High season is starting, and several of Costa Rica’s best-known national parks have a trail, an entrance or a whole sector closed. Others are open but are letting in fewer people under stricter rules. Here’s what’s shut, what’s open with conditions, and what to check before you buy a ticket.
Entry to most national parks is sold only online, and many parks close one day a week. Volcano parks can change their rules with little notice, so check the park’s official page the day before you go.
1. Marino Ballena National Park
The Piñuela sector closed on Monday, Nov. 9, and is expected to stay closed for six months because its facilities have deteriorated. You can’t walk in, and boats can’t drop off or pick up passengers there. The bathrooms and showers at Piñuela are also closed. The Uvita, Colonia and Ballena sectors stay open.
If your tour lands at Piñuela, ask your operator how the plan has changed.
2. Manuel Antonio National Park
The Punta Catedral trail is temporarily closed. It’s the loop over the headland between the park’s two main beaches, with lookouts over the Pacific. No reopening date has been given. The rest of the park is open Wednesday through Monday. It closes every Tuesday.
3. Poás Volcano National Park
Poás is open, but since Aug. 28 it has admitted about half as many people and you must wear a helmet. The rules followed a moderate eruption that threw rock from the crater. The park now admits 1,064 visitors a day, down from 2,052. Only two trails are open: the main trail to the crater lookout and the Sombrilla de Pobre trail. Up to 56 people at a time can stand at the lookout, for 20 minutes per group.
The limits stay in place until volcanic activity drops enough to lower the risk. Book early, because half the daily tickets means they sell out faster.
4. Rincón de la Vieja National Park
The trail to the active crater is still closed. It stays shut until activity drops enough for the climb to be considered safe. The volcano has been one of the country’s most active this year. Five districts of Upala and Liberia near the volcano have been under a yellow alert since Oct. 1.
The Las Pailas sector, with its mud pots and steam vents, is open Tuesday through Sunday, well below the summit.
5. Corcovado National Park
The Sirena, Los Patos and El Tigre sectors were closed to tourists through October for maintenance and the heaviest rains. Only San Pedrillo and La Leona stayed open.
Daily limits also apply. Sirena takes 366 visitors a day, San Pedrillo 120, and La Leona, Los Patos and El Tigre 80 each. Before you travel, confirm with your guide or lodge that your sector has reopened.
Playa Langosta, near Tamarindo
This isn’t a trail closure. Environmental authorities are investigating a die-off of fish, sharks, rays and birds in the San Francisco estuary at Playa Langosta. They have asked people not to alter the estuary’s mouth to the sea without permission.
The national park system has more than two dozen protected areas open to visitors, and most trails are running normally this season. Tickets, schedules and closures are posted on each park’s official page, and those pages are the most reliable guide to what’s open on the day you plan to go.
