Premio DMC: Region of Guanacaste for Incentives, Meetings and Events

When talking about Guanacaste, it is impossible to sip the fact that this province is in fact like a condensed version of Costa Rica: Different climates, great biodiversity, a deep rooted culture and amazing adventures.

Landscape

Costa Rica has a lot of mountains, that makes the landscape to be varied and beautiful, but sometimes roads are winding and routes can turn slow. In Guanacaste however, the landscape is rather flat with rolling hills and the gorgeous Guanacaste Volcanic Mountain Range in the back.

Other hand it has some of the most beautiful beaches in Central America, surrounded by forest and wildlife and featuring great resorts.

Weather

This is the driest province of Costa Rica. With eight months of the year of sunny season, it allows itself amazing beach resorts and several activities that participants can enjoy almost all year round… And even in the rainy season it may rain, maybe two or three hours of the day.

When it comes to the mountains this changes, as they are influenced by the Caribbean winds that bring a lot of humidity. This is fantastic in terms of touristic activity, since you can enjoy very different landscapes in a very small time gap.

Culture

Guanacaste’s pace has been always a bit different from the rest of the country. Because of the conditions written above, the region was first conquered by Mesoamerican ethnic groups (Whilst the rest of Costa Rica was more influenced by South American groups) and later by Andalusia Spanish, creating a mixture of cultures between Mesoamerican (Corn diet, Aztec originated) Spanish, and the strong spirit of the Arabic roots, creating a very rich culture and folklore.

Guanacaste is, up until this day, the place where our folklore comes from: Our typical dress, the marimba, its songs and dances, the big corn tortillas and the cow boys and their horses and bullfights traditions all come from Guanacaste.

One of the most typical sites to see this mixture of cultures is Guaitil, a fantastic shopping opportunity of clay ceramics that are made the way the made them five hundred years ago.

Area, population and cities

: Liberia City

With an area of 3,915 sq mi (10,141 km2) and as of 2010, it has a population of 354,154.

Guanacaste's capital is Liberia. Other important cities include Cañas and Nicoya.

In Liberia we find the International Daniel Oduber Airport (LIR).

National Parks in Guanacaste

The Conservation Area of Guanacaste encompasses several National Parks and reserves. The ones that are of interest as activities for a program or event are:

: Rincon de la Vieja Volcano

Rincón de la Vieja Volcano

With its fantastic mixture of humid rainforests, dry tropical forests and volcanic steam cracks and bubbling ponds, and surrounded by several hot springs and spas is, most likely the most popular of them all.

Guanacaste National Park

Mixing also the rainforests with the dry forests, this national Park is great for nature lovers and bird watchers.

Santa Rosa National Park

This national park is a mixture of great tropical dry forest, gorgeous isolated beaches and historical points. It is used for hikes starting in La Casona (The old Hacienda house) and going around the dry forest.

Horizontes Biological Station

A great protected area used by the University of Costa Rica for research, it has a wide biodiversity, beautiful landscapes and great waterfalls

Ostional and Las Baulas:

These two marine protected areas are quite popular because they are arriving and nesting sites for sea turtles. In Las Baulas they receive the huge leatherback sea turtles and Ostional is one of five turtle arribadas sites in the World. (An arribada is a mass nesting of turtles, sometimes with hundreds of turtles arriving simultaneously to one beach).

Palo Verde

Palo Verde is simultaneously an amazing wetlands and tropical dry forests as a result of the Río Tempisque flooding over land located in a relatively arid climate region. Great birdwatching and wildlife sightings.

Accomodations for Incentives Programs and Events: