Explore La Fortuna & Arenal by area

Base yourself in La Fortuna and this hub explains where to look next, covering the town and the Arenal Volcano area plus six further regions arranged around it, connected mostly by rental car, shuttle van and, for one region, a lake crossing by boat. La Fortuna & Arenal Volcano covers the town itself, the 1,670-metre volcano whose strombolian activity stopped in October 2010, the hanging bridges and canyoning canyons on its flanks, and the La Fortuna waterfall's roughly 500 steps down to the plunge pool.

Lake Arenal & the West Shore groups the roughly 85-square-kilometre artificial lake formed when the dam closed in 1979 and flooded the villages of Arenal and Tronadora, the windsurfing town of Tilarán, and the string of restaurants and small hotels along the north shore road toward Nuevo Arenal — about 30 to 45 minutes from La Fortuna depending on which stretch of shore. Río Celeste, Tenorio & Bijagua covers the turquoise river inside Tenorio Volcano National Park, reached in around 1 hour 15 minutes, where the trail to the mirador closes to new entries in the mid-afternoon and daily numbers are capped.

Caño Negro, Sarapiquí & the Northern Lowlands groups the Ramsar-listed wetland on the Río Frío, roughly 100 square kilometres of seasonal marsh that shrinks hard in the dry months, plus the rainforest lodges and rafting put-ins around Sarapiquí, both about 1 hour 30 minutes to 2 hours away. Monteverde & Santa Elena covers the cloud forest reserves above 1,400 metres founded by Quaker settlers in 1951 — reachable in roughly 3 hours by the jeep-boat-jeep route across Lake Arenal, or 3 hours 30 minutes to 4 hours by the paved road around it.

Poás, Alajuela & the San José Gateway covers the 2,708-metre volcano that requires an advance-booked entry slot and a helmet at the crater rim, plus the airport towns most visitors pass through on the way in or out, about 2 hours 15 minutes to 3 hours from La Fortuna. Rincón de la Vieja & the Liberia Gateway rounds out the hub with the dry-forest volcano near Liberia's international airport, about 3 to 4 hours away depending on whether the unpaved stretch of Route 702 is taken or the longer paved route via Cañas.

Each destination page below sets out realistic driving times from La Fortuna and whether the trip suits a morning, a full day or an overnight, since river crossings, one-lane bridges and unpaved sections make distances on a map a poor guide to actual travel time here.