North Puntarenas Introduction

Puntarenas, which means "Sandy Point" in Spanish, is the capital and main city in the province Puntarenas, Costa Rica, at the Pacific coast. The homonymous and oddly shaped province has its largest section in the South, far from the capital.

Its port, Caldera, is one of the main ports in the country. Some 100,000 live in the city and close towns. With beaches on the Pacific Ocean, it also attracts many tourists, especially surfers. It is also a possible stopover point for the touristy Monteverde, further inland.

North Puntarenas Weather

Being Costa Rica's largest province (11,277 sq. km.), Puntarenas includes practically all of the climate regimes found in this small, but tremendously varied, country. From tropical dry forest to rain forest, and from mangrove swamp to cloud forest to subalpine paramo, this sprawling province contains at least a little bit of everything.

North Puntarenas Attractions

Sirena Ranger Station, Corcovado National Park, Osa Attraction type: Tourist/visitor center Santa Elena Skywalk, Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve Attraction type: Scenic/historic walking area; Bridge Isla Tortuga, Puntarenas This state-owned island is leased to a Costa Rican family that leads tours. Attraction type: Island Reserva Biologica Carara, Puntarenas A coastal rain forest park. Attraction type: Park; National park Sky Mountain Canopy, Puntarenas Attraction type: Nature trail; Tour; Trail

North Puntarenas History

The peculiar shape of Puntarenas province has a very sensible explanation. During the first 350 years of Spanish presence in Central America, the southern Pacific portion of what is now Costa Rica remained quite isolated from the developing population centers of the region. The high mountains between this area and the Central Valley presented a formidable barrier to the available means of terrestrial transportation. Thus, the few early settlers that ventured into the southern region came either from Panama to the south, or by boat from the port of Caldera in the Gulf of Nicoya.

The dimensions of the province are due to the fact that it includes all the many kilometers of coastline from the Gulf of Nicoya south to Panama, the large inland valleys of Coto Brus and El General, and the southern tip of the Nicoya Peninsula -- all areas that were once most easily approached by sea.

Despite the use of the Gulf of Nicoya as an entryway to Costa Rica's inland territory, the port of Puntarenas was not developed until 1840 when coffee production in the highlands reached exportable volumes. Originally, the coffee was brought to port in oxcarts via a trail through the mountains. In 1879, a stretch of railroad track was completed which connected Puntarenas with the town of Esparza (one of the country's earliest Spanish settlements, founded in 1554, a decade before the Central Valley began to be colonized) where the oxcart trail came out of the mountains. Eventually, the railroad was built all the way through to San José and service was inaugurated in 1910.

With the railroad connection to the Central Valley, the Pacific port's activities continued to be a major part of the region's economy throughout the 20th century. However, due to the aging and deterioration of the port facilities and the need to accommodate the much larger vessels of modern shipping fleets, a new port was constructed in the 1980's to the south of Puntarenas. The site chosen was Caldera, where ships had anchored during colonial times.

Prior to the Spaniards' arrival, the area that is now Puntarenas province was home to numerous groups of native peoples with varied lifestyles depending on the habitats in which they lived. The coastal inhabitants were no strangers to the sea and ventured out into open water either in dugouts or in balsa wood rafts. In addition to fish, they harvested other marine products such as shellfish (dug from the mudflats at low tide), sea turtles and turtle eggs, and murex shells from which they obtained a purple dye used in tinting cloth.