The La Paz Waterfall Gardens in Costa Rica

One of the things about Costa Rica is that there are waterfalls all over the country. With so many options, you sort of have to make a decision on which ones you are going to spend time at. A popular option is the La Paz Waterfall Gardens because of its proximity to San Jose and how many waterfalls you can see in one place.

But those two things are also why I was a little skeptical on going. Any attraction that is close enough to be a day trip from a major city is usually pretty touristy. But also, this is one of the more expensive attractions to go to and you can see waterfalls all over that are more secluded and much cheaper.

We decided to take a chance since we didn’t have any other plans for the afternoon before starting on our Costa Rica itinerary. We also needed to stay in the area since we had booked tickets to the Poas Volcano for the following morning.

About the La Paz Waterfall Gardens

The La Paz Waterfall Gardens are located about an hour and a half north of San Jose, Costa Rica’s capital city. It’s a popular place for organized tours and an easy day trip from San Jose. It’s location is really accessible.

If you’re heading to La Fortuna, it’s an easy stop off one of the main roads. It takes you on a different route than just going straight to La Fortuna, but it doesn’t add that much time on your drive–maybe 30 minutes. And if you plan on seeing other things in the area, like the Poas Volcano, or some of the waterfalls (Catarata del Toro or Rio Agrio), then you’ll be on this route anyway.

The Waterfall Gardens consists of 70 acres and is a nature park and a wildlife refuge. There are just over 2 miles (3.5km) of paved trails that take you through cloud forests and rainforests, as well as the wildlife refuge and along five beautiful waterfalls. The property is very cute with stone and wood accents that blend it in to the surrounding nature.

Trails:

There are three paved trails at La Paz Waterfall Gardens that take you through the beautiful property.

• Fern Trail – (Peach trail below) Starts at Trout Lake and takes you through the forest to the La Paz River. Out and back trail, or connects to the Rio La Paz Trail.
• Rio La Paz Trail – (Yellow) Connects from both trails and takes you along the La Paz River or can start at the trail behind the aviary.
• Main Trail – (Orange) Takes you through the wildlife refuge and through each of the five waterfalls and ends at the gift shop and shuttle bus.

Restaurants:

There are several dining options throughout the property, so you can stop along the way for lunch or dinner. Or if you want to just enjoy nature and have a cocktail, you can do that too.

• Tortillas Restaurant – Casual dining open for breakfast 7am-10am, and lunch 11am-4pm. Has views of the cloud forest and Poas Volcano.
• Colibries Restaurant – Buffet lunch open from 11am-4pm.
• Big Trout Bar – Lakeside bar and grill open for lunch 11am-4:30pm and cocktails from 11am-6pm. They’ll even prepare your freshly caught trout!
• Vista Poas Restaurant – Fine dining with traditional Costa Rican dishes. Open for dinner 5pm-9pm, reservation only.
• Las Tucas Bar – Cocktail bar open from 5pm-10pm.
• La Terraza – Coffee and pastries open from 8am-4pm.

Peace Lodge

You can actually choose to stay at the La Paz Waterfall Gardens as well. The Peace Lodge has accommodations within the nature park that allow you to stay on the beautiful property. Picture balconies overlooking the rainforest, hammocks, jacuzzi tubs, wooden accents throughout the rooms and stone fireplaces. When you are a guest of Peace Lodge, you have exclusive access to the Waterfall Gardens before it opens and after it closes.

Trout Lake

Located on the property is Trout Lake: a lake, restaurant and fishing/swimming area. You can try your luck at fishing and if you catch something, the restaurant will cook it up fresh for you anyway you like. To cool off, you can take a plunge in the cold water or just head to one of two jacuzzis to soak.

Guided Tours:

You can explore the waterfall gardens at your leisure but you can also choose to do a guided tour. You’ll get a behind-the-scenes tour with garden and wildlife information along the way. It also allows you to interact with the animals, though I’m not sure what that entails.

There are two guided tours offered daily at 8:45am and 1:30pm. You’ll need to make reservations with the front desk when you check in to reserve your spot.

Parking:

Parking is on-site and there are two main large lots with plenty of spaces. When you pull in, they’ll hand you a ticket to keep with you and you’ll need to hand it back when you leave. There is no additional cost for parking.

