Tour operator crosses border to offer the ultimate Caribbean experience

“If you want to do business in tourism in Costa Rica, the way to go forward is to find new ideas, which often means new destinations,” says Sonia Rojas, owner of a new travel agency Costa Rica Treasures. Although based in San José, Costa Rica Treasures is not limited by geographical boundaries.

Rojas goes on to say that Costa Rica is one of the most biologically diverse countries in the world – a treasure of flora and fauna, a natural wonderland of tropical forests, scenic rivers, exotic animals, secluded beaches, picturesque mountains and awesome volcanoes. However, what has not been exploited, according to her, is the richness of culture and togetherness in Central America.

This is why her offer to anyone, wanting to explore a bit more of the history and culture of Central America is to combine the Costa Rican Caribbean with the Panamanian archipelago, Bocas del Toro.

What Ms. Rojas does is to organize everything from the beginning to the end. If necessary she picks you up at the airport, where your journey begins. There are two types of packages: five-day and nine-day. In the nine-day package, the first two nights are spent at the beautiful Pachira Lodge in Tortuguero, where, depending on the season, a night’s turtle- watching can be organized. This is also an area where dozens of multiple canals form a small Costa Rican Amazon, to be experienced by boat.

From Tortuguero, in the northern part of Costa Rica, the package continues south to the Puerto Viejo area, which is the other very popular destination for those longing for Caribbean music, dancing and fine food. A night is spent at Cariblue hotel, whose créme caramel is to die for!

Day five, one of the most interesting and beautiful borders in the world is crossed: Sixaola is a Costa Rican border town, which is separated from Panama only by a bridge. However, no hassle is to be feared as Costa Rica Treasures has taken care of all the paperwork before reaching this point.

On the other side of the border the journey continues by private taxi and boat, which finally takes you to the hotel. There are a multitude of choices. The Hotel Bahia is a historic building and one of the oldest in the town. It used to serve as the headquarters of the United Fruit Company. In the hotel’s reception room one can still see a huge safe that once belonged to the UFC. The Bahia offers the lowest cost, but the richest cultural experience. For those looking for total privacy and luxury, an option is Punta Caracol Hotel. Here you can book one of five villas built along the water’s edge.

Bocas del Toro is considered historic for many reasons: The UFC had its headquarters, as well as its banana plantations, in Bocas del Toro. Moreover, long before the banana became a commercial product, Columbus discovered the region and called it Bocas del Toro. If you look at a map, there are two Bocas (mouths) – one of a Dragon and one of a Bull. The Dragon is the one through which he first attempted to enter this beautiful, white beached, palm treed archipelago, and the Toro is the one where he actually managed to sail on in.

Once in the Bocas del Toro, a visitor can dive, snorkel, visit national as well as marine parks, a turtle nesting beach, and a mangrove forest, or simply enjoy Caribbean relaxation under hundreds of palm trees.

The journey finishes in San José either by car or, once the flight path from San José to Bocas del Toros is opened, by plane.

As a pioneer in this type of combination package, Rojas is looking forward to combining Costa Rica with Nicaragua in the north. The options are endless, and certainly as the transportation infrastructure improves it will become easier and cheaper for tour operators and agencies to offer most anything. Moreover, in this time of globalization, tourism can also become a major stabilizer in countries since it provides income and opportunity to areas that have not necessarily always been the first priority of governments. At least the reception of this kind of tourism in the Costa Rican Caribbean has been very positive.