Things to do in La Fortuna
From hiking the lava fields at the foot of Arenal Volcano to soaking in the free river hot springs and crossing the lake to Monteverde, La Fortuna packs an unusual range of adventure into a small stretch of Costa Rica.
Signature experiences
The categories that define a first trip to La Fortuna — the volcano hikes, the hot springs, and La Fortuna Waterfall.
Hot springs
Volcanically heated water reaches La Fortuna two ways: paid resorts like Tabacón, Baldi and Ecotermales with landscaped pools and swim-up bars, and the free public springs along the Río Chollín, unsupervised and with no lockers or changing rooms. Bag theft is common at the free springs, so paid resorts are the safer choice for anything left unattended.
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Volcano hikes
Trails through Arenal Volcano National Park, including the 1968 Trail across solidified lava flows from that year's eruption and the older 1992 flow. Arenal has been dormant since 2010, so there's no lava to see, but the cone appears and vanishes with the cloud cover, and Cerro Chato has been closed to hikers since 2018 after safety concerns.
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Hanging bridges
Suspended walkways through the rainforest canopy at Mistico Arenal Hanging Bridges Park and Sky Adventures, both within a short drive of La Fortuna. Mistico's roughly six-kilometre trail crosses fifteen bridges, six of them hanging, at heights that put the forest canopy and, on clear days, the volcano itself at eye level.
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Wildlife tours
Boat tours through the Caño Negro Wildlife Refuge, a wetland roughly ninety minutes north near the Nicaraguan border, turn up caimans, howler monkeys and wading birds along the Río Frío. Closer to town, the Bogarín Trail delivers sloths and toucans without the drive.
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Waterfalls
La Fortuna Waterfall drops around 70 metres into a swimmable pool at the base, reached by roughly 500 steps down through the forest — and back up again. The turquoise Río Celeste waterfall in Tenorio Volcano National Park is the other regional landmark, about an hour and a half away.
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Cloud forest
Monteverde and Santa Elena Cloud Forest Reserves, along with the smaller Curi-Cancha Wildlife Refuge, protect the cool, mist-wrapped forest on the Continental Divide across the lake from La Fortuna. Reaching them means either the roughly three-hour jeep-boat-jeep crossing over Lake Arenal or a three-and-a-half to four-hour drive that includes a long stretch of unpaved road 702.
4 guidesMore ways to experience the region
Specialist interests and practical planning — wildlife, canyoning, the crossing to Monteverde, and the comparisons every first-time visitor searches for.
Ziplining
Canopy tours at Sky Adventures and Ecoglide, both on the forested slopes above La Fortuna with lines that open onto views of Arenal's cone when the clouds cooperate. Sky Adventures pairs its zip lines with a gondola and hanging bridges on the same property, one of the region's most complete canopy circuits.
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White-water rafting
Class II-III runs on the Río Balsa close to La Fortuna, an easier introduction through jungle canyon, and the tougher Class III-IV Río Sarapiquí a couple of hours northeast. Both rivers run year-round, fed by rain rather than snowmelt, so levels shift with the season rather than disappearing in the dry months.
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Night tours
Guided night walks around La Fortuna and the Arenal Observatory Lodge grounds turn up red-eyed tree frogs, sleeping birds, tarantulas and insects invisible on a daytime hike. Guides use red-filtered flashlights to avoid disturbing nocturnal animals, and sightings vary a lot by season and rainfall.
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ATV & buggy tours
Quad and buggy routes through the farmland and forest at Arenal Volcano's foot, crossing rivers and climbing to viewpoints over the cone and Lake Arenal. Trails run through private cattle ranches and secondary forest rather than the national park itself, since motorised vehicles aren't permitted inside it.
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Horseback riding
Rides along the shoulder of Arenal Volcano and down to Lake Arenal, and the long-standing horseback route over to Monteverde used before the jeep-boat-jeep shuttle existed. The Monteverde crossing takes most of a day on muddy, steep trails and isn't a casual outing for inexperienced riders.
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Tubing & river floats
Inner-tube floats down gentler stretches of the Río Balsa, drifting past rainforest banks with a guide steering between the mild rapids. It's pitched as the calmer alternative to rafting, workable for families and for visitors who want the river without the whitewater.
