International arrivals to Juan Santamaria International Airport (SJO). Tour leader Joshua Covill will meet you at the airport and coordinate transfers to our arrival hotel. We recommend planning flights that arrive by 5pm in order to attend the kickoff dinner and orientation with the group.

Depending on arrival times, we may have the afternoon to enjoy a first taste of Costa Rican birdlife on the grounds of the hotel.

Night at Hotel Robledal.

The first full day is always exciting, and we kick off the tour with birding the grounds of our hotel where we will find a nice set of classically Costa Rican species like Rufous-naped Wren, Blue-gray Tanager, Hoffman’s Woodpecker, and Ferruginous Pygmy-owl.

After breakfast, we depart for the Talamanca mountains with a few birding stops along the way to target the endemic Cabanis’s Ground-Sparrow.

We will have lunch at the splendid ‘Casa Tangara Dowii’, where we will have a great home-cooked meal while watching the bird feeders for several hard to find bird species like Buffy-crowned Wood-Partridge, Buff-fronted Quail-Dove, Chestnut-capped Brushfinch, and Spangle-cheeked Tanager (after which the place is named!)

After lunch, we will make the short drive to Savegre Lodge, tucked away in the highland cloud forest.

The Talamancas, a mountain range that runs down the middle of Costa Rica and western Panama, are host to a whole suite of regionally endemic species. The high elevations are the main driver of species diversity in the area. We will spend the next 2 days exploring the cloud-forests ranging from 7,000ft to 10,000ft, where we will focus on finding as many regionally endemic species as we can while enjoying the crisp mountain air and gorgeous vistas.

Some targets include: Slaty Flowerpiercer, Black-and-Yellow Silky-Flycatcher, Yellow-thighed Brushfinch, Collared Redstart, Large-footed Finch, Golden-browed Chlorophonia, and Black-capped Flycatcher.

Night at Hotel Savegre.

We start quite early in search of the famous Resplendent Quetzal. With some luck, and the help of local “quetzal guides”, we will see some of these mythical and outstanding birds!

After our early adventure, we will visit the Paraiso Quetzal Lodge for breakfast and spend the morning birding the feeders and garden.

The hummingbird feeders are a buzz with beautiful Fiery-throated Hummingbirds, Talamanca Hummingbirds, Volcano Hummingbirds, and White-throated Mountain-Gems. The gardens provide us an opportunity to see many of the Talamanca specialties like Large-footed Finch and Long-tailed Silky-Flycatcher.

We will have lunch in the area and in the afternoon we will visit the Providencia road to look for Collared Trogon, Costa Rican Pygmy-Owl, Northern Emerald-Toucanet, Flame-colored Tanager, Spotted Wood-Quail, Long-tailed Silky-Flycatcher, Ruddy Treerunner, and Yellow-winged Vireo and more.

Night at Hotel Savegre.

After breakfast and a final morning of birding, we will leave for our next destination in the central Costa Rican Pacific. We will have lunch en route and visit local spots near the Tarcoles River.

The afternoon will feature a fantastic boat ride on the Tarcoles River. Here we will explore the mangroves and sandbars, which are home to Mangrove Vireo, Collared Plover, Double-striped Thick-Knee, Panama Flycatcher, Common Black Hawk and the endemic Mangrove hummingbird. We will check into the hotel in the early evening before dinner.

Night at Hotel Villa Lapas.

For the morning birding, we will visit Carara National Park. The park protects a huge amount of transitional forest, where the humid pacific rainforest meets the dry-forest, and it’s home to many humid forest bird species that are only found in southwestern Costa Rica. We will look for Golden-naped Woodpecker, Baird’s Trogon, Black-hooded Antshrike, Fiery-billed Aracari, Riverside Wren, and Orange-collared Manakin. The Carara National Park and its surroundings provide some fantastic birding; the forest can be full of birds throughout the day and shy birds seem easier to see here than elsewhere.

After lunch and a moment to rest during the heat of the day, we will resume birding in the afternoon, this time experiencing the true dry forest habitats. Target birds here include Turquoise-browed Motmot, Black-headed Trogon, Banded Wren, Orange-fronted Parakeet, and the magnificent Scarlet Macaw.

Night at Hotel Villa Lapas.

Some final birding in the area, we will look for any of the pacific slope species we are missing, and soon depart for the Caribbean slope!

Holding a whole new suite of birds for us, this area of amazing lowland rainforest, the Sarapiquí region, is where we will be staying at La Selva Biological Station.

We will have lunch en route, taking advantage of the many roadside birding hotspots in Costa Rica. The hummingbird feeders often have Violet Sabrewing, Green-crowned Brilliant, and Green Hermit while the fruit attracts Prong-billed Barbets and Crimson-collared Tanagers.

We will arrive to La Selva in the afternoon, and start racking up the species and the onslaught of birds begins!

Night at La Selva Biological Station.

Staying for 2 nights at “La Selva” affords us the opportunity to soak in the glorious biodiversity of this world-famous birding site.

Our morning birding at La Selva Biological Station will be fantastic, with dozens of new species for the trip at this primary rainforest site. Along with the birds, we will try to find some unique fauna in the area like the Strawberry Poison Dart frogs that are common in the Caribbean lowlands.

A few target species for our time in La Selva include: Great Tinamou, Scaled Pigeon, Great Green Macaw, Lesser Swallow-tailed Swift, Semiplumbeous Hawk, Middle American Screech-Owl, Chestnut-colored Woodpecker, Fasciated Antshrike, Chestnut-backed Antbird, Plain-brown Woodcreeper, Snowy Cotinga, Royal Flycatcher, Black-capped Pygmy-tyrant, Chestnut-headed Oropendola, and Dusky-faced Tanager.

Accommodations at La Selva lean towards rustic, but staying well within the rainforest is an experience well worth it. Well-made cabins are clean and comfortable, albeit without air conditioning. Falling asleep to owls and nightjars and waking up to Howler Monkeys is an experience hard to forget!

After dinner, we will have the option for some night birding, looking for Middle American Screech-Owl, Mottled and Spectacled Owl.

Night at La Selva Biological Station.

We will say goodbye to La Selva after breakfast, and visit a few birding sights en route back to the central valley.

We will visit the Quebrada Gonzalez Sector of Braulio Carrillo National Park to look for Ocellated Antbird, Lattice-tailed Trogon, Streak-crowned Antvireo, White-ruffed Manakin, White-throated Shrike-Tanager and other species of this Caribbean slope “foothill forest” ecosystem. We will have lunch en route and arrive at Hotel Robledal in the late afternoon for our last evening of the tour. Over dinner, we will recap our favorite experiences of this brilliant introduction to the birder’s paradise that is Costa Rica!

Night at Hotel Robledal.

Breakfast, final birds in the garden, and depart to Juan Santamaria International Airport (SJO).