Three Day Adventure Tour

First hire your driver, tell him what you want to do and set a price for everything in advance. The first trip mentioned below is the trip I took with my husband and daughter in July of 2003, and it was truly awesome....I highly recommend this if you like adventure.

First stop...La Fortuna, where the Arenal Volcano is located. It's about a three hour drive from San Jose. Some people pay the driver's expenses and just have him tag along for the entire trip. While you stay at the better hotels, the drivers can stay at much cheaper places if you want to keep him nearby. Otherwise you can keep in touch by phone. Everybody in Costa RIca has a cell phone. You'll need to learn how to use the public phones and get a phone card down there so you can reach your driver by phone whenever you want. Also, if you just offer a couple hundred colones to someone to let you use their cell phone, you should have no problem at all getting people to lend you their phones.

The Arenal Volcano is active and if you're lucky, you can see the fire spewing out of the top of the volcano at night...I say "if you're lucky" because most of the time there are heavy clouds that form around the top of the volcano at night preventing you from seeing the fire spewing out. But during the day, if you look closely and use binoculars, you can see hot volcanic rocks spewing out of the volcano and as the rocks roll down the sides of the volcano, you can see it singe it's path leaving smoke in the rock's trail. It's cool (in a "hot" sorta way).

The best place to stay in Arenal is the Tabacon Lodge. The telephone number for Tabacon Lodge is: 1-877-277-8291 from USA, from CR (506) 256-1500. I recommend that you stay there one night. The place has hot pools from the volcano and they are in a gorgeous tropical setting. The grounds of the Tabacon Lodge are absolutely spectacular. Visit their web site at www.tabacon.com for views of the grounds and lodge. You can have lunch and watch the volcano there. And they also have a spa where you can get massages, manicures, etc. It's a good place to stay (even though I found that the rooms smelled like farts from all the sulphur from the volcano....but since men fart a lot, they are usually very comfortable there....however....we women are much more ladylike about farts and so we're a little more "put off" by the sulphuric smell)

>From Arenal/La Fortuna....I highly recommend that you arrange to take horses through the mountains to beautiful Monteverde (you can ask your tour company or driver to set all this up for you ..certainly the Tabacon Lodge will know how to set that up for you, so you can ask them about it when you make your reservation there) . They will arrange for your luggage to be sent ahead to your hotel at the second stop on your adventure trail, Monteverde (a/k/a the "Cloud Forest").

>From Arenal, you will spend three hours on horseback going up and down muddy hills, narrow paths, three rivers and brush going from Arenal to Monteverde. Of course a guide will lead you on your horse trek through the mountains. It's very exciting and adventurous. I truly highly recommend getting from Arenal to Monteverde that way...it's awesome beyond words.

Once in Monteverde you can stay at the Monteverde Lodge (257-0766). Stay there for the next two nights. Or you can opt to stay at a more basic lodge called Las Orquideas, which is smaller and more intimate and probably half the price of the Monteverde Lodge. The first night you will be wanting to rest and relax after your horseback ride adventure....and then the next day you can arrange to go on the SkyTrek Zip Line. That's totally awesome!! They attach you to a cable/pulley system that "zips" you over the tops of the trees of the rainforest. you "zip" from one platform to the next. You need to be in pretty good shape to do this because the hike from one platform to the next can be strenuous at times. But what an adventure that is!! It's a "must do". Once you are in Costa Rica you can call the place directly. The number is 645-5238 and they have a website www.skywalk.co.cr

There is only one area code in the entire country, so wherever you are, you just need to dial seven numbers within the country's boundaries. Once you are there in Costa Rica you never need to add an area code to any number you dial.

On your third day, you will be driven back to San Jose from Monteverde. The road out of Monteverde is very bumpy. For about three hours you rock and roll your way down the mountain. It's not the most comfy ride, but hey...it's a little slice of the Costa Rica experience. When you take horses to Monteverde, you get to miss that bumpy three hour ride on the way there...so that's good. Of course the horse ride offers bumps and rough rides of its very own....but that's an adventure that you will talk about for the rest of your life. Trust me on that one.

Well, that's my personal experience recommendation for your three days of seeing Costa Rica. There are many other options, of course, but that's what I suggest if you want adventure.

If you don't want adventure, just to see the Costa Rican culture...I recommend taking three one-day trips. One day your driver takes you to the Bosque de Lluvioso (the rainforest) about an hour's drive from San Jose. The next day you can go see La Paz Waterfalls (about an hour and a half's drive from San Jose) where you'll see gorgeous waterfalls, a butterfly garden and bird sanctuary...gorgeous gardens and hummingbirds galore. Maybe the third day you can go downtown and see a museum or two, and you can see the amazing National Theatre, and you can go to the Central Market for a little local color where they sell everything from meat, fish, flowers, fresh herbs from the rainforest, kitchen utensils, duffle bags, teeshirts, wood products made by local artisans, household supplies, shoes, clothes, handmade stuff of all sorts, etc. etc. you could probably even buy a live chicken there. It's an interesting place to visit. And the Volio coffee factory is across the street from the Central Market. There, you can buy a big bag of ten small bags of Volio coffee to bring home as gifts...it's easy and cheap and very Costa Rican....coffee is their biggest export product).

Make sure, if you are having plastic surgery with Dr. Lev, that you take these tours BEFORE your surgery...you will definitely not be in shape to take tours after your surgery...so plan your adventures before your surgery, please. People who venture out on tours after their surgeries live to regret it!! After your surgery, REST, REST, REST.....until you go home.....and then after you get home.....you'll still need to rest. It takes six weeks for you to get your "old" energy level back. That's why those first two weeks after your surgery spent at the recovery retreat in Costa Rica are of the utmost importance for setting the stage for your entire six month healing process. So....NO TOURING or anything strenuous at all....for six weeks after your surgery!!! Ok? Promise?? Good. I'm happy now.