I’ve lived in Guanacaste for five years, and I’ve been to all the big beaches – but this is a daunting topic. The 5 best Guanacaste beaches? There’s a long list to choose from, and it’s possible that no two people would agree!
I live in Flamingo, three blocks from the beach, with a wonderful Costa Rican woman named Guiselle. Every Christmas, New Year’s or Semana Santa, much of her family from the Central Valley flocks to visit us, arriving on motorcycles or in packed cars, often with two little chihuahuas, sometimes requiring us to inflate air mattresses on the floor to accommodate all our guests.
So I started wondering: Why do they always come to visit us for the holidays, but we rarely go to visit them? And the answer is simple: because we have a beach, and the Costa Rican people seem to have it hard-wired into their brains that during the holidays you have to go visit a beach.
This has happened so many times that Guiselle and her family are always looking for new beaches to visit. Junquillal? Nacascolo? Mina? Negra? Pan de Azúcar? Calzón de Pobre? There are so many choices that the decision alone sometimes takes as much time as five people trying to use our only bathroom in the morning.
So I’m going to try to set some parameters here, including accessibility, popularity, beauty and things to do. And I recognize up-front that any beach lover in Guanacaste might have a different list. But this would be mine.
1. Playa Conchal
Located near Brasilito and in front of the Reserva Conchal resort, Playa Conchal is widely considered the most beautiful beach in Guanacaste. The sand at most beaches is made of rocks crushed by millions of years of erosion, but here the sand is made of crushed seashells – millions of tiny, mostly white seashell fragments. It makes a perfect bed to lie down on, and it’s weirdly fascinating to scoop up the “seashell sand” in your hand and just look at it.
The "sand" at Playa Conchal consists almost entirely of crushed seashells.
Location is both a plus and a minus for Conchal, because unless you’re a guest at the Reserva, you have to walk 20 minutes or so from Brasilito to get there. The plus is that you’ll be on a pristine, gorgeous beach with no walk-through traffic. The minus is that if you’re hauling coolers full of beer and ice, you’ll probably arrive pretty tired. So the access is not exactly easy, but the walk is well worth it.
2. Playa Tamarindo
You had to include Tamarindo, Mr. Obvious? Yes, I did, because it’s the most entertaining beach town I’ve ever lived in, it has good surfing for all skill levels, and for size and popularity it’s rivaled only by Jaco or Coco. Tamarindo is a kaleidoscope of sights, sounds, monkeys, bikinis, beachfront bars and the pounding waves of a swimmable, surfable beach. If you’re looking for isolated little beaches where you can’t see anyone for miles, you’re looking at the wrong list. But if you think people are part of the attraction of visiting Costa Rica, or if you like it when waiters bring you beers on the beach, then you’ve come to the right place.
Visit Surf City Costa Rica... A vibrant mix of culture, shops and night-life!
3. Playas del Coco
I lived here for a year, and I highly recommend this high-energy town and its bucolic beach. You don’t have to bring your surfboard, as Coco is surrounded by C-shaped headlands that make it a great harbor for fishing boats and catamarans, but not a place to catch raging waves.
The beachfront promenade is a winding walkway called “Amor de Temporada,” which roughly translates to “Summer Lovin’,” implying that someone had an affair while on vacation. Best of luck with that, but meanwhile, let your kids try the skate park, the basketball court or the sand volleyball while you lounge on the grass or the beach.
Playas del Coco offers a natural harbor, tranquil waves and a great beach.
4. Playa Flamingo
Call it hometown pride if you want, and yes, I can walk there from my house if I have enough energy – but Flamingo is truly an outstanding beach in Guanacaste, and I live here for a reason. The playa is roughly 1 kilometer long, a beautiful, crescent-shaped white beach, with a lot of shade trees on the sand. It’s almost completely devoid of development because of the protected mangrove swamps between the Margaritaville resort and the first houses on the outskirts of the South Ridge.
Flamingo's crescent-shaped beach is a beauty, and there's very little development behind it because of protected mangroves.
So when you drive down the bumpy little dirt road next to Playa Flamingo, you may see a lot of cars parked on the shoulders, yet you can always find a spot. (But don’t try this on New Year’s Eve.) The reason there are so many people on this beach, at least in the high season, is that it’s such a great beach. Safety in numbers!
5. Playa Nosara
Here I venture a bit far afield, but I also lived in Nosara for six weeks, and this place has four or five good beaches. Nogara is the yoga capital of Costa Rica, it has great surf, and coincidentally it’s home to one of the country’s best turtle-nesting beaches, at Ostional.
