COSTA RICA / NICARAGUA
By Tom Neal
Bigfoot Trails Basecamp | Independent Adventure Media
In January 2025, we took a short trip south. Mom, my wife, and I drove to Portland, Oregon, the day before we flew out, and stayed the night at the Holiday Inn Express. We arrived a little early so I could take advantage of the Danner Boot Company headquarters being there and buy a new pair of boots for work. The added benefit of the discounted price was no sales tax in Oregon. Double win!
Early the next morning, we woke up to play the airport game with TSA. Everything went well, and the flight to Houston was pretty uneventful. A dull and boring flight is always great! Whenever I get to Texas, I like to eat at Whataburger, just a small treat we hadn't had in years.
After leaving Houston, we flew into San Jose, Costa Rica, getting in around 10 p.m. After having been up since 4 a.m., we were all pretty much exhausted, but we picked up our rental car and drove the long distance to the hotel for the night.
All the way across the parking lot.
Getting around San Jose by GPS was a royal pain in the ass. I finally opened up my OnX Offroad app and plotted our route out of town, getting us to the La Paz Waterfall Gardens for a little Costa Rican wildlife tour.
After seeing so many cool critters and taking a nice little walk to multiple waterfalls, we drove out to La Fortuna to our Airbnb. We got the car unloaded and drove down to Mundo de Perezosos for a private tour to view sloths and monkeys on a private ranch.
This was a pretty cool place and very informative. We learned a lot about monkeys and heard plenty of them, but only saw a couple of sloths. All in all, it was a pretty cool adventure. We then went grocery shopping with the locals and cooked up a great dinner at the house before playing in the pool.
The next morning was a little wet. Not too rainy, but misty as we drove to the Sky Adventure Park for the best zip lining I have done to date.
They got us harnessed up and loaded onto a tram to take us up the mountain through the rainforest and above the canopy, with some beautiful mountain views along the way. It was awesome. Breathtaking.
Once we reached the top, we hit seven zip lines back to the restaurant. The longest line was over 2,400 feet long and 650 feet above the canopy.
Needless to say, it was frickin' AMAZING!
The weather didn't hold out too well for us, but it was better than the group behind us. We had a wet mist the whole time. One line we ran took us to speeds of around 45 mph, which just reminded me of riding the bike at home.
The "rain" felt like needles puncturing my face. Picture a face tattoo. That's how it felt.
Made me want to go get on a bike and ride!
After the last line, we ditched the gear and sat down for lunch. As we sat down, the sky above got dark, and the clouds decided to DUMP rain hard. I kinda felt sorry for the groups still out on the lines at that point.
Lunch was at the Chillout Restaurant, and the food was AMAZING. This was our first meal in the country and turned out to be the second-best meal we had there. We only had one meal that wasn't good, so that is saying a lot!
After lunch, we wandered the trails, crossing hanging bridges and suspension bridges to see some amazing views of the rainforest canopies and canyons. At this point, I fell in love with Costa Rica, with the exception of the humidity.
We then loaded our soaking-wet bodies into the rental car and proceeded to drive, and drive, and drive.
We had a four-and-a-half-hour drive out to Tamarindo to an all-inclusive resort, the Occidental Tamarindo. This place was pretty amazing. The service was great, and the grounds and rooms were fantastic, but the buffet needed help, in my opinion. The food was okay, but not great.
We stayed there for a few days, and on the first full day's night, we did a private turtle tour. A local guide picked us up in his personal truck and took us through some sketchy-looking areas, out through the forest and down to the beach.
We had ZERO idea where we were or how to get back if something happened.
I am ALWAYS on guard and almost always have a sense of direction and an escape plan if something happened. By the time we hit the beach, my only "plan" was to wait out the night and walk the beach at first light to get back.
Well, if something happened that night, we'd have been screwed!
But obviously nothing bad happened. Actually, everything good happened.
Not only did our guide find a turtle nesting, it was an old momma who was digging to lay her eggs. We were only supposed to be out there for an hour, but that turned into about two and a half hours.
Mom and my wife were basically up the turtle's butt getting pictures. They could have EASILY reached over to pet the turtle if they wanted to.
It was an awesome experience watching momma dig the nest, lay her eggs, and bury it all back up.
What a great night.
So now we had seen the process of nesting as well as digging up, rescuing, and setting baby sea turtles free while in Mexico.
Life is so good!
The next couple of days we just chilled out and relaxed at the resort, checking out the pool and the beach before heading out for more adventures in other lands.
After checking out of the resort, we cruised on over to Palo Verde Boat Tours to take a fun excursion out to see crocs, gators, monkeys, sloths, birds, and more. It was a pretty cool little trip. Not the highlight, for sure, but it was a good experience.
When we returned, the family fed us a Costa Rican lunch at their home, which was amazing. One family member was making pottery and clay animals, and while he was making the pieces, he educated us on the materials he used.
No paint.
Just different parts of the land used to color in his amazing pieces of art.
Needless to say, we had to support him and purchased a few items.
We then finished our driving part of the adventure by heading to Liberia for the next few nights.
This was where we had our worst meal and our best meal.
The first day in Liberia was short. We woke up to a guide picking us up and taking us to Nicaragua.
Holy shit, what an adventure that was!
Our guide was some "local celebrity bull rider" who had all these contacts and assured us our border crossing was going to be smooth, fast, and painless.
As we approached the border, there were MILES of cars waiting to cross.
Our plan was to walk across, then meet up with his partner in Nicaragua, who had a car there for us.
He drop-kicked us at the border, told us to "wait right here" while he parked the van, and disappeared.
We waited for about 20 minutes for him to return.
After he did, he had us get in line, but took our passports.
I was very hesitant.
He ran off for about another 30 minutes.
