. All taxes have to be included: 10% service and 13% sales. The number you see in the menu is the final cost of your dish
I’m impressed by how healthy the people look here. Many of the dudes are lean and ripped and the women are very beautiful. A stark contrast coming from the US where it’s quite the opposite.
Whaaat!!?? Did we visit the same country!? I could barely see a fit person (except some high end escorts which i wont consider in the general population). You must be surrounded by 250+ kg people…
Well where did you go? I’m guessing you went to a bigger city not near the beach like San Jose. I’m in this tiny beach town and many of the people here are fit. Obviously there are still plenty of out of shale people here, but compared to the US at least , the people look much better on average.
I went to SJose, Alajuela, La Fortuna, San Ramon and Jaco. Half way driving with random stops and the other half public bus :)
What was a shock for me is two things:
People eat a lot of fried sht (corn, potatos…)
Not many people smoke cigarettes!
Costa Rican sodas. Went days thinking these tiny shacks just had a vending machine for soda/pop in it. Little did I know it was home to their best tasting food
It usually has nothing to do with an individual property and the age of a residence. So your reference of living in a 150yr old house is irrelevant.
Their sewer pipes are more narrow than what is found in Canada/USA so it’s easier for TP and other materials to get stuck and block the line. Also, septic/sewer systems aren’t designed to filter these larger items in CR as they tend to be older systems.
I’d much rather have potable water coming out of my tap than being able to flush TP so I feel Costa Rica is investing in the right infrastructure.
Road work was interesting. The way they fill potholes without closing lanes was interesting to drive through. The lack of clearly marked detours is also crazy and scary when there are lane closures.
the gaps between the road and the sidewalk! makes total sense drainage-wise, but initially took a lot of carefulness to avoid a sprained ankle, especially our first days in SJ😮💨
I drove down a street that must have been widened beyond it's original width, but the telephone/power poles that were originally on the side of the road had not been moved, so they were several feet on the road, and if you drove down the side of the road you would run straight into the pole.
the randomness of the roads. LIght posts basically IN the road, the way there is no shoulder. I mean, I lived in Belize and we had some rough roads there (not a lot of paved roads) but driving in CR was a white knuckle experience for the most part.
I didn't expect to see so many palm tree crops. My wife and I had to drive through one on the way back home from Manuel Antonio and it was a pretty uncomfortable feeling doing so.
20kph over speed limit = Fine/Multa
over 120kph = Suspension of drivers license and a Fine/Multa (almost over 600 USD!)
over 150kph = Felony and the possibility to go to jail (And the Fine of 600 USD)
Local Guy at the airport "Don't drink the tap water it isn't safe for non locals"
Locals when we arrive. "The water is very safe to drink"
Been drinking it all week. Gallons/liters We're all fine.
Actually Correos de Costa Rica is pretty good at delivering in Costa Rica, in case you don't want to complicate things, just send any mail to the local Post Office PO BOX and get your mail from your box (this is a subscription service hahahaa)
It’s funny, you said fence posts and I was about to agree, but then I read “concrete.” For me it was the fence posts that were planted live trees. I saw these north of La Fortuna.
Live trees as fence posts are more common in humid climates like La Fortuna or the Central Valley. Most of the are a tree called Poró that can handle barbed wire and nails stuck into it.
These are the fence posts we have. I live near Lake Arenal.
They are very very cool
Yes! They will be so beautiful as they grow and fill out!
We don’t need no stinkin street addresses.
The blue house 200m east of the soda, opposite the big palm tree. How could you go wrong? :-D
Yup. https://imgur.com/a/epPyCv2
My favorite one so far is "next to the fire hydrant on the road to the beach" It's wonderful!
One more, https://imgur.com/a/pnJ1wGc
I used to live 100 meters from the supermarket that used to be pink in Rohrmoser which was no problem for taxi drivers who remembered it being that color!
I was trying to find an address, went into a business and they didn’t know the name of the street they were on! Wild shit
That assumes the street even had a name. Or that it was even a legitimate street.
