Driving Conditions in Costa Rica

The roads in Costa Rica are different from those you will find in the U.S., Canada, or Europe. The roads can be narrow, winding, and with little or no markings. Fog and heavy rain can greatly reduce visibility and the rules of the road are confusing, to say the least.

By far the most dangerous activity in Costa Rica is driving on the main roads of the country, especially after dark, with no white outer edge lines, no center yellow lines, no reflecting cat eyes on curves, no guard rails, a LARGE selection of deep potholes, lots of trucks going 10 miles an hour with no taillights, and pedestrians who believe that, if they can see your headlights, certainly you can see them in the middle of the road. Did we also mention, no direction signs or route numbers? Because of this, Serendipity guides do almost anything to avoid driving at night.

Costa Rican road maps were written for the gullible. Many of the “roads” shown are really political boundaries. Some roads shown as paved were once paved with 4 inches of hand-pressed asphalt, then destroyed by heavy trucks, mudslides, volcanoes, earthquakes, hard rain, bombas de agua, and other natural disasters. The distance from Arenal Volcano to Monteverde, for example, is shown as about 35 miles. The route on the map is clear, but once on the dirt roads up to Monteverde you’ll find it’s like driving through an English maze — no markings, nothing at forks in the road to point you to the cloud forest, no clear major road, and only GPS can save you. The drive, for the in-the-know, takes about 3 hours and is ill-advised without 4-wheel drive. So, think of getting there as half (or more) of the adventure, and remember — relax, you’re in paradise, and the adventure of the journey is exactly that.

Yet, you may want to look at a map of Costa Rica, just to get an idea of where things are. Don’t be fooled by distances; things may appear close, but the time to get from one place to another may be longer than you expect.

Top Tips for Driving in Costa Rica

• -Download the Waze App onto your cell phone to plan your route. Waze will give you a more accurate arrival time and will warn you of delays, road closures, and accidents.
• -Aim to arrive earlier than you need to, you never know what you may come across enroute.
  -Do not attempt to drive at night, plan ahead to arrive before sundown.
  -Be aware of other drivers, pedestrians and cyclists and give large trucks plenty of distance, especially on curvy roads.