Questions?

Rain Trails may NOT be your Site!
If you're the typical 'eco-tourist', in search of a predigested vacation, you may have come to the wrong people. If you enjoy being led around by the nose, being spoon-fed by 'tour leaders' who expound on the wonders of the tropics, then the services we provide are definitely not for you.

If you like being the passive object of somebody else's experience (and enrichment), if you enjoy being 'shuttled around' from one pricy location to another... then we can't help you very much, except maybe to put you in touch with 'tour organizations' that do this as a regular thing.

We are not a resort facility that arranges 'tours' in order to boost revenue from other 'services' we provide. We don't depend on the meals, drinks, and lodging of visitors to survive as a 'tour company'. We own no hotels, no bars, no catering services, no 'hospedajes', no 'albergues', although we may use, at times, the facilities of others... if these are modestly conceived and managed by 'natives' (important factors in estimation).

'Nature' is the builder of our primary 'infrastructure'. We seek out, on the backs of horses, mules, and on foot, the nooks and human crannies of a remote rainforest paradise that few 'outsiders' get to know first-hand, places where nature and human community coexist, (more or less) by the pressures of the world you likely come from. The key to our survival, as an organization, lies in the quality of a natural experience that we alone, in this burgeoning business of tropical 'tourism', make possible.

Why Horses?
We use horses because we like horses and know horses - their limitations as well as their capabilities - but also because horses (and one's own two feet) are the only means of travel in much of the area we visit.

On the more traveled portions of your route you may, on a rare occasion, see a 4-Wheel Drive (likely an English Land Rover or Toyota Land Cruiser) negotiating the sometimes treacherous and twisted trails that connect the scattered centers of native activity, the rural 'pueblos'. But, in general, the folks you pass will return your interested gaze at eye-level... that is, they, too, will be 'hunkered' on the backs of friendly horses or mules.

The draft engine of choice in this part of the world is - what else? - the ubiquitous pair of oxen, yoked at the forehead and horns, big-humped Brahmas more often than not. You'll get used to the sight of a team finding its way to work in the dim light of morning, or grazing at noon (still yoked) on open pasture or beside the road, or winding their way home at night, pulling the traditional wood-wheeled cart and its tired campesino.

Distinctive sights such as the above will become so commonplace that you'll soon make them entirely your own. With luck (and a bit of work on your part) you may come to feel such a part of the landscape, securely preserved in your mind's store of indelible images, that you'll forget about the digital camera tucked away in your saddle bag.

Frijolito (left)-- 'little black bean' -- with friends Daniel and Lefty. Lefty belongs to a special class of dogs in Costa Rica which are immediately recognized as 'saguates'. They are timid, do not bark, and are usually without permanent human attachment. Lefty loves horses, too, and joined Rain Trails in 2002.

Night falls quickly on the clouded summit of Santa Maria.

How do you manage Rivers and Streams?
Our horses are native Criollas, especially suited to difficult terrain and the extreme weather contrasts Costa Rica is noted for. The South American Criolla (meaning 'indigenous'), immediately recognized by its compact frame and convex nose configuration, is a breed of horse apart, sure-footed and uniquely adapted to river crossing and the rocky surfaces of mountain passes. Given a certain latitude, our horses will skillfully find their way across rivers several hundred feet wide and three-to-four feet deep.

However, at times we may leave the horses (well pastured) behind and use the rivers themselves for productive travel. Rain Trails possesses the technical means (inflatable water craft) for navigating the waters and lake systems in (and to the north of) the vast roadless area in which we operate.

Why the name 'Rain Trails'?
No, it doesn't rain all the time in a tropical rain forest. Even during the 'rainy season' it tends to rain only in mid to late afternoon, and by no means every day. You will discover that much of the time the sun shines as it does during the verano, Spanish for 'summer'. (In Central America the 'dry' and 'rainy' seasons are designated 'summer' [verano] and 'winter' [invierno] respectively. However, because of rapidly changing meteorological patterns, one day may be called 'summer', by natives, the next day 'winter', which visitors invariably find confusing.)

