Lonely Planet Costa Rica

Average customer rating:

Pretty good but not enough pictures.
Get this guide!
Must have guide to Costa Rica
Good, But There's Better
Great guide

Lonely Planet Costa Rica
Mara Vorhees , and Matthew Firestone
Manufacturer: Lonely Planet Publications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Lonely Planet Nicaragua & El Salvador

ASIN: 1741044634

Book Description

Beyond the deserted beaches of the Nicoya Peninsula and the visceral heights of the Monteverde cloud forests lies the real Costa Rica - a land of delicate pathos, forthright purity and hard-won pacifism. Tromp through virgin rain forest - sighting poison-dart frogs and howler monkeys along the way - or simply explore the local lore and laid-back beach scene with this comprehensive guide. LESS IS MORE - expanded ecofriendly coverage and loads of volunteer and learning opportunities make traveling with a conscience easier than ever THE WILD SIDE - spot your favorite rain forest dwellers - scarlet macaws, caimans and more - with our expert-written color wildlife section GAPS ON THE MAP - lose yourself in the seldom-visited corners of this ecological powerhouse with informed do-it-yourself content and more than 80 maps CHARGE IT! - surf the world's longest left at Pavones, hike through rain forest in Corcovado or drop into roaring rapids with our Adventure Travel chapter

Customer Reviews:

Pretty good but not enough pictures........2007-05-31

This book is very detailed but it can be hard to use without so many pictures of what they are describing. Some of the information was a little out dated or incorrect, but on the whole, a useful resource. I used it in conjunction with the DK Eyewitness Travel Guide which has more pictures but less detail. Using the two, we were able to get a a more comprehensive guide for our excursioins.

Get this guide!.......2007-05-12

Coming to Costa Rica? I live here and periodically renew my guidebooks for all my visiting friends and family. We are also still exploring parts of the country we haven't seen. This is a great comprehensive guidebook no matter what your enthusiasms or budget.

Must have guide to Costa Rica.......2007-05-09

I live in Costa Rica, and this is the best guidebook I've found so far. It can be used by $500 per day globetrotters or penny pinching backpackers. Hotels, places to hang a hammock, luxurious restaurants, places that serve a nice lunch for under US$2.00, local airlines and buslines. Great book.

Good, But There's Better.......2007-05-07

On a recent trip, I had a few travel guides with me, and one of them was The Lonely Planet's Costa Rica. I found the Lonely Planet guide useful, but a bit dry. I also took Explore Costa Rica (5th ed.) by Harry S. Pariser, and enjoyed reading and using the two books in tandem. We could get the nuts and bolts from Lonely Planet--they are GREAT for this--as well as a lot of lesser known background information from Pariser, and the two worked together fabulously. In fact, come to think of it, I usually take a Lonely Planet and Pariser combo when I go Central America or the Caribbean...In any case, I highly recommend using both books to explore the country, and get away from the tourist traps which have become so prevalent!

Great guide .......2007-05-07

This is a helpful guide for those who don't want to just visit a few Latin American tourist areas. I like their frankeness about how over travelled an area is and how to get off the path without getting too lost or having unreasonable expectations.

Average customer rating:

Put this book among History Books!
The perfect companion for a Costa Rica trip
This is a lucky book.
Outdated, sorely lacking, get Tico Times in-country
Least helpful travel book I've ever used

Lonely Planet Costa Rica
Carolina A. Miranda , and Paige Penland
Manufacturer: Lonely Planet Publications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Living Abroad in Costa Rica

ASIN: 1740597753

Amazon.com

Many Costa Rica guides provide hotel, restaurant, and arrival information, but Lonely Planet's stands out from the pack. Written by Rob Rachowiecki, an award-winning travel writer and naturalist, this guide delves into Costa Rica's flora, fauna, and nature reserves like no other. Rachowiecki's Costa Rica includes a 36-page color wildlife guide, contacts, and details on outdoor activities from kayaking to scuba diving, and bird watching to surfing. There are 54 maps of cities, towns, regions, and parks, plus a comprehensive e-mail and Web site directory, and scads of eating and accommodations options, from budget to upscale. With its rainforests, wildlife, volcanoes, and beaches, Costa Rica is among the most beautiful destinations, and Rachowiecki's guide prepares you to explore and enjoy.