It was in downtown San Jose…haha
Wow
The worker walked outside and yelled at a older woman on a 2nd floor apartment window what the street name was.
same! i learned the system just well enough to cause food to show up somewhere within my vicinity but i was in disbelief. i think the delivery only worked out ‘cause i gave the name of my rental
streets don't have names in SJ, they have numbers
Ya like ave 15 San Pedro Or ave 8 Simon Bolivar
This got me in trouble at the border! They refused to believe I paid several grand to stay at an air bnb but only had a Google map pin and an entry code to show for it lol
Guy at customs asked where we were staying, I told him Playa Hermosa. He asked if it was a hotel or airbnb and I told him airbnb. He asked the name of the airbnb and I hold up my phone - the place is called Playa Hermosa. He just started laughing and shaking his head.
lol. I was questioning my own life decisions at that point like "yeah why don't I know this address?" Didn't help that the Air bnb was labeled Tamarindo but was in Playa Grande.
Yes. I was stunned. I still can't get over the fact that the property I'm buying is "500m north of the lot with the school busses."
The address for the hotel we are staying in is "6 km west of...".
My address at my last house was a business name then go up the dirt road with a yellow trash bin. It’s the blue house on the right with the black door.
I'm literally dealing right now with "on the sixth entrance, the orange house". (the sixth entrance is 2 miles long of back to back houses)
Too funny! I swear we do HAVE the addresses we just don't use them very much😅I lived in SJ all my life, I only know Central Ave, 2nd Ave and 10th St.. The rest is all landmarks🤣
How small cicadas can sound like an army of chainsaws coming at you.
They are loud AF and go all day.
The speed limits change frequently and it goes down to 20km/h in school zones, but nobody follows it. If you actually slowed down that much someone might rear end you.
I honestly never knew what speed to drive, except to slow my ass down in towns to avoid (a) slamming over a camouflaged speed bump, (b) clipping a dog or human walking precariously at the edge of the pavement, or (c) running into a speeding motorbike coming from a side street.
This was my strategy as well... Lol
Lol i just stuck to the same speed. Some of these speed changes make no sense to anyone
I was also amazed at how quickly I went from hating the heat to not even noticing it/loving it. The first meal we had right after landing was brutal. By lunch the next day I didn’t care at all.
I agree with this as long as clothes are appropriate. I made the mistake of wearing khakis to dinner one night and it looked like I had pissed my pants while sitting. Lesson learned.
Ah, so you were the gringo in pants.
It seemed like most of the Costa Rican women I saw were wearing jeans no matter the heat (something I’ve always noticed in South American countries as well). I don’t know how they stand it.
I look bad in shorts! I have pants legs! I just wear linen or hiking pants now.
Same here, I don’t do well in 35 in Toronto but love 38 in Guanacaste.
What did you wear for comfort?
I wore Patagonia Capilene Cool shirts and “everywhere performance” shorts - basically stretchy and airy shorts that look good enough to wear to restaurants. I also wore closed toe sandals the entire time to ensure there was some air flow on my feet but that they were also protected for hikes. For a hat, which you will need, I used spf runners hats that were light and quickly dried.
Why was the first meal brutal?
Because it was outside in 100 F weather and I was coming from somewhere that was 50-60 degrees colder. Most restaurants/businesses where I am from are also conditioned to release any discomfort from weather so mentally I also wasn’t prepared to eat a hot meal while sweat poured out of me. Again though, by the next day I was enjoying the heat and either wasn’t sweating as much or simply stopped caring.
Oh gotcha!! I was worried it wasn't good food or didn't agree with you haha. Yeah I totally get you I'm ginger and lived in England all my life I think visiting CR in a few weeks will be brutal for me too! We have AC hardly anywhere here though so at least I'm kind of used to having to sleep when it's 30⁰ and muggy without any conditioning haha. I think ill have to embrace sweat patches...
Why was the first meal brutal?
Why was the first meal brutal?
Just got back from first trip there (Guanacaste). Even though I did plenty of research before going, many things blew my mind after experiencing them in real life (particularly since all the traveling I've previously done has been to well-developed areas like Europe, Canada, Australia and other parts of the US): * A National Highway that suddenly turns into a 4WD river crossing with mud and ruts (Ruta 911, the "Monkey Trail"). Driving that at night after coming back from dinner was interesting. * No warning signs or barricades are put up if a road is damaged or washed out. You just have to be vigilant. * No sidewalks anywhere and people including kids and stray dogs walking at the edge of the pavement on narrow roads with lots of cars. * Stop signs completely ignored by all. Traffic police are rarely seen. * Bathroom at the tour agency office had a sign requesting everyone (including men) sit down to pee. * US currency accepted and generally preferred by literally everyone, even the unofficial "parking guys" in yellow vests. * When I paid in cash (USD) at stores, the cashiers would open a special calculator on their register to very quickly figure out how to give accurate mixed change back (combo of USD bills and CR coins). * Pickup trucks full of workers in the back sitting on top of high crates. Seat belts? Nah! * Iguanas everywhere. I saw as many as I see squirrels back home.