But we call ourselves 'Rain Trails' for a very positive reason. The broad area we visit is on the 'green' (or 'wet') side of one of Central America's largest volcano systems, where, to our immense gratification, it does happen to rain a bit more than elsewhere in Costa Rica and in neighboring countries. Hence the stupendous (and unrivaled) diversity of fauna and flora, much of which has not been identified, much less studied! Called the Rincón de la Vieja (Corner of the Old Woman), the green peaks of this chain of mountains form an enchanting backdrop for an experience (in sunshine or drizzle) that you are not apt to forget!

Hands-On!
Ours is a 'hands-on' approach to nature - and be assured that we have very little competition in this respect. All aspects of the experience are developed according to your own specifications.
You do the basic planning, you develop the schedule in line with your personal requirements... and in advance of your visit.

Once on the scene, you manage the care of your own horse and (if necessary) your own pack mule. You plan and help put your own meals together. You seek out destinations of your choice and the trails to get there.

You and your traveling companions decide where and how to spend the following days (and nights).
Meanwhile, the nature you explore will be an extension of your own imagination, a product (we believe) of your own growing capacity for experiencing life. Life is what these excursions are about.

Map of Northwestern Costa Rica where Raintrails operates. Click for a larger image

What role does Rain Trails play in all this?
Rain Trails makes possible the hands-on experience described above... we do this by placing you in direct interaction with the object of your experience. Also, we cut corners. We get rid of the nonsense that often consumes the visitor's precious time and energy. With us there is no standing in lines, or waiting around for the next 'event' on your schedule.

We bring you from the airport (or bus station) directly to where the excursion begins: to the physical source of the experience in question. Leave your money, if you have brought any with you to Costa Rica, and passport behind. (A 'strong-box' is available for that purpose at your point of departure in Guayabo de Bagaces)

We provide you with the essentials of the trip. You start out with only a few personal items, things that can be easily tucked into the saddle bags behind you. We provide you with everything else.

There are the horses, of course, the preferred means of travel in the areas we visit, plus the leather tack and equipment you need to use horses and pack animals intelligently and effectively. We put things together you that we feel need to be put together.

Do not expect the amenities of your present life to follow you into the tropical adventure that lies ahead. In general, we follow the familiar dictum that 'less is more'. (See What do Bring above.) You will need a toothbrush, a towel, one or two changes of clothing, a pair of stiff boots, but little else.

We'll provide rain gear if needed. If your penchant is to explore the bottom of a particular waterfall, or a seemingly inaccessible bathing area in one of the clear rivers that flow, hot or cold, in this volcanic region, your guide will have both the know-how and rappelling equipment, if that's what it takes, to manage a safe descent.

To allay your understandable qualms and apprehensions, remember Rain Trails provides you with the full-time service of an experienced (and bilingual) horseman who functions competently as 'guide'. Your ‘guide’ is an extraordinary individual who knows the region you will visit like the back of his (or her) hand.

You might think of Rain Trails as the 'mediating element' in a personal exploration. We are the agency that makes possible your interaction with a new and often breathtaking environment... but the depth and details are yours to fill in! Rain Trails remains, through it all, a secondary factor in this unfolding of personal experience.

Rarely visited by outsiders!
It is hard to convey the sense of cultural and geographic remoteness one can experience a mere hour or two from the Inter-American Highway. (The IAH connects the northern reaches of Canada and Alaska with sub-equatorial Panama.) Yet, if you leave the pot-holed surface of this famous highway, called also the 'Pan-American', and drive north from the historical pueblo of Bagaces in Guanacaste, you soon enter a world in which the last remnants of Western-style road engineering and maintenance have gone by the way.

North of Guayabo, an outpost of modest cultural modernity shaped, in large part, by the presence of a huge geo-thermal power generating facility, roads are rocky and barely passable, except for the sturdiest of four-wheel drives.