Book Description

Stroll through pristine cloud forests and peer into simmering volcanoes, catch the perfect turquoise wave and howl back at howler monkeys, gaze at the waters of the Caribbean and the Pacific from the top of Mt Chirripo - Costa Rica is an adventurer's dream. Packed with expert advice on making the most of your trip, our authoritative guide will help you discover your own paradise in the land of pura vida.

• GET WILD - our full-color wildlife guide gets you in touch with the swingers, the swimmers and the slitherers • GO NATURAL - an expert ecologist gives you the scoop on Costa Rica's stunning national parks in our environment chapter • TAKE IT OUTSIDE - our adventure travel chapter has you covered, from hiking and surfing to rafting and kayaking • GET AROUND - 77 user-friendly maps, more than any other guidebook to Costa Rica • REST EASY - from treehouse hammocks to luxury ecolodges, accommodations to please every style and budget

Customer Reviews:

Put this book among History Books!.......2007-02-13

Although the overall impression of the book is positive (so the 3 stars...) I could not find ANY hotel still close to the price range listed for them, not to say that some of them are now defunct (restaurants included). But what I found worse were the low-planning content of the proposed routes (I eventually started one of them and had to remodel it on-the-fly for the loss of time it would cause me) and the misguided information on some attractions (take Las Baulas National Park for example: it has NO touristic structure besides the beach itself, being mostly a scientific facility for the preservation of turtles, but is currently being sold - in a unethical way, with thousand of unfulfilled promises - by local guides who in fact make you pay USD28 for just a night on the beach. The books says something about dozens of turtles coming EVERY NIGHT to the beach, which is totally false if not impossible, providing free-but-wrong advertising for those unethical guides and not helping at all the buyer of the book).

The perfect companion for a Costa Rica trip.......2006-12-17

Once again, Lonely Planet delivers a thorough guide for travellers heading into an unknown destination. The book covers popular destinations as well as providing the history of the country and highlighting wildlife that is unique to the region. The book is broken up by region so it is easy to reference as you travel throughout the country. The restaurant guide is so thorough it included a bakery that we saw at a remote village in the jungle only accessible by boat. And the review was right on! I will definitely keep this for my next trip and look to Lonely Planet when venturing somewhere new.

This is a lucky book........2006-10-02

My friend said he has loaned this book to six people, all of whom have returned from Costa Rica, ecstatic and safe. This book is good luck... I said write to the author to tell him, and he said, "No, this is a really popular book, he gets hundreds of emails every week." I thought I'd try anyway.

Outdated, sorely lacking, get Tico Times in-country.......2006-06-02

I bought this book for my Costa Rica trip (8 weeks w/ a class, 3 weeks w/o), and replaced it within the first week. Most of the hotels are priced above what is listed, if they even exist anymore. Same with the restaurants. Also, LP over-emphasized many extreme tourist hotspots without giving enough info about smaller towns (don't miss Cauhita!), lesser-known forests (check out the Children's Eternal Rainforest), getting around by bus, super-budget hotels or border crossings. My advice: wait until you get into Costa Rica, then get the Tico Times guidebook, updated EVERY YEAR, written by the local english newspaper. It's easy to find and so much more relevant, with maps of every town, bus schedules, local festivals (where and when), border information, updated hotel + restaurant info, and how to find the information you can't find anywhere else.

Least helpful travel book I've ever used.......2006-01-19

I bought this book before a trip to Costa Rica, based on the "Lonely Planet" name alone. Lonely Planet usually publishes the best travel books, but not in this case. We found that the directions to many of the establishments were incorrect, as were the descriptions. Some of the locals even pointed out parts of the book that were blatantly incorrect, such as certain restaurants or bars that were in a different part of town than stated in the book. This particular book could have used a better fact-checker. I will not be taking it with me on my next trip to Costa Rica.

Costa Rican Spanish: Lonely Planet Phrasebook

Average customer rating:

Some improvements
Inferior to previous edition

Costa Rican Spanish: Lonely Planet Phrasebook
Thomas Kohnstamm , and Lonely Planet Phrasebooks
Manufacturer: Lonely Planet Publications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1740591194

Book Description

Lounging around in a resort will make great use of your English. You could, however, grab this phrasebook and trade tiquismos with the Ticos, chase the best beach break, track down a toucan and go home knowing youÂ've had an all-round pura vida time.