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Wildlife Refuge

The Wildlife Refuge at the La Paz Waterfall Gardens has over 100 species of Costa Rican animals within the park and where you can see some exotic animals up close. I’m always wary about places that have animals in cages or enclosures because I fully believe they should be in their natural habitats if possible. However, there are signs below all over the park stating the following:

“None of the animals that you will see in this Wildlife Refuge have been taken from their natural habitat; they were entrusted to our care by the Costa Rican Wildlife Ministry (MINAET), most of them were illegally held as pets when the Wild Life Ministry found and confiscated them. For various reasons these animals cannot be released back in to the wild.”

For animals that aren’t able to survive on their own in the wild, I’m glad they have a place to be, though I feel like some of them need larger enclosures. That aside, there are quite a few animals you can see here such as:

Birds

This part I am gutted about. So, when we arrived, we glanced at the map and then just took the main path down. Well, the first thing you see going down the main path is the monkey section and to the left are the butterflies. We didn’t see another building past the butterflies and once we entered the butterflies and exited out the other way, we STILL did not see the section for birds and ended up at the monkeys again. We just kept walking and exploring and…we missed the freaking birds.

The aviary is where you can see Costa Rica’s exotic birds up close and personal. You’ll see scarlet macaws, tanagers, toucans, parakeets and many more. You might see some of these in the wild while you’re exploring Costa Rica, but they are pretty hard to see up close and especially photograph.

Luckily we were able to spot many scarlet macaws on the beach in Playa Hermosa, but even with a telephoto lens, they were hard to photograph since they were pretty active. But I was so, so bummed not to see toucans up close. So, my note to you, don’t just get caught up with whatever is in front of you and make sure you get to the aviary.

Butterflies

The butterfly observatory is actually pretty large and a space that you can walk around freely to see the different butterflies fluttering around you. There are flowers and fruit bowls scattered around as well so it’s really easy to see the different types here (and get some pretty great pictures). There are over 25 species of butterflies to try and find within the observatory, including one of my favorites: the Blue Morpho Butterfly, a large butterfly with bright blue wings on the inside.

They also have a section that has many butterflies in the pupa or chrysalis stage hanging from a display. Apparently only about 5% of butterfly eggs make it to the adult stage in nature, but within the observatory, that number has gone up to 55%.

Hummingbirds

The hummingbird section is a little garden outside with feeders hanging around and 26 species of hummingbirds buzzing around that you might see. The feeders are pretty low so you can get a close look at them as they land.

Monkeys

The monkey pass is the first section we came to and it captures your attention right away since there are White Faced Monkeys or Capuchins in one of the main sections. They are pretty high energy and were chasing each other around and wrestling for most of the time we were there.

These monkeys were all rescued from illegal captivity and grouped together by sociability.

Snakes

There are no pictures here for a reason. I poked my head through the door and then walked back out and sat outside to wait for my husband. I’m not about to contribute to the snake nightmares I already have.

If you want to subject yourself to this sort of thing, there’s about 30 different, some deadly, (all vile), snakes to observe from within glass cases.

Jungle Cats

The jungle cats are fun to see. When we walked up to the enclosure, they were definitely curious and came right up to the glass and were walking around. We saw pumas and jaguars, and smaller cats. At 3:30pm, you can watch them being fed as well.

Like the other animals at the refuge, the cats were either injured, very old or had been around humans too long to be returned to the wild. The refuge also has a breeding program and according to their website, they want to eventually release the offspring into a protected zone if that were ever a valid option.

Frogs

There’s several enclosed cases in this area and for some reason I expected to see a bunch of brightly colored frogs. Maybe because their website has some great photos of different kinds of frogs in Costa Rica.

But frogs are kind of hard to spot and the ones we did find weren’t too exotic looking or anything. There’s also a Ranarium with a fountain and plants around that has signs up about frogs you might see in there. There weren’t any cases so I assumed they would be freely roaming, but we didn’t see any when we were in there and I feel like we looked pretty thoroughly. There’s also a few in enclosed cases that are poisonous.

Orchids

There is a little orchid pavilion as well. It’s a quick walk in and out to admire the different types of orchids before you move on.

Casita De La Paz

I did not understand this area while we were there. There’s a section right before the waterfalls that was a little strange. There were some farm animals that were in really small corridors and it was a little sad looking. Apparently it is a reproduction of what life would have looked like a hundred years ago as a Tico living on a farm. You can take a ride in a cart driven by an ox, taste fresh cow milk or home made tortillas. When we were there, none of this was happening and it just looked a little sad to me.

La Paz Waterfall Gardens

I have to say, most places in Costa Rica have one, maybe two waterfalls on a hike that you can see, so the fact that you can see five here is pretty cool. While the paths are obviously man made, they blend in well with nature and take you through some beautiful scenery. And while I was worried about it being too touristy, we only ran into about 3 groups of people on the trails. We were the only ones at the waterfalls and felt like we had the place to ourselves.

