National Geographic has published a new essential travel guide that shows Costa Rica as Central America’s ultimate nature escape, a country where rainforest meets reef and volcanoes rise above cloud forest. The guide, written by New York and Lima-based journalist Nicholas Gill and published Oct. 22, credits decades of environmental stewardship for protecting that natural wealth.
It holds Costa Rica up as a model for sustainable tourism and maps six regions for visitors, from Arenal to the Caribbean coast. It is the latest in a string of international nods from the publisher this year. National Geographic named Costa Rica a forest bathing paradise in August, and the country took two top honors at the National Geographic UK Travel Awards in October.
Gill describes Costa Rica roughly the size of West Virginia that packs misty cloud forest, surf beaches, active volcanoes and jungle into a short drive. He points to scarlet macaws, three-toed sloths hanging from cecropia trees and howler monkeys calling at dawn as the everyday backdrop.
The guide splits the year into two seasons. The dry months from December to April bring the best beach weather on the Pacific coast, along with higher prices and bigger crowds. The rainy months from May to November bring greener landscapes, fuller rivers and waterfalls, and thinner crowds, with September and October singled out as especially good on the Caribbean side.
Hans Pfister, co-founder of the Cayuga Collection hotel group, told the magazine that the stretch from mid-April to mid-December is what he calls “wildlife season.” He said the rainforest is at its most active then, with migrations and nesting cycles at their peak. Arenal and the northern highlands lead the regional tour.
The guide highlights trails across old lava fields in Arenal Volcano National Park, canopy ziplines, rappelling down waterfalls, rafting on the Balsa and Sarapiquà rivers, and the hot springs around La Fortuna. In the Tilarán Mountains, Monteverde’s cloud forest gets attention for its hanging bridges, moss-draped trees, glasswing butterflies and the resplendent quetzal.
The guide also recommends night walks for kinkajous, tarantulas and glowing fungi, and notes the area’s Quaker dairy-farming roots. Quetzals have been turning up beyond the classic hotspots too, including a first recorded sighting at a little-known Cartago refuge last month.
Guanacaste is shown as the home of Tico cowboy culture, with the surf of Tamarindo, the turtle nesting beach at Ostional, the resorts of the Papagayo Peninsula and the bubbling mud pots of Rincón de la Vieja National Park. Next door, the Nicoya Peninsula draws praise for Santa Teresa, Nosara, the year-round surf at Playa Guiones, Cabo Blanco Absolute Natural Reserve and its status as one of the world’s Blue Zones.
On the Central Pacific, Manuel Antonio National Park anchors what the guide calls the most cinematic mix of rainforest and beach. On the Caribbean coast, it points readers to Puerto Viejo de Talamanca, the reefs off Cahuita National Park, cacao farms and Afro-Caribbean cooking built on coconut milk and seafood.
Food gets its own section. Gilberto Briceño, chef and owner of Road Less Traveled Cuisine in Playa Potrero, told the magazine that the roadside sodas keep Costa Rica fed day to day, and he named Soda y Mirador Cinchona in Alajuela as home to the best tortilla aliñada he has tasted. Chifrijo, casado, Caribbean rondón and ceviche round out the list.
Three hotels are named. El Remanso is an eco-lodge above the canopy on the Osa Peninsula, Hotel Belmar is a family-run Monteverde retreat with its own microbrewery and regenerative farm and The Springs Resort & Spa sits on 67 hectares (165 acres) of hot springs facing Arenal Volcano.
The practical advice is standard but useful. The guide recommends a 4×4 for rural roads in the rainy season, learning some Spanish before arriving, and the 16-day Camino de Costa Rica trail for hikers who want to cross the country from the Caribbean to the Pacific. It also notes that Costa Rica abolished its army in 1948.
On safety, Gill calls Costa Rica one of the safest places in the Americas but warns of organized and petty crime in parts of San José and in port areas, and advises against flashing phones or jewelry or walking empty streets at night. The Judicial Investigation Agency (OIJ) recorded 873 homicides in 2025 and has projected fewer than 800 for 2026, with most killings tied to the local drug trade and score-settling between gangs.
The sustainability section asks travelers to book lodges certified under the Costa Rican Tourism Board’s Certification for Sustainable Tourism, hire official guides in fragile areas, stay on marked trails, use reef-safe sunscreen and never feed wildlife. It notes that nearly a third of the country’s land is protected.
The spotlight lands as the tourism industry heads into high season on uneven footing. Figures from the Costa Rican Tourism Board (ICT) show 2.31 million international arrivals through September, up 4.8% from a year earlier, but September arrivals fell 2.4%, the second monthly decline in a row, after air arrivals from the United States dropped 13.9% in August.
The promotion group Proimagen Costa Rica has pointed to the country’s high prices compared with its neighbors and the strength of the colón against the dollar as pressures on demand. Rivals to the north are also competing harder for nature travelers.
For a destination that sells itself on forests, wildlife and protected land, a high-profile guide from one of the world’s best-known nature brands is the kind of attention money struggles to buy. Whether it translates into arrivals will show up in the ICT’s numbers over the coming dry season.