They should have a bumper sticker that says, “Nosara is not for everyone – it’s for everyone ELSE.” Nosara is sort of a magical place, full of mindful people who like yoga and surfing and Buddha and tattoos but don’t like television.
Nosara, like much of Costa Rica's Pacific coast, boasts some great sunsets.
In addition to great surfing, yoga is one of Nosara's top attractions.
Nosara is a pretty long haul from most places – usually you have to drive to Nicoya first, and then to Samara, and then to Nosara. But when people reach the end of the road here, they are rarely disappointed.
So how did I do?
Guiselle: “I don’t know if even TWO of your picks would have made my list of the top five.” Karl: “But sweetheart, that’s the beauty of Costa Rica. We all get to like what we like!”
Special Places is located within the beautiful coastal resort town of Flamingo, in the province of Guanacaste, Costa Rica. With over 15 years of service dedicated to the rental and property management profession, we have an extensive list of rentals in the Flamingo, Potrero, Brasilito and Tamarindo Beach area. Whether looking to plan your next tropical vacation or searching for someone to manage your home, our goal is to provide our clients with the most efficient and personable service in the area.
** In accordance with public health recommendations, Special Places continues to work hard to keep our guests safe. These protocols include enhanced cleaning and disinfection procedures for all properties under management **
We are very proud of our professional maid service staff, who provide regular cleaning for some 150 properties — and do it with a smile. A half-dozen maids provide full-time service at a single house, but all the rest rotate among a wide variety of properties from Matapalo to Playa del Coco.
Maids are responsible not just for cleaning but for staging the house, with everything in its proper place, and keeping track of inventory (so that, for example, new clients don’t check in and find there’s no toilet paper). At times, say on Jan. 2, there are so many checkouts and check-ins that the maids bring their sisters, brothers and mothers to get all the work done.
Full-time maids assigned to a single property assist clients with shopping, cooking and laundry, and they often form close bonds with clients. It’s no surprise that our clients often want to take their maids home with them.
Special Places of Costa Rica employs two full-time maintenance men who service all our properties, plus a handful of caretakers dedicated to a single property each.
These men will fix just about any problem that arises — leaks, electrical and plumbing issues, a door that scrapes on a floor, a noisy ceiling fan… you name it. They also paint homes and provide roofing maintenance.
Our maintenance staff are available 24/7 for emergencies like a burst pipe that causes a flood. Special Places of Costa Rica also enjoys a network of qualified subcontractors to handle swimming pool service, gardening / landscaping and repairs to air conditioning units & kitchen appliances.
Steven, from Potrero, is a rental agent for Special Places. He processes rental inquiries, checks on property availability, makes reservations and helps with check-in and check-out info.
Steven has worked at three hotels: as a bellman at Casa Chameleon in Las Catalinas, as a receptionist in the Sugar Beach Hotel near there, and as a receptionist at Jardín del Edén in Tamarindo. He has a bachelor’s degree in teaching English from the Universidad Latina in Santa Cruz, and someday he hopes to teach English at his old high school in Cartagena.
Steven likes to ride his Kawasaki 250 dirt bike in the Potrero Hills, around Las Catalinas and in Tempate. He’s also interested in cars and mechanics, and he’s skilled at repairing motorcycles.
Quote: “I think work is a very important tool that helps us to fulfill ourselves as human beings in life and to improve on what we already know.”
Rebeca is an accounting assistant at Special Places, processing invoices and accounts payable and monitoring vehicle fleet expenses.
Originally from San José, she studied accounting at two institutions there and spent years working in accounting for two international shipping firms.
She currently lives in Santa Cruz, where she is married and has dogs and cats. She is a big fan of the Saprissa soccer team and also likes going to the beach and the movies.
Quote: “Haz bien y no mires a quién,” meaning, “Do good without considering to whom.”
Born in Samar Province in the Philippines, Phem has a two-year degree in computer science from the Asian Institute of Computer Studies. She came to Costa Rica at age 19 to work for her aunt, who owned the Mariner Inn in Flamingo. She later worked for House of Rentals, then Special Places of Costa Rica when the companies merged. As a concierge, she books tours, rental cars, chefs or whatever clients need to make their stay enjoyable. “Whatever they request, you do it,” she said.