When he finally returned, he told us ALL of his contacts were off that day, but he had a plan.
He took Mom by the arm and started walking to the front of the line.
My wife and I followed.
About halfway up, he turned around and was shocked to see us following.
He said we were supposed to wait in line.
Well shit, NOW you tell us?
So we waited next to a police truck near "no man's land" for him to return with our passports and my mom.
Once they got to the front of the line, the crowd roared and yelled, and I knew they were upset with our guide cutting to the front. But he did it. He escorted the "frail old lady" through, and we followed.
It was a very interesting experience, to say the least.
But we were only OUT of Costa Rica and into No Man's Land.
We weren't into Nicaragua yet.
As we got into the customs building, our guide's bullshit didn't change much. He acted like he was the top shit, but slowly faded. It was entertaining to watch him jump all over the place.
At one point, I watched as he put his bag down, along with our passports, on a table, then walked over to a border agent.
When he left the station, they waved us over and we walked out the door, leaving our passports on the table.
I quickly snatched them up.
He claimed he was supposed to hold them all day.
After we got into Nicaragua, my wife snuck the passports into the conversation. She knew what had happened, and he lost his mind while searching his pockets and his pack for them.
After about 45 seconds of watching him search, I pulled them out of my pocket and told him he had left them on the table.
Nicaragua was absolutely beautiful.
Even though it's on the U.S. State Department's list of countries not to visit, the people, the culture, and the country were all beautiful.
The roads were well maintained, way better than the Costa Rican roads.
We had a wonderful Nicaraguan lunch before seeing some beautiful scenery and Lake Nicaragua.
I never thought I would say this, but I had a good time touring the chocolate factory. The guide there was fun as hell.
We also took a horse-drawn carriage ride through town with another local bullshitter. I'm not sure if 20% of what he said was true or not, but he had some good stories along our tour through town.
Entertaining, to say the least.
But not as entertaining as our return into Costa Rica.
To back up a little to the morning when we went TO Nicaragua, our guide needed to "stop at the boss's wife's house to get the cash needed for the border crossing."
He got a backpack from the "boss's wife" that never left him the whole day.
Well, on the way back to the border, he had to stop and pick up another guide that he would be traveling with the next day.
When we got there, the backpack vanished, and he had a box wrapped in black plastic.
I immediately thought a drug deal just happened.
When we got to the customs building, we had an easy time getting out of Nicaragua and into No Man's Land, and our guide sketched our way back to Costa Rica.
We had to have one bag go through the X-ray, so he asked me to put my backpack through, and he slid his box off to the side.
After going through customs, he had us wait, with his box, in a dark, sketchy area while he went to get the van.
Now, keep in mind, EVERYTHING you read says not to go out at night as a tourist.
Well, here we are, standing basically in No Man's Land, no passports, no guide, no clue what's in this damn box, and here comes a few dudes toward us.
I immediately went into defense and protection mode.
Before I could say anything, Mom said we were waiting for our guide, gave his name, and this dude stepped off about 10 yards and kept an eye on us until our guide showed up.
On the way back to the Airbnb, we had to stop to drop the package at his "boss's house."
Funny, this wasn't the same house his "boss's wife" lived in.
But the package was left, a picture was taken of the package on the doorstep, just like Amazon, another dude got in the van, and off to the house we went.
Very interesting day.
Very interesting border crossing.
I am 95% sure we were just involved in a drug-smuggling operation, but we have no way of really knowing what truly went down.
I am smart enough to keep an eye on this, but NOT ask any questions.
Our last day in the country, we pretty much took it easy and went on a couple hikes at Las Pailas Park. We saw some beautiful waterfalls and mud pots, rainforest to barren landscape. Very cool place, although not temperature-wise. Hot and humid.
But we knew that going into the trip!
After leaving the park, we decided we would walk to dinner at this sketchy-looking place a block away from the house.
7 Fuegos was the name of the restaurant.
And yep, you guessed it.
The BEST food we had was here!
Not only was the food spectacular, the service was the absolute best we experienced ANYWHERE in the world.
My mom and my wife are diabetic, and Mom is vegetarian. This is a steakhouse, so we questioned whether she would find anything.
After explaining this to the waiter, he brought the head chef out to talk to Mom and get an idea of what she could have. Then he talked to my wife and came up with a plan for her.
I went for something I'd never had before: chimichurri steak.
I wasn't sure what chimichurri was, but upon the first bite, I knew I had found heaven.
Mom's meal came out as vegetables and a couple of other things, and she was extremely satisfied. My wife's meal was great too.
We loved the food and service so much that we paid double what the bill was by giving a huge tip.
They stopped us as we were leaving, trying to give us money back and explain what we'd done, but we assured them that we purposely paid extra and that was the tip for them.
They were almost as happy with us as we were with them.
It was an awesome way to leave Costa Rica.
I don't think I ate anything the next day because I didn't want the chimichurri steak flavor to ever leave my mouth!
Here it is, eight months after returning home from this trip, and I still think about that wonderful steak at least twice a month. Sitting here typing this post, my mouth is watering thinking of this amazing piece of meat that was cooked perfectly.
I found chimichurri seasonings and have made MANY different meals with it. Great on burgers too, by the way.
But I now make my steak with a butter and chimichurri concoction, which comes out amazing!
One of the best parts of traveling is returning home with part of the culture you just visited and having it stick with you.
I have since turned a few other people onto this amazing seasoning and way of cooking.
And every once in a while, when I make that steak, I'm right back in Costa Rica.
Not bad for a trip that started with a pair of boots in Portland and ended with a steak I still can't stop thinking about.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Tom Neal is the founder of Bigfoot Trails Basecamp, an independent adventure media project built around real experiences rather than destination lists and polished travel content. He writes about the people, places, vehicles, roads and unexpected situations encountered along the way.