1. Templo Waterfall

85ft tall (26m)

The first waterfall you’ll come to on the main trail is the Templo Waterfall. If you take the Rio La Paz trail, you can reach the Upper Templo Lookout, but honestly the upper lookouts aren’t my favorite. You can’t see much of the waterfall, only the water going over the edge.

Walking down to the first viewpoint puts you right up close to the Templo Waterfall that you can feel the water spray from the platform.

Continuing along the trail, there’s an optional hike down which I recommend taking. It gives you a different vantage point of the Templo Waterfall from further away and you get more of a jungle vibe at the bottom. There’s a sandy area by the water and a great photo op.

2. Magia Blanca Waterfall

120ft tall (37m)

The second waterfall that you’ll come to is the Magia Blanca waterfall which also happens to be the tallest at the La Paz Waterfall Gardens. Like the one before, there is a viewing platform right near the falls, but this one doesn’t do as much justice as the next one.

There is another viewing platform from afar that lets you see the waterfall in its entirety. Or you can walk down another set of stairs to the platform at the foot of the waterfall. Water warning, you will get fairly wet at this platform. I could hardly keep my eyes open because of the water spray.

3. & 4. Encantada Waterfall + Escondida Waterfall

Encantada: 65ft tall (20m), Escondida: 15ft tall (5m)

The next section is where you’ll see two waterfalls. The Encantada and Escondida waterfalls are side by side and feed into the same pool. These two are the shortest and it’s a bit hard to see the second one.

5. La Paz Waterfall

110ft tall (34m)

The La Paz Waterfall is the fifth and final waterfall that you can see. However, take note that you can’t actually see the full waterfall from within the La Paz Waterfall Gardens. You can only see the top of it. The trail down will take you to a small overlook where you can only see the water going over the edge. And if you take the trail down, you’ll have to take many stairs back up to get to the main trail that leads to the restrooms and then back down again to get to the gift shop and where the shuttle will be.

To see the full waterfall, like these pictures, you can see it right by the road and don’t even have to have access to the park. So yes, you can still see the La Paz Waterfall even if you don’t want to visit the Waterfall Gardens.

You’ll just follow the road around until you see it. People park along the side of the road and just walk up to it from there. You can take a dirt path that takes you up to the fall and you can also walk up the road to get a nice shot of the waterfall with the bridge.

Shuttle Service

Once you get to the La Paz Waterfall, which is the last waterfall, you’ll end up at the gift shop and bathrooms. There’s a shuttle stop at the bottom near the road that runs from 8am-5pm and takes you right back up to the main lodge and parking area. (Then you can drive down the road to see the full waterfall.)

What to Bring

There’s nothing in particular you need to make sure to bring here except for the general Costa Rica things. You’ll want comfortable tennis shoes to walk and hike in. And you may want a raincoat/any rain gear if you are traveling in the rainy season and the weather looks questionable. Bring a water bottle. Other than that, you shouldn’t need too much as most visits here are typically about 2.5 hours.

Camping at La Paz

This is a rather random one and only applicable to those who are camping in Costa Rica. But while searching for places to camp, the La Paz parking lot showed up on our map. There are two large lots and the further one is a flat, open area. We thought it was kind of a strange place to just set up camp, but it was our first night and we were already there.

After a conversation with the guards through google translate, they assured us it was completely fine to camp there and that the gates would close at 10pm and open at 6am.

We had stayed until the park was about to close anyway, so by that time, most people had already left. It was safe, secure and worked for the night. The guards were really nice and said we could use the water up by the buildings and bathrooms inside, etc.

Where to go next

There are several other things to see around the La Paz Waterfall Gardens that are a 30 min-1 hour drive.

• Poas Volcano – If you haven’t visited this volcano yet, you will be backtracking a bit, but this is what we ended up doing because that’s just what worked with tickets and entry times. The Poas Volcano is an easy trail up to the crater of an active volcano. You’ll want to visit on a clear day though so you have visibility!
• Catarata del Toro – This popular waterfall is on the other side of the Poas Volcano but the easiest way to get to it is driving up and around the volcano. This waterfall is incredibly unique as it happens to fall into an extinct volcanic crater.
• Rio Agrio Waterfall – Located just south of Catarata del Toro, this hiking trail leads you through a beautiful area that looks more like a trail through Jurassic Park. The landscape is simply stunning as you arrive at the waterfall.

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