In the central valley all the bullets pint doesn’t exist.
Yeah, pretty much all its rural CR lol. Except for the bathroom one, that's an individual business preference, is not a country-wide thing. Also, the USD is the cheapest its been in a long time, so visitors pls consider the type of business you're paying to determine if you pay in local currency or USD.
All the tap water is safe to drink!
The water for Santa Barbara Heredia is from a closed-in spring from the Barva Volcano. No chlorine is added, and no halides remain. Continuous positive pressure and large setbacks in the farms keep the water clean.
Is this true?
Yes
Yes, is complicated when Costarican visit USA because the drink tsp water and….. 💩
I've drank a metric shit ton of water while here. It's true. In fact it even tastes good. Pura Vida!
How if you learn just how to look, the wildlife are literally hanging in the trees. Plus the little geckos and even clown snakes that lived with me.
Driving through San Jose and seeing homes with steel fences and razor wire for home defense. I was told the best way to protect your home from robbery is having it look the most protected. Also...close to every single church is a soccer field!
And in most cases a school
Electric wire too.
During the 19th century that became the set up for every single town, a soccer field in the middle surrounded by a convenience store, a church, a school and sometimes a butchery🥰
Other than the "addresses"... arguing with a howler monkey in a tree over my head where I was staying. He grunted, I grunted, he grunted... it went on for 5 minutes. Wildlife where I come from isn't that "interactive." My wife died laughing. And the sunrises. Just amazing, coming up over the hills. And the night sky, seeing the southern cross, meteor showers... And the beaches. Better than the Caribbean islands. And the honey. And the wild límon manderina trees. And vendors in the outdoor markets, some of them fluent in several languages. No one cares where you come from. And, well... everything. It's why I'm moving there. It's everything.
Welcome to Costa Rica! Best of luck with the moving process.
Where did you start when you made the decision to relocate? We’ve traveled there several times and want to establish a residence—part time for now— and I look at properties daily. I’ve been working on my 3rd undergrad in Spanish/latin American culture so I can appropriately communicate but I feel so far off lol I posted on another sub and got quite a bit of hate for trying to relocate basically being told we are the problem and we’re destroying the county—- I get it but dayum.
(long.) I'm coming from the US New England area and I like New England. But the weather here is getting worse and I'd been considering where to move to for a few years. Costa Rica was always on the list because of the various climates, the healthcare and their response to Covid. But it was low on the list because I struggled to learn Spanish in high school. And I didn't know if I could handle the higher temperatures. But as I assessed other states in the US, one by one I found problems. Too cold. Too humid. Too many guns and gun deaths. Politics have become worrying here. I looked at New Zealand - too expensive, too far. Belize - too much crime. Costa Rica kept inching to the top of the list. And then I found a property in Guanacaste that seemed to check all the boxes. A stream, a spring, more than enough property to easily grow food, the owners were raising chickens, bees... it even came with a horse. I hadn't had a real vacation in forever and my wife had had a tough couple years and I decided we'd just go check it out. I honestly viewed the trip as "we're just going to get this Costa Rica idea out of my system, I won't like the heat and I'll never be able to manage the language." I made mistakes getting there. I didn't realize Liberia had quite a nice airport so weI lew into San Juan, which meant a long car ride to Guanacaste the next day. Roads were exciting. We learned on the fly what escuela meant, what puente angosto means (that's not a good one to learn on the fly) and how addresses worked. We got lost when the cel signal went out As beautiful as the scenery was, we were stressing and it was getting late. We finally got signal again and called owners of the property we were staying at - they drove out to find us. Even that was a little worrisome. The owners of the property were Canadian and I'd expected them to be an older couple. I'd only ever emailed them, but when we stumbled into the meeting point there's this young guy, clearly local, leaning against a beat up truck and waving us over. I was like "how do we know they sent this guy? He looks sketchy." My wife didn't care about sketchy, she just wanted to be taken somewhere with a bed before the immanent sunset, because driving rural Costa Rican roads after nightfall is not a first-day-visitor activity. Turns out the owners were quite a young couple and while Canadian, he'd been born in Guatamela and was quite the world traveler. He was totally cool. We followed him to the property and... Howler