She enjoys “having a connection to people, meeting different people, helping people.” Her proudest accomplishment was moving from the Philippines to Costa Rica to explore better opportunities. She recommends that visitors to Flamingo try an ATV tour, a catamaran cruise, rappelling or whitewater rafting.
Quote: “I love Potrero. I live in Surfside. It’s quiet, safe, and people there are very accommodating, nice, friendly, always willing to help you. They’re open to anyone. I like that community. And the bars are within walking distance.”
Pascale, Kenny’s mother and business partner, is the head accountant at Special Places. She is responsible for all the accounting, billing and taxes, managing the maid service, setting work schedules and procuring cleaning products.
Pascale is from Antwerp, Belgium, where she and her husband had a food-service business specializing in poultry. But they often traveled to the Caribbean and Central America, and in 2009 decided to move to Costa Rica.
“We thought it was time to follow some dreams, so we sold the business and came to Costa Rica,” she said. They traveled to every corner of the country, but they fell in love with Guanacaste and decided to settle in Flamingo. They couldn’t find a house that satisfied Pascale’s handyman husband, so they built their own on the hills above Potrero in Pacific Heights.
She says her proudest accomplishment is “bringing two beautiful sons into the world.”
Quote: “The way we raised them, they were very independent. We taught them to work also. Of course, school came first. To us it’s white and black, and the gray doesn’t exist. It’s good or bad.”
Norlyng coordinates the maintenance of all Special Places properties, and she’s also in charge of Human Relations and is an assistant to Kenny Segers.
Born in Limón but a longtime resident of Matapalo, she previously worked as a receptionist at the Best Western Seis Playas Hotel. She also spent six years at the Wyndham Tamarindo, working as head of reception and as an administrative assistant.
Norlyng studied law for a year and a half at the University of Costa Rica in Liberia, but currently she is more focused on tourism. She is married and has two daughters, ages 9 and 2. Her interests include reading (the Bible, inspirational works and finance) and going to relaxing places.
Quote: “My philosophy of life is to live in the present and try not to worry about the future, to have clear objectives, to try not to stress too much and to act in the present.”
A native of Brasilito, Karolayn has a bachelor’s degree in accounting from the Universidad Latina in Santa Cruz. She is responsible for the billing, accounting and filing at Special Places.
She enjoys hiking and swimming, and her favorite local places are Playa Danta and Playa Conchal. Asked what activity she would recommend to visitors, she said riding a Banana Boat, an inflatable, banana-shaped boat towed behind a speedboat.
Quote: “The working environment here is very nice, very tranquilo. We get along really well, the management, the coworkers, and also the maids and maintenance people. Also, in my job I’ve learned a lot of things that in university classes they don’t teach. It gives you the opportunity to learn and grow.”
A native of Antwerp, Belgium, Kenny emigrated to Costa Rica in 2008. Having graduated from high school in Belgium, he studied economics and business administration in Costa Rica. Eager to go into business, Kenny left university to work as a property manager for House of Rentals in Flamingo, which he acquired not long after starting the job. House of Rentals grew into Special Places of Costa Rica, currently represented by offices in Playa Flamingo and Playas del Coco, and known as one of the leading agencies in the area.
Kenny speaks and writes fluent Spanish, English and Dutch. He is the proud father of a Costa Rican son, Khael, who was born in 2016.
Passionate about his growing vacation rental and management business, Kenny is always looking for investments and opportunities. Hotel Pitaya Lodge (formerly Kakaos Lodge) is also under his management.
In 2020, he began building the first of several homes as part of a newly launched project development/construction company.
Juan Carlos works as a rental agent, attending to any questions about renting a property, explaining the options available, answering any questions and supporting the concierge team in extra services like tours or transport.
Juan Carlos was born in San José and currently lives in Potrero. He has worked for some 15 years in sales or customer service at hotels, including the Hotel Barceló in San José, the Hotel Parador in Manuel Antonio and the Lagarta Lodge in Nosara.
He also studied English at the Instituto Norteamericano in San José, earning a C2 certification in English. He has also taken several courses in administration.
Juan Carlos likes walking on the beach (“so I’m definitely in the right place”) with his French bulldog. “They’re very mischievous but very sweet, very good company.”
Quote: “I always say, ‘It costs nothing to smile.’ I always like to convey that people should be happy no matter what.”
Juan Diego, who was born and raised in Villarreal, works as a concierge. That means he helps visitors arrange tours and transportation, rental cars, airport pickup and dropoff, and other services.