You spend a night in Guayabo, enjoy food and a hot 'sauna' (if that is your preference), and switch to horses immediately the next morning. We leave the 'main road' and head away from the sun, riding between two volcano systems which have been visible on the horizon since we approached Bagaces the day before: Miravalles, on the right, the Rincón de la Vieja on the left, our gateway to the experience in question. Ahead is a valley, hidden from all but the few who live there, that sprawls into the low-lying border area of Costa Rica and Nicaragua, one of the least populated regions of Central America.

The General Location...
Check out the Map. The broad area you will investigate lies to the west of the road (clearly marked on most maps but undependable in actual fact) that leads from Guayabo de Bagaces north to the small community of San José and points beyond in neighboring Nicaragua.

Our area of primary interest takes in the western-most portion of the sprawling Province of Alajuela, a political unit that reaches across half of Costa Rica.

Western Alajuela has been largely neglected by authorities due to its rough terrain, relative inaccessibility, and remoteness from the center of provincial administration, circumstances which have turned out to be a benefit in our estimation. Unrecognized in travel manuals (and unknown to Costa Ricans themselves) this forgotten region has remained a treasure-store of natural beauty. Unmanaged by government, yet uncontaminated at the same time by commercial interests, this area reveals what we feel is the best of all possible worlds.

We ourselves, and the horses beneath us, tread lightly on its fragile surface. Our hope is that the area will remain in its present roadless condition... and outlast, by many generations, our own hesitant probing of its natural state.

There is much to see and experience here... but in the course of your brief stay no other 'tourist' will cross your path, this we can assure you. Although a 'national park' extends, officially, into a small portion of the region in question, no 'park officials' will be on hand to welcome you or (alas) to collect 'visitor's fees'.

There are, in fact, no official 'entrances' and 'exits' in this section of the park... and, should your horses take you into that pristine environment, you are apt to discover that you and your small group are the sole visitors. The only evidence of a human presence is likely to be a network of well worn trails that were in use by the indigenous population long before 'national park' were words in anybody's vocabulary.

The Valley of the 'Boy-Child'.
The principal water way, which winds through the valley draining the springs and tributaries of the northeast slopes of the Rincón de la Vieja, is the River Pizote, called by some El Niño, which connects a series of pueblos (not indicated on maps) which you may think of, when you unexpectedly come upon them, as the 'Brigadoons' of Costa Rica.

You will discover, however, that unlike 'Brigadoon' these little communities, the names of which we leave unrecorded (to whet your appetite for the unknown), have a very real existence, though they appear to play little role in the larger economy, this due, no doubt, to their extreme isolation. Here there is no electric power... no telephones ring.

The Valley of the Pizote has been a conduit, in ages past, for the movement, back and forth, of indigenous populations. In recent centuries these folk 'on the move' have comprised that mix of Europeans and Native Peoples referred to often, by academics, as 'mestizos', though the people themselves do not know this word. Despite their native roots they have lost many of the outward trappings of the indigenous culture and have become speakers of Spanish on the whole.

North Into Nicaragua?
The Rio Pizote empties, eventually, into the fresh waters of Cocibolca (or Lake Nicaragua) and will provide, for the truly undaunted among you (who happen also to have two weeks, or more, of free time), a practical access to one or more of the thirty-eight islands of the Solentiname Archipelago, a place where automobiles are unknown and life goes on as it has for centuries. Here, circular palm-thatched 'chosas' share space on the human landscape with rectangular buildings assembled with timbers and sun-dried bricks. We find it a refreshing place to visit in its specifically human quality and cultural ambiance.

The World will never be the Same...
Somebody once said that experience is empty if it fails to change your life. Your exposure to the unprocesseed reality of a tropical rainforest will be invigorating, challenging, hard at times, lacking in many of the 'comforts of home', but we believe it will stretch your imagination and leave you a different person. Get in touch!