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Canyoning
Rappelling down waterfalls in the canyons cut by the Río Peñas Blancas and Río Balsa, on the slopes below Arenal Volcano. Full-day routes typically string together four to six rappels, the tallest well over 50 metres, finishing with a swim or a zip line back to the trailhead.
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Kayaking & boating
Kayaking and stand-up paddleboarding on Lake Arenal, an artificial reservoir formed when the dam closed in 1979, with the volcano's cone visible across the water on a clear day. The lake's western end near Nuevo Arenal is Central America's best-known windsurfing and kitesurfing spot, thanks to steady trade winds funnelled down the valley.
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Coffee & chocolate
Small-farm tours around La Fortuna and on the Monteverde side walk visitors from coffee cherry to roasted bean, and from raw cacao pod to drinking chocolate, both grown at the volcanic soil's mid-elevation sweet spot. Most combine a tasting with a short walk through the farm itself.
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Birdwatching
The Bogarín Trail on the edge of La Fortuna town is a reliable, low-effort spot for toucans, sloths and a long list of resident birds within walking distance of most hotels. Resplendent quetzals are a Monteverde specialty rather than a La Fortuna one, best seen there from February to July during their breeding season.
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Caves
The Venado Caves, roughly 45 minutes from La Fortuna near Ciudad Quesada, a wet limestone system explored by headlamp and wading through shallow underground streams. Stalactites, bats and the occasional blind fish share the passages, and guides require closed shoes and a change of clothes afterward.
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Combo tours
Packages that pair a volcano hike or hanging bridges walk with an afternoon at the hot springs are the region's most-booked format, saving a separate transfer for each activity. Full-day combos adding ziplining or rafting are common too, aimed at visitors with only one or two days around La Fortuna.
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Town & culture
La Fortuna's central plaza sits below the volcano's old, roughly conical silhouette, with the parish church on one side and sodas and tour operators around it. The town grew up almost entirely around volcano tourism after Arenal's 1968 eruption, and its economy still runs on that rhythm today.
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Food & drink
Sodas around La Fortuna's central plaza serve gallo pinto, casado plates and fresh tilapia from the lake, alongside the fruit stands along the road toward the volcano. Costa Rican coffee, grown in the hills above town, shows up on nearly every breakfast table.
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Spa & wellness
Tabacón's riverside thermal complex and Baldi's tiered volcanic pools both pair spa treatments with views toward Arenal's cone when the clouds lift. Los Lagos and other resort properties offer similar volcanically heated soaking with less crowding than the two biggest names.
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Family
The hanging bridges at Mistico, the shallow family pools at the hot-spring resorts, and the easy, sloth-spotting Bogarín Trail all suit visitors travelling with kids. Rafting, canyoning and the tougher volcano trails carry age and fitness minimums worth checking before booking.
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Day trips
Río Celeste and Tenorio Volcano National Park, Caño Negro's wetlands, and Monteverde's cloud forest are all workable as day trips from La Fortuna, ranging from about ninety minutes to four hours each way. Most visitors pick one, since the driving alone fills a meaningful part of the day.
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Getting there & around
The jeep-boat-jeep shuttle across Lake Arenal to Monteverde takes about three hours, roughly half the three-and-a-half to four hours the equivalent drive takes on route 702's long unpaved stretch. Shared shuttle vans link La Fortuna to San José, Liberia and Monteverde, while a hire car gives the most flexibility for reaching Río Celeste and Caño Negro.
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Season by season
Costa Rica's dry season runs December to April and the green season May to November, with a short dry spell called the veranillo in June and July. La Fortuna sits on the rainy Caribbean-facing slope, so afternoon showers are common even in the dry months, and rain year-round is normal rather than a bad-luck exception.
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Trip planning
Prices around La Fortuna run in US dollars, with hot-spring resorts, guided tours and hire cars as the main budget lines. Book hanging-bridges and rafting slots ahead in high season, and if a Poás Volcano side trip is on the itinerary, its timed-entry tickets need reserving in advance too.
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Comparisons
Free river hot springs versus paid resorts like Tabacón and Baldi, and La Fortuna versus Monteverde as a cloud-forest base, are the two comparisons first-time visitors search for most. Both come down to budget and how much supervision or infrastructure matters to the traveller.