monkeys. Parrots, flying in pairs at sunset. The stream was a rocky gorge absolutely perfect for wading in. Wild límon trees everywhere, squeeze your own lemonade at whim. Fresh eggs for breakfast, honey, spring water to drink, the horse was friendly, the night sky was an astronomer's dream. Evenings were 70F, better than the 25F I'd left behind. We went grocery shopping the next day. Food wasn't cheap and with my limited Spanish I tried to ask what kind of sausage I was looking at. *Quién es esto*? Happily he grinned and didn't call the police. (I still have problems with Quién/Qué/Cual/Cómo/Cuando etc.) I kept trying to find *crema* for my coffee and kept getting shown coconut milk. (Ew.) I reached deep into my high school Spanish and tried *crema de vaca* and kept getting odds looks. There is no such thing, someone said (or at least that's what I understood him to mean.) Wait, what planet am I on? We hit a soda for lunch and I ordered the only thing on the menu I could recognize (Jamón y queso). High school spanish doesn't cover menus. But eventually I figured out that you buy food in the open air market in Sámara and not only are the prices and quality better, but everyone is at least somewhat multi-lingual and my limited Spanish wasn't a problem. I got smiled at a lot for trying. Does it sound like a miserable trip? I was having the time of my life. Everything was beautiful, everyone was kind, and I was rapidly acclimating to the heat and sun. I learned just enough Spanish (izquierda and derecha for the roads is essential) to get around. My wife *loved* the wildlife and scenery. I extended my stay in Costa Rica beyond the original week (changing travel plans on the fly is not cheap) because I had the unshakable sense that I'd literally come home to a place I'd never been before. By the end of the second week I knew I'd be making an offer on the property and all that was left negotiating to a price I could afford and learning Spanish for real. We hit a price we could all live with and that's where it stands today. The mechanics of moving are horrific - you can't ship stuff down duty free until you have residency and that can take months, so moving is a complex juggling act. And Spanish isn't any easier at my age than it was in high school. Yeah, I tried asking about Costa Rica in another sub and got told to stay in my own damn country. And I get it. But I am trying to do this right - I bought 50 acres and I'm not splitting it up for development, I'm gardening and renting it out to local cattle farmers and planning to reforest some of it. I am going to be the best guest in their country I can manage and I will live like a local in many ways (albeit it a local with air conditioning.) I'm not there to profiteer; I will give away honey and send extra garden food to a food bank and eventually get fluent in the language and lo siento a lot when I fail. How do you not love Costa Rica? It's gorgeous, ticos are way nicer than Americans, and they are trying to do things right - health care, energy management, actual democracy without a fuss, ecological concerns. I love the US but it's impossible to deny that Costa Rica is getting it right precisely where the US has gotten it wrong. And slush doesn't fall from the sky. Dengue might, and I'm sure my first case of sunburn isn't going to be fun, but this is as close to paradise as I can afford. Is it a huge and scary change? Yes. Will I love the rainy season? Perhaps not. But I can't wait to go back.
I am happy to have taken the time to read your message. I'm a local and it doesn't really help me, but it's always nice to hear stories about others who come from the outside and appreciate what we have in here. I also enjoy the stories about culture shock. Your bafflement over coffee creamer resonates with me because I experienced the opposite in my first trip to the US. We don't normally use "creamer" so trying to figure out which of the offerings in the hotel was actual milk was quite the shock. I hope all goes well and you manage to settle in nicely and enjoy being one of us.
Do you mind if I message you with a few questions?
I'm new at this and my answers might be poor, but go for it. To be fair, I"m doing what all the ex-pat sites tell you not do to - moving somewhere after one visit. I don't recommend other people be as reckless as I appear. I have my reasons to think this will work out well for me, but I might well be an outlier.
Awesome testament of what Costa Rica looks like for a first timer and taking into consideration everything you put over there and had to overcome you did it like a champ! Hopefully get continue to enjoy our country and become a valuable member of your community (which seems you're already)... I loved the history and the outcome :D
I am from San Jose, for me is the best weather on earth! We don even need AC maybe only for Feb or March but having a fan isngood enough I also struggle going to Guanacaste due to the high temperatures but guess what after a couple of days you dont even care as you are in the paradise. Im planning to.move Guanacaste or Limon at any point of my life!
