Costa Rica with Kids- Our 10-Day Itinerary

Mohit and I have traveled all over the world, and I have always been the travel researcher/ planner.  But when I started to dream and plan our Costa Rica vacation with kids (ours were 4 and 6 during our visit), I found the planning difficult.  We wanted to explore the country, not stay at a big resort the whole time.  I could not easily find recommended itineraries, had a hard time narrowing down which places we shouldn’t miss, and most of all, it was really hard to figure out how we would travel from place to place (would driving ourselves be easy enough?  How long would it take in the car with two potentially whiny kids in the backseat?).

So in the interest of saving others from the same frustration, here’s our 10-day itinerary, which ended up being perfect for our family (with 4 and 6 year old kids).  Due to the long travel distances between our stops (2 to 4 hours can feel awful long with 2 kids in the backseat!) and our long travel days to fly to/from Costa Rica from Boston, we made plans to start and end close to San Jose:

Day 1: ARRIVAL/ POAS

• Land at San Jose (Juann Santamaria International) airport at 4:39 pm
• Drive to Poas Volcano Lodge in Alajuela (1.5 hrs, mostly due to traffic getting out of San Jose, otherwise it would have been ~50 mins) 

Day 2: POAS (blog post here!)

• Morning visit to Poas Volcano
• Rest of the day at La Paz Waterfall Gardens
• Overnight at Poas Volcano Lodge

Day 3: ARENAL (blog post here!)

• Drive to Hotel Lomas del Volcan in La Fortuna (2 hrs)
• Pool/ lunch time
• Afternoon at Mistico Arenal Hanging Bridges

Day 4: ARENAL

• Day pass to enjoy hot springs at The Springs Resort & Spa
• Overnight at Hotel Lomas del Volcan

Day 5: ARENAL

• Morning at Ecoglide (zipline park)
  
• Afternoon rafting trip (booked through our hotel)
• Overnight at Hotel Lomas de Volcan

Day 6: PLAYA ESTERILLOS ESTE (blog post here!)

• Drive to Encantada Ocean Cottages (4.25 hrs)
• Afternoon at pool/ beach

Day 7: PLAYA ESTERILLOS ESTE

• Chill all day at pool/ beach
• Overnight at Encantada

Day 8: PLAYA ESTERILLOS ESTE

• Day trip to Manuel Antonio National Park
• Late lunch at El Avion
• Overnight at Encantada

Day 9: ALAJUELA (blog post here!)

• Morning yoga/ beach/ pool
• Drive to Xandari Resort & Spa (2.25 hrs)
• Afternoon at the pool/ hiking

Day 10: DEPARTURE

• 20 min drive to the San Jose (Juan Santamaria) airport for our 8 a.m. flight home

I have posted detailed reviews of each of the stops on our itinerary here:

• Poas
• Arenal / La Fortuna
• Esterillos Este/ Manuel Antonio
• Xandari Resort 

Besides our itinerary, the other thing I hemmed and hawed about during planning was our Costa Rica

rental car arrangements.  In the family travel groups I follow on Facebook, many people recommend Vamos for car rental.  By the time we were ready to book a car for the popular school vacation week, Vamos did not have any SUVs left available from the San Jose airport.  So we just went with the best price we could find (National Car Rental) and crossed our fingers there would be no hassle.  Other than the fact that the facility is a shuttle ride away from the airport (10 minutes in traffic, a pain with kids after a long day of travel), it was a pleasant, hassle-free experience, comparable to renting a car from any major chain in the U.S.  The rental office staff were pleasant and helpful, the car (Toyota Rush) was new and comfortable. The office is staffed 24-7, which we verified by returning our car on the last day at 5:15 a.m.

I was a bit nervous about driving in Costa Rica, since I’d read lots of traveler reviews complaining about bad roads, needing 4-wheel drive, and under-estimated travel times on Google maps.  We did not experience any of those inconveniences- I think conditions have improved and those comments are outdated.  The roads were well paved and generally wide enough for 2 cars to pass easily (the one exception was the first 20 minutes of driving from downtown San Jose until we reached the city outskirts- the city roads we took were steep uphill, twisty, and narrow enough that Mohit decided it would just be better to pull over and let cars pass- fingers crossed they would not hit us!).  

In fact, most roads were in better shape than the potholed roads in our hometown near Boston, Massachusetts!  We did not have 4-wheel drive, and we definitely did not need it. The only unpaved roads we drove on were the local road/ driveway leading off the main roads to our hotels in Arenal and Playa Esterillos Este, and these were fine in the dry season with a regular car.  Some of the roads were steep/ twisty since Costa Rica is mountainous in areas, but it was nothing scary (we've driven on much scarier roads in Morocco!).  

We paid for an international data pass on my iPhone from Verizon (about $10/day) while we were there and used Google maps to navigate. We had no issues (did not get lost) and found that Google accurately estimated travel times.