Juan Diego studied sustainable tourism management at UNED, the Universidad Estatal a Distancia, where he received a bachelor’s degree in 2013. He has worked as an admin for the Dream Chaser catamaran in Tamarindo, as a receptionist at the Hotel Pasatiempo in Tamarindo, and as a concierge at the Hotel Dreams Las Mareas in El Jobo.
Juan Diego enjoys watching HBO series and movies, riding his bike, going out with friends and watching the sunset on the beach.
Quote: “I like concierge work because I get to help a lot of people, fulfilling the dreams of tourists who visit a beautiful country like Costa Rica that’s full of nature.”
José does property inspections, check-ins and check-outs for Special Places, making sure that properties are in great shape for new clients.
Born in Limón, he currently lives in Cartagena. He went to high school at Liceo Experimental Bilingüe de Santa Cruz, and he spent seven years working as a waiter and bartender at the JW Marriotts in Hacienda Pinilla and Reserva Conchal.
He enjoys going to the beach, listening to music, watching movies and series, playing video games and spending time with family.
Quote: “If you’re afraid of dying, it’s better not to be born.”
A native of Nicoya who lives in Cartagena, Jhon works in accounting at Special Places, calculating reservation contracts, sales commissions and billing. He has been studying accounting at the Universidad Latina in Santa Cruz for a year and a half.
His goal is to have an accounting firm of his own. His favorite hobby is artisanal fishing, usually from a boat out of Flamingo, and he once caught a 70-pound mahi-mahi. He also has caught marlin in Tamarindo and Quepos.
His greatest pride is a nearly 2-year-old daughter named Elizabeth Aitana.
Quote: “I think the most marvelous thing that’s happened to me would be the birth of my daughter. That’s the thing I’m most proud of.”
Jason is a concierge and rental specialist with an interesting job — knocking on new clients’ doors to see if they need anything or would like to book any tours or other services.
Born in Limón and currently living in Huacas, Jason speaks flawless English. He has taken some university courses on websites and social media marketing. He is married, no kids, but has a cat named Kirara.
Jason previously worked as a database analyst at Western Union in San José, typically addressing charge-backs on credit cards and resolving other monetary issues.
Jason loves “adrenaline,” muddy offroad adventures, motorcycling, ATV, video games, surfing and skateboarding.
Quote: “You don’t have to be the smartest person to fulfill your dreams, all you need is to put in a little effort and be certain that you will achieve whatever you set your mind to.”
Gabriel joined Special Places as an accounting assistant at the age of 20. He was born in Liberia and currently lives in Filadelfia with his family.
He studied at the Colegio Técnico Profesional de Carrillo, with a specialty in accounting and auditing. He worked previously as an accounting assistant and secretary for a clinic in Palestina de Belén that serves disabled people.
Gabriel enjoys mountain biking, and for the past eight years he has volunteered at the Red Cross in Filadelfia, working mostly in strategic communication.
Quote: “We never have to give up on a dream just because of the time it takes to achieve it.”
Daniela works as an administrative assistant in Human Resources, helping with payroll, health benefits and insurance, as well as onboarding new personnel.
Born in Liberia, she now lives in Villarreal, and she not only has two dogs but also a horse. She adores animals and loves to go horseback riding in the country. She also likes listening to Latin music like cumbia and salsa.
Daniela has a bachelor’s degree in business administration from the Universidad Libre de Costa Rica (ULICORI). Before coming to Special Places, she worked as an HR assistant at the Occidental Hotel in Tamarindo, where she learned a lot about Human Resources in a real-world environment.
Quote: “Take risks, because everything good starts with a little fear!”
Carla works as an accounting assistant at Special Places and is also involved in property management.
She was born in Caracas, Venezuela, and raised in Ciudad Guayana, where she earned a law and accountant degree and worked as a lawyer and accountant. Since coming to Costa Rica, she has worked as a manicurist, masseuse, bartender, waitress and artist.
A gifted artist and something of a Renaissance woman, Carla also draws and makes earrings, necklaces, and bracelets. Her varied interests include dancing, hiking, scuba diving, traveling and discovering new cultures.
Quote: “My motto is ‘I know that I own the weak and fragile body of a woman, but I have the heart and stomach of a king.’ ”
Pricing Notice
This property is not managed by Special Places of Costa Rica.
Accordingly, rental rates and availability for this property might not be current. Please submit an inquiry and will be be happy to verify the details and assist you with your booking.