Customer Reviews:

Some improvements.......2007-03-06

This new edition has corrected some of the mistakes I pointed out in a previous review and in an email exchange with the author. As I thumbed through the book I didn't see any "tu" conjugations, only "vos" and "usted". This is much more accurate for Costa Rican Spanish and was a blunder in the first edition. There is also an explanation at the beginning of the book about Costa Rican Spanish, which includes mention of the predominance of the voseo en Costa Rica. Nonetheless, I still give the book one star for two reasons. First the pronunciation section, as Mr. Kohnstamm informed me, was done by someone from Australia (if I remember right). So if you are from the U.S. several of the pronunciations are incorrect. Second, it only took me about a minute of looking through the book to see several mistakes in grammar and translation. Example: "Si vengas a Costa Rica..." should be "Si viene/venis a Costa Rica..." and "Adonde es la sala ejecutiva?" should be "Donde esta la sala ejecutiva?". These types of mistakes really stand out and defeat the purpose of the book, which is to help English-speaking tourists fit in and learn correct phrases for interacting with the locals... at least I think that is the purpose here.

Inferior to previous edition.......2007-02-04

This 2nd edition is more than just a beauty cleanup of the 1st. It completely changes the content, the intent and therefore the usefulness of the book. It is full of pronunciations, painstakingly spelled out as if someone was going to read them preferentially over the Spanish words. It's sort of lame, because Spanish pronunciation is basically invariable (accents aren't, of course) and if you are having trouble with it that is best fixed with a different book. It seems like there is less information, because a big chunk of the page has gone over to pronunciations. It has been scrubbed of most of the sketchier inclusions of the 1st edition, which are fun. The very useful verb endings charts and some of the Tiquismo sidebars are gone. I also find the typeface harder to read in dim light, especially the dictionary. On the plus side, it is prettier, and perhaps better organized and easier to find information.

I had my 1st edition stolen while down there. I hadn't been in a hurry to replace it, but the minute I received this 2nd edition, I scoured the 'net to locate another 1st. You should consider the same.

Diving & Snorkeling Guide to Cocos Island (Lonely Planet Diving & Snorkeling Great Barrier Reef)

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Diving & Snorkeling Guide to Cocos Island (Lonely Planet Diving & Snorkeling Great Barrier Reef)
Lucy Agace
Manufacturer: Gulf Publishing Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Island of the Sharks (Large Format)

ASIN: 1559920920

Book Description

Book Description

In Costa Rica, it's impossible not to get caught up in the feeling of Pura Vida, 'pure life'. So whether selecting from the huge range of traditional dishes, dancing the merenge at a fiesta, or cheering a toro brava, 'fighting bull', this book will help you get into the swing. <ul>

join in the crowd at a rodeo, street festival or salsa club </li>

loads of cultural & traveling tips, whether you go by bus, scooter or donkey </li>

sections on diving, hiking and surfing </li>

includes Lim n Creole, the language of Costa Rica's Caribbean coast </li>

music, food, shopping, art & more </li></ul>

Customer Reviews:

Well organized and useful.......2005-08-26

This is a handy phrase book for those who have no knowledge of Spanish and for those situations where you just need to be that much more specific in communicating your needs. It's not too big, so it's relatively easy to travel with.

This book has phrases for every occasion!.......2005-07-21

Tins book will help you in just about every situation; meeting people, getting around, accommodations, food, illegal drugs, Dating, Romance and Intimate phrases, dealing with police, and lots more!

Most people in the tourist areas spoke enough English to get by but I found this book invaluable to brush up on my memories of high school Spanish so that I could communicate in any situation while I was in Costa Rica

Please add local expressions.......2005-06-16

This phrasebook is very well organised. This is its strong point, I think. This is what I told some English people who asked for my advice (I am a Costarican). I also told them that I think it covers all the expected areas of vocabulary, like airport, travelling, food, but it could cater better for local expressions, the voccabulary local people use. This is what I am asking for, perhaps for the next edition.

