In sharp contrast to the brutal
internal conflicts in Guatemala or
the grinding poverty of Nicaragua,
Costa
Rica has become synonymous with
stability and prosperity - Costa
Ricans enjoy the highest rate of
literacy, health care, education and
life expectancy in the isthmus.
Unlike so many of its neighbours,
the country has a long democratic
tradition of free and open
elections, no standing army (it was
abolished in 1948) and even a Nobel
Peace Prize to its name, won by
former president, Oscar Arias, a key
architect in the Peace Plan that
helped bring an end to the conflicts
in the region during the 1980s.
In recent years Costa Rica has
also become the prime eco-tourism
destination in Central America, if
not in all the Americas, due in no
small part to an efficient promotion
machine that trumpets the country's
complex system of national parks and
wildlife refuges. Every year
hundreds of thousands of visitors -
mainly from the United States and
Canada - come to walk trails through
million-year-old rainforests
, raft foaming whitewater rapids,
surf on the Pacific beaches
and climb the volcanoes that
punctuate the country's mountainous
spine. More than anything it is the
enduring natural beauty that
impresses. Milk-thick twilight and
dawn mists gather in the clefts and
ridges divided by high mountain
passes; on the Pacific coast,
carmine and mauve sunsets splash
down into the sea like meteors;
vaulting canopy trees and thick
deciduous understoreys carpet large
areas of undisturbed rainforest, and
vestiges of high-altitude
cloudforest offer glimpses into a
misty, primeval universe, home to
the jaguar, the lumbering Jurassic
tapir and the truly resplendent
quetzal.
One glib accusation you're almost
certain to hear lobbed at the tiny
nation is that it has no culture
or history . It's certainly true
that there are no ancient
Mesoamerican monuments on the scale
of Guatemala or Honduras, and just
one percent of the population is of
indigenous extraction, so you will
see little native culture. However,
anyone who spends some time in the
country will find that Costa Rica's
character is rooted in distinct local
cultures , from the
Afro-Caribbean province of Limón,
with its Creole cuisine, games and
patois, to the traditional ladino
values embodied by the sabanero
(cowboy) of Guanacaste. Above all,
you're sure to be left with mental
snapshots of la vida campesina
, or rural life - whether it
be aloof horsemen trotting by on
dirt roads, coffee-plantation day-labourers
setting off to work in the dawn
mists of the Highlands, or
avocado-pickers cycling home at
sunset.
