Costa Rica Rios - Adventure Vacations — Attraction in Turrialba

Exceptional from start to finish. We travel a lot and have used wonderful travel companies but this one was the most outstanding. Costa Rica is magical and all your companies will take you to great spots but the guides are what makes this company stand out. Manuel may be the happiest person. Spending 18 hours a day with us some days, he is so much fun interacting with adults and kids. Pura Vida embodied! Pablo, our ultra marathoner, farm and camp owner renaissance man is about the hardest worker I’ve seen. A dad of 3 girls, he is so patient and great with kids. Mao is a kick, such great encouragement all around. Andres aka Rasta Man the photographer and helper just loves life. He is so fun and made us all laugh all of the time. Carola, aka the unofficial mayor of Turrialba was fantastic On the canyoning. Logistically, it was perfect. Nice buses and vans and drivers, always right where you need them. Bags magically showed up from place to place. How they coordinated all of the moving parts is top notch.

The food? So good. We have a picky eater kid and I’m a vegetarian and we were all so happy with the fresh fruit, delicious veggies, rice, beans and proteins. While we went to a bunch of great restaurants some of the best were “grandma’s special recipe” meals the guides made at the eco lodge. The mojitos and jungle juice happy hours with fresh guacamole - yum! Snacks were perfect and right when we needed them.

The adventure? Wow! My son said he wasn’t looking forward to kayaking but then loved it. He pictured boring flat water but not at all. They company anticipated my 11 year old daughter might not want to go solo so took a double kayak and offered her solo, with me, or a guide. Great forethought. White water rafting? Just outstanding starting with class 2 rapids until we got used to it, then day 2 class 4s through canyons, past waterfalls, and mint green water. We’ve zip lined a lot but the views along the river made this special and the Tarzan swing was a thrilling unique experience. The ocean day was great too - beautiful beach and they provided the boogie boards and kayaks. Canyoning was so cool. I’ve rappelled before but never over waterfalls. When my daughter got a little scared they were right there to go down tandem with her. Pablo’s farm eating fresh sugar cane, seeing how things were grown, and making cheese tortillas with his family was a lot of fun. With all the activities we were asleep by 10 most nights. In fact we were here for New Years and tried to stay up but only 1 person made it! A good kind of exhaustion.

Stays? Eco lodge by POC was the highlight. The kids were wary of the lack of electricity and wifi but it ended up being the favorite part of their stay. Candlelight and headlamps and playing cards into the night. The beds weren’t super comfortable but hey it’s an Eco Lodge and the views made up for it. The jungle lodge on the Carribean was a short but great stay. The AC made for a great night sleep. The initial and ending hotel, Villa Florencia, was in a beautiful setting, large rooms with comfortable beds and the family enjoyed the pool, hot tub, pool table, and foosball table and even the outdoor gym. A good little dirt 5K running route is out the camp to the right. The hotel is a bit run down and they could use some additional staff but overall a great experience.

Bottom line - this was a trip of a lifetime and one we will always remember. The Costa Rican people across the board were so welcoming and friendly. Being away from tourist areas out in nature and in small communities was perfect. Amazing value...

My family of 5 (mom, dad, 3 sons who are 21+) had the BEST trip ever. We've been on various adventure tours but this one was the absolute BEST! We were met at the airport by a very friendly guide. We waited a short while for one other group participant to arrive and then were driven a few hours to Villa Florencia. This was a beautiful resort with a restaurant, pool, work out area and many places to relax. We arrived at around lunchtime and needed to arrange a lunch with the restaurant staff as this was not provided. Food was provided from dinner that first night through breakfast on the last day. Each night all week, our fearless leader briefed us on what to expect the next day. We went kayaking, zip-lining, whitewater rafting for 2 days on #1,2,3,4 rapids, hiking, tarzan swing, repelling down a handful of waterfalls, walk in animal sanctuary, morning at the beach and shopping. There's probably more I'm forgetting as the schedule was very packed. My favorite place was the ECO Lodge without electricity where the view and experience was spectacular. We traveled with a group of 13 people (including our family) in a van with our Leader and Driver. We all got along very well and had a great time together. It didn't take long for us to feel like a family. The food was great, accommodations also great (some had more bugs than others but hey, this is Costa Rica - there are bugs!) I recommend a few things: listen to your guide and you will have a much better time - when traveling, when adventuring, when given safety warnings and for all things Costa Rica. Bring a watertight sealed bag for your camera to wear around your neck so you can take pictures in all settings. Bring a pair of binoculars for animal viewing. Bring good water shoes that you can also hike in, and another pair of shoes that can get wet and muddy along with flip flops and something else. I was glad I brought 4 pairs of shoes to wear. One pair gets wet and you will have another to wear. They do not necessarily dry out overnight. Bring lots of t-shirts and shorts for the same reason. You will go through clothing. Bring rain gear. Not much need for dress-up clothes although you might want something clean for restaurants and a possible trip to a bar. There's not much opportunity to wash/dry clothes. Bring sunscreen and bug spray. There is some time for relaxing in the evenings before and after dinner. Bring the stuff on the list you are given. Keep in mind that at the end there is an expectation to tip guides 5-10% of the total per person in cash. An envelope is given out for this purpose. It was our understanding that guides would be given % dependent on how much contact they had with the group all week. There are ATM's in town that you can access the day before you leave. I highly recommend this trip for adventurous people who are tolerant of bugs and who love to see the world and meet other adventurous people. Excellent trip we will have a hard time...

I can't say enough good things about Costa Rica Rios! From the moment of inquiry to post-trip follow up, Fraser and team were beyond friendly, quick to respond and super helpful.

I was feeling pretty deflated when I originally inquired with the company, about 3-4 months prior, to book a holiday trip for my partner and myself. I had previously inquired with two other companies before coming across Costa Rica Rios, both of which had far exceeded my original budget by more than double. I was also getting nervous about the lack of available hotels coming up for that time frame in my own searches. However, Fraser was quick to reassure me that he would be able to find options and work within my budget. 24 hours later my itinerary was confirmed, after just a few tweaks. I was beyond relieved to have everything booked so quickly, and within my budget!

From the point of our arrival, everything was totally taken care of and well organized. We were picked up at the airport and transported to our first location in Turrialba. We were very pleasantly surprised to find that we were the only two on our tour, we had such a wonderful and intimate experience. Our guide Mao and the rest of the crew were fantastic. Everyone was incredibly friendly, informative and helpful. We had a blast hanging out with them. Even when we were nervous about white water rafting, Mao made sure that we felt comfortable and safe. He was also great about pointing out and teaching us about all the local flora and fauna.

The highlight of the trip for us was most definitely the night we spent at the eco-lodge. Spending the night in a remote location in the rainforest, without electricity and listening to all the sounds of nature from our screened-in room was a truly unique experience!

I would highly recommend Costa Rica Rios for anyone looking to travel to Costa Rica. This was my first time using an agency, it was such a painless experience and the trip was so seamless, I would definitely...