4 guidesBrowse by destination
Tours and activities organised by where you're headed — the best of each city and region.
Good to know about things to do in La Fortuna
La Fortuna's things-to-do hub is organised into twenty-seven categories, because the right day here depends heavily on what brought you. Canyoning gets some of the most detailed treatment, since guided descents through the waterfalls and narrow gorges on the volcano's flanks are the single reason many visitors book this trip. Rafting, tubing & float safari covers the Río Balsa, the Peñas Blancas and the Sarapiquí, from gentle float trips suited to families to genuine white water further downstream.
Zip-lining and hanging bridges are grouped separately because they solve different problems — a zip-line canopy tour is speed and adrenaline, while the fixed and suspension bridge networks on the volcano's lower slopes are built for slow wildlife-spotting at canopy height. Caves covers the Venado caverns northwest of town, reached by a short hike and a wade through several chambers. ATV and horseback tours both cross farmland and forest trails toward viewpoints of the volcano that a car can't reach. Kayak & boat groups paddling on Lake Arenal itself with the boat crossing used on the route to Monteverde.
Volcano hike stands apart from ordinary sightseeing: Cerro Chato, the older, dormant cone beside Arenal, has been closed to hikers since 2018, so guided walks here mean the lower trails and lava-field paths within Arenal Volcano National Park, created in 1991, rather than a summit attempt on the still-restless 1,670-metre peak. Hot springs covers everything from the free, unsupervised pools of the Río Chollín, where bag theft is a recurring problem, to the roughly 40-to-115-US-dollar resort complexes with landscaped pools and swim-up bars. Waterfalls is anchored by the La Fortuna waterfall's roughly 500 steps down to the plunge pool, plus smaller falls further along the Lake Arenal road.
Cloud forest and birdwatching overlap heavily and point mainly toward Monteverde and Santa Elena, where resplendent quetzals are most reliably seen between February and July. Night walks and wildlife cover the frogs, snakes, sloths and kinkajous that come out after dark on private reserves around town, distinct from a daytime hike where most of the same animals stay hidden. Coffee & chocolate covers small-batch farm tours above town, while dining, spa & wellness and town & culture round out La Fortuna itself, from riverside sodas to hot-spring-adjacent spa treatments.
Family groups what genuinely works with young children, and combos packages two or three activities — commonly a hanging bridges walk paired with a hot springs afternoon — into a single booked day. Day trips exists because Río Celeste, Caño Negro, Poás, Monteverde and Rincón de la Vieja all sit well outside easy reach and deserve their own planning, while transport, seasons, planning and comparisons work through the questions travellers actually ask — shuttle or rental car, when the green season's afternoon rain actually falls, and how a hot springs resort stacks up against a free river pool.
Frequently asked questions about things to do in La Fortuna
What are the main categories of things to do in La Fortuna?
This hub groups activities into twenty-seven categories: canyoning, rafting/tubing/float safari, zip-lining, hanging bridges, caves, ATV, horseback riding, kayak & boat, volcano hike, hot springs, waterfalls, cloud forest, birdwatching, night walks, wildlife, coffee & chocolate, dining, spa & wellness, town & culture, family, combos, day trips, transport, seasons, planning and comparisons. Most visitors lean heavily on four or five of them.
Why is Cerro Chato closed to hikers?
Cerro Chato, the dormant cone beside Arenal, has been closed to hiking since 2018 for safety and conservation reasons. Guided walks in the area now stay on the lower trails and lava-field paths within Arenal Volcano National Park instead.
What's the difference between the free Río Chollín hot springs and the resort hot springs?
The Río Chollín's pools are free, public and unsupervised, and bag theft is a recurring problem there. The resort complexes charge roughly 40 to 115 US dollars per person for landscaped pools, restaurants and, at some properties, swim-up bars and spa treatments.
Which category covers quetzal spotting?
Cloud forest & birdwatching, focused mainly on Monteverde and Santa Elena, where resplendent quetzals are most reliably seen between February and July.
Is canyoning here suitable for beginners?
Most operators run beginner-friendly routes with rappels adjusted to ability and a guide on each drop, though a reasonable level of fitness and comfort with heights is still expected.
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