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The arrival to Costa Rica was like any other Carribean country - You have to wait in long lines in the heat to get through customs, pick up your luggage and then head off to your resort. I recommend bringing a change of clothes either before you arrive or while you wait in line to get through customs. Air Canada Vacations had a bus waiting to pick everyone up and take you to the Grand Papagaya. The whole process takes about an hour. Once there you have a cocktail waiting for you as you wait in line to check in. Overall a smooth process and as I said before no different from any other all inclusive set up.
Costa Rica though is an extremely beautiful country and I highly recommend people to explore the countryside as much as you can. The best tour company bar none to go with is Avispa Adventures to book all your excursions. They are an excellent tour company. You can book in advance by emailing or calling the owner, Amy and she will see to your every need. She provides not only the tours but any other things your would need to know about in Costa Rica. She is an US expat who fell in love with Costa Rica and stayed.
Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel
On the resort, we did some diving with the Dive Company situated at the Resort. The visibility was poor when diving. You would be lucky to have 25 ft of visibility. I am not sure if it is because of the location in the Pacific or the time of year we came. But it was not as good as what I have seen on the Carribean side. But you do see some great sealife (white tipped reef sharkes, lots of eagle rays, manta rays if you are lucky). It is just too bad that you can't spot them until they are up close and even then it still isn't nice and clear. Th resort dive company could have been better. They aren't very accomodating (their dives leave late as far as dives go - 9 am and they weren't very happy to move it to an earlier time so that you could do some other tours in the afternoon). Also their boat is old and needs repair. The dive master and boat captain were very good though and helpful.
For off the resort activities, I went on tours with Avispa Adventure and as I had mentioned above, they were excellent. I would go with no one else and when I go back I will book everything I want to do next time with them. What was really nice with them is they are quite flexibile with your schedule. As I mentioned above, the dive company wasn't very flexible and so we would come back later than I wanted from the dives but Amy made sure to be ready for us once we got back so that we could do other things with her to maximize the day. Very excellent with that. Again, I can't say enough good things with this company. Avispa and Amy are the best. The Miravelles Tour is absolutely great with Amy. Fun and lots to see and do. Whitewater rafting is a lot of fun. Palo Verde is great to see especially if you are into nature and wildlife. Hidden Treasures takes you to the Llanos de Cortez Waterfall and it is beautiful. If I had more time, I would see more of the region but that will be for another time with Amy.
Beach/Pools/Grounds
The pool was nice to swim in to cool off from the heat. The grounds were well kept and the view from the hotel is gorgeous. The hotel is situated on a hill so from the main building to the beach it is quite an elevation difference so be aware that at this resort there are a lot of stairs to climb. But it is a good way to build up an appetite for dinner. The beach isn't like the carribean beaches with their white sands - darker volcanic sand. And with the tide in there isn't much beach but that is usually late in the day. The water is warm and nice to swim in.
Other Comments
Overall, we enjoyed the hotel. Good service, Staff are super friendly there and everyone has a smile there. My best recommendation is where ever you are staying go with Avispa for your activities.
Restaurants and Bars
The Oriental and Italian restuarants are very good. The meals we had there very good. It is a la carte but you can order as much as you want. No issues with that. If you are a large party (greater than 6) the Oriental restaurant puts you in your own separate room where you sit close to the floor and it is excellent. The Buffet was good for buffet. However they don't have as much of a selection as some other places I've been. But the food overall was fine. This is the Carribean so you shouldn't be expecting five star here.
Rooms
The rooms were fine. Clean and spacious with good beds. Though not all the rooms have a safe as advertised. Air conditioning works so that really is the most important thing for when you are in the room. Otherwise we didn't spend much time in the room except to get ready and sleep. The rooms are set up in about a dozen buildings spread out throughout the grounds of the resort. So depending on where your room is, you could have a bit of a hike to get to the main building where the restaurants are. But they do have a shuttle to drive people around. Our room was in building 1 so nothing was far away.
This place was amazing
Hotel Adventure Inn
User Rating:
Sharkbait98 >
1 contribution(s)
Nov, 2008
Flew Continental arriving a couple of days early because I had concerns of my dive gear not making it. We stayed at Adventure Inn, San Jose until we cabbed over to the Marriot Courtyard for our pick up to be taken to Puntarenas to board the Okeanos Aggressor liveaboard going to Cocos Island. The Aggressor only picks up at the Marriot or the Alta but I didn't like the price tag that came with these hotels so we decided to stay at the Adventure in. The Adventure Inn was amazing and inexpensive. The cab ride to the Marriot was a mere 12 US so it more than made up for the cost of the Marriot. For 79.99 US per night (10% discount if paying cash) got you a nice BIG room, clean, great staff, and a full breakfast. This place was amazing. It was probably one of the best hotels I have stayed in. For every day you stay there you get free entrance to a water park that is about a 10 minutes walk. This hotel is owned by a Canadian who went there in 1994 and never came back. Nancy, who worked the front desk was very personable and did everything in her power to make our stay memorable. If you go to San Jose I suggest you stay at this hotel.
