Beach Hotel in Dominical, Costa Rica. With high-speed WiFi.

Although the Central Valley is one of the world’s principal coffee-growing centers, the cultural and political environment of the region has matured greatly in recent years. With the booming capital of San Jose at its core, and the bustling cities of Alajuela, Heredia and Cartago on its perimeter, the Central Valley serves as the main population center of the country as well as embodying the modern-day persona of Costa Rica. The region boasts one of the largest microchip production centers in the world, and the country’s young workforce is educated, computer-savvy and increasingly bilingual. With vast cityscapes, a modern infrastructure and dizzying traffic, Costa Rica is clearly much more than ‘pretty beaches and rain forest.’

In recent years, hotels have started springing up throughout the Central Valley, particularly near the airport in Alajuela. Although travelers are discovering that the city is a safer and more convenient alternative to staying in San Jose, tourism remains low-key throughout the region. However, it’s worth taking a few days to explore the country’s heartland where you can experience Costa Rica from a unique, ‘nongringofied’ prospective.

As an added bonus, regional roads are generally excellent and public transportation is inexpensive, frequent and comfortable – a bus ride of no more than two hours will bring you to towering waterfalls, active volcanoes, steaming hot springs, enormous coffee fincas (farms or plantations) and some of the best white-water rafting in the world. And, if you have a rental car, there’s nothing quite like the thrill of shifting gears on a windy, mountain road.

Alajuela & The North Of The Valley

Cradled by the gentle undulations of coffee fincas and tamed jungle parks, the provincial capital of Alajuela lies about 18km northwest of San Jose. Originally known as Villa Hermosa, it’s still a very ‘pretty city, ’ not to mention the country’s second largest, with a population of more than 185, 000. And, contrary to what most cab drivers will tell you, Alajuela is only 3km from Juan Santamaría international airport, and is rapidly becoming the preferred base for travelers leaving and entering the country. However, Alajuela will not be our own preferred city to stay at when we are in the San Jose area.

If we want to stay really close to the airport, we will always choose Dos Palmas (www.dospalmascr.com), a Dutch/Costarican owned hotel which owners will go out of their way to make the guests happy.

Also close to the airport, only a short 8 minute drive, is La Garita, a gorgeous piece of natural beauty that has become a popular area for Airport hotels. The three hotels we like best are La Rosa de America (www.larosadeamerica.com), Margarita de La Garita (www.margarita.cr) and Dos Palmas (this is another hotel owned by the same people as the hotel at the airport) ((www.dospalmascr.com), all three in La Garita.

The owners of these hotels are very hospitable, try to make your stay a memorable one in every which way they can, the hotel grounds are more than beautiful, the rooms equipped with lots of extras and the prices are still very good.

Also, the La Garita area is perfect for use as an uncongested jumping off point to visit many of the popular Central Valley sights including ZOOAVE, the POAS Volcano, the LA PAZ Waterfall gardens and the DOKA Coffee Plantation as well as offering a quick and easy "escape" to the Pacific Coast and the many beautiful locations to the South. Finally this region benefits from some of the best climate circumstances in the world with Spring like conditions year round and more sun than the rest of the Central Valley.