Místico Arenal Hanging Bridges — Attraction in La Fortuna

After reading several articles and blogs about this place, I was wrongly led to believe that the hanging bridges were a way to enable visitors to see into the tree tops of the forest canopy, so that we could see the birds and animals that lived there. They weren't at all. Despite arriving just after the park opened at 6am to get the best chance to see the wildlife and being among the only people there at that time, we didn't see any animals at all. It's true that we didn't hire a guide, but we walked very slowly and silently and really searched everywhere. We heard a few birds, but only saw one or two. The only other thing we managed to see was a few butterflies and insects. In this regard, this place was incredibly disappointing. Even after we finished walking around the whole park, we talked with other guests that we met at the end and only one couple actually saw any animals and that was just one coati. This place is not a good place to visit if you want to see animals in Costa Rica. Curi Cancha, Monteverde and Manuel Antonio are all far, far better, as it's much easier to see wildlife at all of these other places. However, the plants and trees there were really beautiful and we enjoyed our time there. There is also a pleasant waterfall to see, although bizarrely, it can't be seen from the Waterfall bridge. The paths and bridges are all clearly marked and it was easy to find our way around. There are about 10 or so bridges there, starting off short, low and fixed and getting longer, higher and more and more wobbly. If you have vertigo, you will struggle to cross some of these bridges, as a few are very long, very high and seriously wobbly, even without anyone else on them. If you arrive later, you will find many more people and each extra person on the bridge will make it shake more and more vigorously. There are many rules that you must follow in this place, one of which is not to bring any food and not to feed the (nonexistent) animals. Another rule is to keep quiet, so as not to disturb the invisible animals. It was therefore a real surprise to find many staff members in the park, none of which made any effort whatsoever to speak quietly. In fact, one group laughed and joked loudly together, ignoring this rule altogether. All in all, it was quite a disappointing experience and at over $30 USD each, I really couldn't recommend this place to anyone, except rich plant lovers. There are few, if any, animals here, and you can see better plants and trees at many other parks and reserves for less money. The nearby Los Lobos Hot Springs has far more incredible gardens for far less money, for example. I really can't understand why this place charges so much money and why it is so highly rated. It's really not worth it at all, despite what others say on...

We visited in late November with our family - 2 teenagers, 2 seniors and 2 adults. It happened to be raining heavily the day we visited so I was glad we had sturdy rain jackets and waterproof ponchos. The road to get to Mistico was fairly steep and windy, but our rented minivan (all-wheel drive but not 4-wheel drive) managed it ok. We reserved tickets in advance for a 10am entry time and were directed to park in the lower lot bc the upper lot was full. There was a large comfortable (free) shuttle bus that took us to the top/main entrance of the park. (It looked like you could also walk the road up). We chose to do a self-guided hike and that worked well for us because we could move at our own pace. We did see several guided groups, however, and the guides were sharing great information and natural history about the park. We really liked that there were multiple walking routes so our group could start together but let the grandparents branch off and do a shorter route while the rest of us continued and did the full hike with all 6 hanging bridges. Note: we had read that closed-toe shoes were required and hiking sandals were not allowed, but they allowed one member of our group to wear Teva sandals - he just had to sign an extra waiver to proceed. The walk itself was very easy in terms of intensity - no strenuous inclines and the path surface was very well maintained. The bridges themselves were beautiful and offered amazing views of the forest and the rivers below. They were fun to walk across. We didn’t seem much wildlife during our visit (2 spider monkeys at the very beginning) and that might have been because of the heavy rains. But the bridges and forest were gorgeous. I would absolutely recommend...

This is for the Mistico Twilight Hanging Bridges tour booked through the Mistico Park website for $52+tax ($63 incl. Taxes + fees). The basis of its appeal, according to the website is that more animals come out at night and I thought it'd be nice to see the park at sunset. The tour guide: Anwa(r)? Started at 6:30 pm on a Sunday evening, after rain showers. He was nice enough but just seemed tired. We walked mostly in silence for about 80% of the time. He named about 9 trees and found 5 frogs, a small snake and a couple of tarantulas in their holes to show us. I saw a small brown rodent scurry across our path towards the end, but didn't catch what it was. Not his fault that we couldn't see many animals, but it was kind of disappointing. It rained halfway through the tour and he provided flashlights when it started to get dark and water bottles and hand towels were provided at the end, at the front of the park. I guess the advantage of this tour is that there weren't any other people around because the park closed to public by this time, so no crowds or noise. But if I had to do it again, I'd do a self-walking tour right when the park opens. I booked transport ($30 round trip) because I was worried about the rain making for dangerous conditions on the road, but the path is so well-trodden that it was no big deal and I wouldn't hesitate to drive myself if I had to make the choice again. All in all, not worth the cost. Maybe during High season (not wet season), it would be worth it. But would not recommend this tour/guide. Also, maybe it's not necessary to book ahead, at least during wet season. It would be better to see how the weather is...