Bad mistakes.......2005-06-03

Just for the author's attention in the dating and romance section the phrase "sacate" does NOT mean take off your clothes, and it can be taken as a very vulgar remark in Spanish. Just one many mistakes in Spanish that this book has.

Grammar and cultural mistakes..........2005-05-20

I agree with several of the criticisms raised about this book. Imagine if you picked up a phrasebook for your native region and found mistake after mistake about your native language and about how you and your fellow countrymen and women speak the language. Most of the tourists who rate this book excellent probably do so because they don't understand Costa Rican Spanish and because the were able to use some of the phrases and be understood while in Costa Rica. This is fine but they should also know that many of the phrases are incorrect. The point is if you are going to publish something and claim this is the way an entire country of people speak then it should be accurate and at the very least be free of all the grammar mistakes that this book has. It is also true as one reviewer points out that here in Costa Rica we do not use tu but vos or actually usted unless you know the person very well and are being informal. This is a major mistake considering the book is supposed to help foreigners fit in. I could not recommend this book to anyone.

Lonely Planet Costa Rica (Lonely Planet Costa Rica (Spanish))

Average customer rating:

Lonely Planet Costa Rica (Lonely Planet Costa Rica (Spanish))
Carolina A. Miranda
Manufacturer: Lonely Planet Publications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Spain | Europe | History | Subjects | Books

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Lonely Planet Costa Rica (Lonely Planet. (Spanish Guides))

Average customer rating:

Lonely Planet Costa Rica (Lonely Planet. (Spanish Guides))
Mara Vorhees , and Matthew Firestone
Manufacturer: Lonely Planet Publications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Lonely Planet | Guidebook Series | Travel | Subjects | Books

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Average customer rating:

Lonely Planet: Costa Rica

Manufacturer: Lonely Planet Publications - Italian editions
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 8870636283

Average customer rating:

* * * a 5 star book for paradise * * *

Lonely Planet Costa Rica Pack

Manufacturer: Lonely Planet
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: 1740590554

Book Description

The Lonely Planet Costa Rica Pack includes the Costa Rica guidebook and Costa Rica Spanish phrasebook. Peer into the crater of a smoking volcano, spot rare birds from high above the rainforest canopy and raft some of the most thrilling white eater in the tropics. Whether you aim to observe endangered sea turtles in Tortuguero or unwind on the warm sands of Playa Tamarindo, this award-winning guide is your essential travel companion.

Customer Reviews:

* * * a 5 star book for paradise * * *.......2001-04-10

A friend and I had made a choice to travel abroad but just weren't sure where to go or what first steps we should take in choosing a destination we both agreed upon. Pondering upon pondering we both agreed and concluded that we wanted a place that was different, 3rd world, and tropical with a history of having a warm climate. So with this main clue, we headed for the nearest BORDERS bookstore and rummaged up and down the travel section reading everything and anything and educating ourselves on different tropical locations. Considering our budget and activities interests and scenic interests, we decided COSTA RICA would be the place to meet our most enjoyable and worthwhile needs. Upon choosing the book, it was a toss up between 3 (one being the Lonely Planet guide)... We chose "Lonely Planet" to be our book guide morely due to its hip nature and background and its cool entourage of excitement seeking followers, travelers and backpackers who own at least on of these unique line of travel guides. Within the trip, we found that no other book had ever been so accurate. From places to go, venues to eat, places to stay, activities to do, discounts to look out for and people to meet; no other travel book we've owned has ever been so accurate. Also we had the chance to learn a great deal of history about the country from the book before we went; could be an excellent pasttime activity on the plane. (Found out that we knew more about the country then the occupants who lived there.) The book is in most, "detail-accurate." The book even survived the humid drenches of the rainforest of Manuel Antonio (a must see). The book is still in an acceptable condition (thanks to its improved binding! I display it on my room shelf along with the souvenirs and pictures of my trip. A shrine would be a good way to describe it. An EXCELLENT book, an EXCELLENT trip, full of EXCELLENT memories!!!!! I've also purchased the LONELY PLANET guide to MORROCCO. and YES i have made that trip... but that is another travel story on it's own full that is also full of more exciting memories!!! I have constructed a shrine for that as well. haha

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