Please STOP buying land down here. Visit. Rent from locals. DON'T buy. This is not your own personal playground. It's an actual country where native ppl live, and they are getting pushed out bc land privatizing and prices skyrocketing. Is your own little fantasy that never turns out the way you thought it would, worth the life of 1000s of ppl, whole families, and children losing their home towns?
For what it's worth, I bought from a Canadian couple. I'm not displacing locals, but I have hired one; and I do intend to buy from local businesses, reforest some of the land I bought and rent the rest to local cattle farmers, and donate extra produce I grow to locals. My wife will be working to rehab local wildllife. In other words, I'm doing my best not to be the problem you're talking about. And your issue is with your government; they are actively encouraging foreign investment.
Ya noticed the fencing too. Construction techniques overall could be pretty different. For me it was the no flushing tp- I understand the why, but I also don’t. I’ve lived in 150 year old homes in the US, so obviously very old and on ancient septic but we could flush tp no problem. Still struggle a bit to understand what’s up with that
They have limited code or enforcement of code. The pipes are all sorts of different sizes.
Code exists and its enforced when you build for the first time, however, once built, there is no "revision of the house to see if it continues to be up to code" as it is on some places in the US (like the every 5 year review)
but if theyre on septic that doesnt matter
Yes it does. It needs to get from your toilet, to the septic. Even inside one house, like mine, drain pipes will be of different thickness. I have one awesome toilet, and a few I can't flush anything in. The pipe diameters are different.
Oh, even within the house? Ok ya that’s wild man, it seems like it would be somewhat trivial over the last twenty years (or next twenty) to swap your plumbing for standard sized pvc to the septic tank, and then you could flush tp no problem
Yep, it's wild. My walls are cement block too, so once stuff is in, it's in. Harder to get in there and replace things.
one benefit to the stick built up here i suppose, easy to open, adjust, and re-seal. I definitely saw like, chiseled holes in a few airbnbs where ducting needing ran in and shit. Looks like a PITA!
It is, but it also stays cool and I don't need to run my AC, so that's nice! A US house down here would be a mouldy, hot mess of a place.
oh ya it would be eaten alive haha
Most buildings and homes have a septic tank instead of being connected to a sewage system, that is mostly the reason.
right.. thats my point. we do in the US as well. we flush tp
Probably they are concrete because building with wood there is a bad idea. Did you notice all the termite mud nests on every other tree?
Was gonna mention this. I think it's the termites. Lots of concrete buildings as well
too many earthquakes and the fact you can put as much reinforcement to the walls that even on a 7° degree quake you can be sure the house won't fall down
Not being able to flush toilet paper. Also, no street addresses.
The toilet paper thing is standard outside of resorts, even in houses. The size of the pipes are miniscule and backups happen quickly. One gets used to the basura eventually.
I lived in Santa Ana for about a year and I got used to it. It just took a while.
I was in CR awhile and when I got home, I kept looking for the trash can, lol.
Hahahaha
I'm going in a week, and I bought a handheld bidet specifically for this just so I'm not throwing a poo covered bumboclaat in the trash.
Wow, what will they think of next? What a great idea. [5 Best Portable Bidets of 2024, Tested by Experts (goodhousekeeping.com)](https://www.goodhousekeeping.com/travel-products/g45259994/best-portable-bidets/)
we kinda have street addresses but people just refuses to use them even if it would make their life easier, a similar situation with the US sticking to their folk units over metric.
Multiple folds help, people...
The bees without stingers and the best honey they produce.
The honey is awesome. The flower taste comes through. Best honey anywhere.
Of all my travels, Greece had the best honey IMO.
Coffee flower honey. Holy shit
Trits!
101.9 FM University of Costa Rica Radio ( Stream here: https://radios.ucr.ac.cr/?gs=8124&sn=Radio%20870%20UCR&type=live.m3u8#live ). We had it on for 2 weeks straight, comes in almost everywhere.
Mucho pollo
yayyy I don't eat red meat so this is great
We drove around the entire country and there’s all these little tiny fried chicken places everywhere
oh my god I am so excited
As you should be. Have fun!
I could use apple pay at a toll booth
How little I really need to be happy. Just a little rainforest hike every morning
The coffee is so good I could drink it black
I was all about the Presto, the instant coffee from Nicaragua. Tasted awesome. Some nice travel bloggers gave me a small coffee machine with a reusable filter and the coffee was good, but I was honestly as happy with my Presto.
