Arenal in a Very Small Group: the Hidden Thermal River and Los Lagos

The group is kept very small and the transport is the comfortable kind, which is most of what separates this day from the coach trips that cover the same road. Meals are not included, deliberately: you eat what you want, where the stops happen to be. La Paz falls is the first stop, brief, in the rainforest, and the guide knows the angle the photograph works from. Local farmers sell fresh fruit there. Then a terrace built into the mountain above the San Fernando falls, with coffee in ceramic cups and hummingbirds working the flowers. An earthquake once shook the foundations of the place and marked the people who live there. At La Fortuna the road goes to a viewpoint under Arenal, 1,670 m of near-perfect cone, which has run the history of this region since the great eruption of 1968. The walk there passes through forest that has grown back over old lava, where white monkeys, sloths, coatis and tropical birds turn up. The thermal river is the part that is not in the guidebooks. It changed in 1968: people crossing it on foot to help the affected found the water boiling. Today it is pools of hot water among the trees, with steam coming off them. No lockers, no queue, no tiles. The day closes at a resort with hot spring pools and gardens, and a thermal wet bar for anyone who wants to finish with music and a cocktail. Changing rooms and showers are there, and food and drink can be bought. Cancel at least 24 hours before departure for a full refund.