Anyway, we board the Okeanos and the trip out was rocky. There were four divers who got pretty seasick. I was lucky as I took Bonamine and it worked great for me. We get to the island 35 hrs later and anchor in a bay. We do our check out dive and it was awesome. White tip reef sharks everywhere, not to mention guinea puffers, lobsters, eels, plus a multitude of fish that I can't name. We do our "real" dive and hammerheads everywhere. All I can do is stare in awe. The week of diving was all hammerhead, white tip sharks, marble rays, eagle rays and a many fishes. I did four night dives and one was amazing. I got to watch about 50 white tip reef sharks go into a feeding frenzy about 3ft below me. WOW.... what else can I say.
Now about the liveaboard. The food was ok. Nothing special per say. Don't get me wrong. It must be hard to feed 22 divers all that food when you are 36hrs away from everything, but it was nothing to write home about. The boat staff (and that I mean non-divemasters or skiff captains) were amazing. There english wasn't the best but they did their best to accommodate everybody.
Now for the divemasters. In my opinion, I may as well have been diving on my own. I only saw them on two-three occations. It appeared they cared more about getting their personal underwater photos and videos than they did the clientel. There was one man who was on his fourth Okeanos trip and they didn't seem to mind showing him around personally. In fact, this man was apparantly so special that when two women on our skiff got hit with jelly-fish after our dive, the divemaster and captain thought it would be beneficial for this man to go and get footage of the island for 10 minutes before returning to the Okeanos where these women could get some vinegar to sooth the sting.
Another incident happened on our skiff. We were on our way to Alcyone (dive site) and the motor crapped out. No biggy. It happens. They tried and tried to get it going for about 10 minutes. So, as we are floating about in the skiff the boat captain calls the Okeanos. He called for approximately 5-10 minutes and NOBODY was responding. The other liveaboard was responding to us, but not ours. They did eventually get the boat going, but it was a bit unnerving knowing that if there had been a medical emergency then the Okeanos would not have responded. Overall my diving was amazing. In my opinion it could have been better if the divemasters would have paid half the attention to the clientel as opposed to their cameras. There were certain fish I did not see because only the divemasters knew where they lived and they were never around to show me, even after I had specifically asked to see them.
If I return to that magical place, I think I will probably pick "the other liveaboard".
On the way back from the island we had smooth sailing and sunsets and dolphins. Definately life altering. We got off of the boat and was transferred back to the Adventure Inn (which was nice because they really didn't have to transfer us back to our hotel, seeing as they only pick up at the Marriott Courtyard and the Alta ). The staff at the Adventure Inn was all happy to see us again and treated us great AGAIN..... Not only that, they gave us free transfers to and from the airport included in that price at the top... GREAT PLACE !! If you go to San Jose, make sure you stay there.
This of course is all in my humble opinion,
Everyone was friendly and the rooms were very clean.
Hotel Capitan Suizo
User Rating:
John and family of 4 from Wilmington, NC >
2 contribution(s) United States of America
Aug, 2005
We stayed at the Capitan Suizo for 5 days during our 9 day visit to Costa Rica. We did find the hotel to be a garden setting with a large pool and short walk to the beach. Everyone was friendly and the rooms were very clean. There is internet service, but only one terminal, so its hit or miss getting air time. The second level rooms have a nice balcony, but do not have air conditioning or a TV. We found this to be a real problem for us as it gets very hot and humid in the afternoon and evenings plus not having a TV can create some boring moments, especially with kids. The first floor units do have AC, so I would demand one of them if you want to stay there. The ceiling fans just don't cut it. We also had a few bug visits, but nothing that shocked us, as we came with warnings about that. The walk into Tamarindo is about 15 minutes over dirt roads. There are some good restaurants (Geicko's, Happy Days, Taco Stop). The town itself is not really for a family vacation. It is full of dirty, muddy roads with little to do. The Beach at Capitan Suizo is not good at all for snorkeling and there are a lot of rocks just below the water surface. Be sure to locate them at low tide for your safety. We found a lovely beach at Playa Conchal for both snorkeling and swimming. We also chartered a boat for 5 hours for $250 which was a highlight as we love to snorkel. We also did a horseback ride trip, prepared by a local by the name of Mario (your hotel staff will know of him), which was terrific. I would not go back to this hotel due to location (wanted snorkeling beach...go to Conchal), Town (not for family) and lack of AC. I would rate it 2 star.
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