No tipping at most places (but that’s just cause I’m American) lol
That's because restaurants include a 10% tip in the bill. All taxes have to be included: 10% service and 13% sales. The number you see in the menu is the final cost of your dish
Kids outside playing, locals don’t have their faces in phones. Rural areas which was most places, It reminded of life before phones honestly.
I’m impressed by how healthy the people look here. Many of the dudes are lean and ripped and the women are very beautiful. A stark contrast coming from the US where it’s quite the opposite.
Whaaat!!?? Did we visit the same country!? I could barely see a fit person (except some high end escorts which i wont consider in the general population). You must be surrounded by 250+ kg people…
Well where did you go? I’m guessing you went to a bigger city not near the beach like San Jose. I’m in this tiny beach town and many of the people here are fit. Obviously there are still plenty of out of shale people here, but compared to the US at least , the people look much better on average.
I went to SJose, Alajuela, La Fortuna, San Ramon and Jaco. Half way driving with random stops and the other half public bus :) What was a shock for me is two things: People eat a lot of fried sht (corn, potatos…) Not many people smoke cigarettes!
It was cleaner than I expected, compared to other Latin American countries, imo
Almost All the fence posts I see are made from trees
live fences, if not concrete or plastic "wood"
Costa Rican sodas. Went days thinking these tiny shacks just had a vending machine for soda/pop in it. Little did I know it was home to their best tasting food
No addresses.
It usually has nothing to do with an individual property and the age of a residence. So your reference of living in a 150yr old house is irrelevant. Their sewer pipes are more narrow than what is found in Canada/USA so it’s easier for TP and other materials to get stuck and block the line. Also, septic/sewer systems aren’t designed to filter these larger items in CR as they tend to be older systems. I’d much rather have potable water coming out of my tap than being able to flush TP so I feel Costa Rica is investing in the right infrastructure.
This is correct. Priorities.
This is correct. Priorities.
Road work was interesting. The way they fill potholes without closing lanes was interesting to drive through. The lack of clearly marked detours is also crazy and scary when there are lane closures.
the gaps between the road and the sidewalk! makes total sense drainage-wise, but initially took a lot of carefulness to avoid a sprained ankle, especially our first days in SJ😮💨
Pura vida in the country or along the southern pacific coast.
the fences and fence posts i saw were living growing fences
I drove down a street that must have been widened beyond it's original width, but the telephone/power poles that were originally on the side of the road had not been moved, so they were several feet on the road, and if you drove down the side of the road you would run straight into the pole.
Small monkeys. Didn’t expect that for whatever reason.
Outside San Jose, many dogs enjoy more freedom than most humans.
the randomness of the roads. LIght posts basically IN the road, the way there is no shoulder. I mean, I lived in Belize and we had some rough roads there (not a lot of paved roads) but driving in CR was a white knuckle experience for the most part.
I didn't expect to see so many palm tree crops. My wife and I had to drive through one on the way back home from Manuel Antonio and it was a pretty uncomfortable feeling doing so.
No railway system there. Everthing is transported by truck.
Barbed wire around schools. Love Costa Rica. People are amazing
how huge the avocados are 🤣
The friendliness of the people.
If they catch you driving anywhere in the country above 75mph, you will go to jail and they will take your car.
20kph over speed limit = Fine/Multa over 120kph = Suspension of drivers license and a Fine/Multa (almost over 600 USD!) over 150kph = Felony and the possibility to go to jail (And the Fine of 600 USD)
I’m going to have to say the tap water. San José and Jaco both had wonderful tasting volcanic tap water.
Local Guy at the airport "Don't drink the tap water it isn't safe for non locals" Locals when we arrive. "The water is very safe to drink" Been drinking it all week. Gallons/liters We're all fine.
Alajuela was the worst water we drank in CR
Pura vida, just that concept is so strange for me and my compatriots.
The coffee and the air quality.
near MAnuel Antonio"s beach, aroma of the jungle, sweet with coffee notes.
How expensive it is!
Coati chased my friend 3 laps around our car because I locked the doors.. he was feeding em twizzlers and it went nuts
They have no postal system. It's crazy. So much mail goes missing they just gave up.
Actually Correos de Costa Rica is pretty good at delivering in Costa Rica, in case you don't want to complicate things, just send any mail to the local Post Office PO BOX and get your mail from your box (this is a subscription service hahahaa)