The boat ride from La Cruz takes ninety minutes, the coastline shifting from tawny beach to fractured basalt as you round the Santa Elena headland. Your captain cuts the engine fifty meters out—the cove is too shallow for a closer approach—and you slip into bathwater-warm surf, backpack hoisted, boots tied around your neck. Ashore, the sand is coarse and flecked with shell fragments; a troop of howlers watches from the acacia thicket, their guttural chorus echoing off the cliff.
“One of Guanacaste's few beaches reachable solely by boat, preserving a shoreline unchanged since the park's founding in 1971.”
Credit: UnsplashLong-tail boats moored in clear water
The forest here is deciduous, shedding leaves in the dry months to reveal gnarled branches and iguanas sunning on limestone outcrops. Trails carved by park rangers wind inland, past termite mounds tall as a man and strangler figs that have swallowed their host trees whole. Tide pools collect in the volcanic shelves at the cove's northern edge, harboring hermit crabs and juvenile damselfish.
You won't find Wi-Fi or a thatched-roof vendor selling coconuts. What you will find: the rasp of cicadas at midday, the slap of frigate birds diving for sardines, and the particular satisfaction of a beach that asks something of you in return for solitude. Pack everything in, pack everything out. The park doesn't negotiate.
