La Fortuna Costa Rica

Our small resort is located just outside of La Fortuna, so we naturally moved there. Luckily, we like it. But what was once a quaint little farming town is no longer. In just three short years, literally hundreds of the Big 3- hotels, souvenir shops, and restaurants line the road from La Fortuna to Tabacon Resort (famous for their hotsprings) some 10 miles away from the center of La Fortuna. It’s quite sad really. And what’s a tourist town without those obligatory billboards, one as big and ugly as the next. Hell, we even got a Burger King and Churchs chicken, UGH! Older buildings are being torn down and replaced with more modern structures at an alarming rate, and always the same- a new hotel, restaurant, souvenir shop or mini-strip mall- nothing ever new or original. (Seriously, 95% of the souvenir shops here, sell the exact same stuff, it’s embarrassing). Here, they have a ‘Field of Dreams’ mentality- ‘If you build it, they will come.” And I fear they are very wrong. Some of these farmers have leveraged their land to build one of the BIG 3 with no idea as how to market- sadly sitting in their new dwellings waiting for tourists to happen upon place and wondering if they’ll make enough for their next mortgage payment. And now, competition is fierce to say the least. The mighty dollar has entered the picture and they all want a piece of the pie. The prices keep rising here. Everything is going up, up, up, and really for no apparent reason.

I still love La Fortuna. We have no car as we are in minutes of everything we need. We have a simple apartment overlooking the park and we have friends, not sure you need much more than that. Plus, there’s so much to explore and do here- the mighty Volcan Arenal, the lake and surrounding rainforest with its wildlife and beautiful scenery, not to mention all the cool adventure tours here- they ALL still do it for me. I just wish they would slow down a bit- regroup, make a plan and not be so random in their construction.

I suppose if it ever got way to commercial, we would just pack it up and find another adventure in Costa Rica, but you know us Gringo’s- get a group of us together and we can F*** up any quaint little farming town.



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