The Town of Turrialba

Conveniently located between San Jose and the Caribbean Coast, we find this lively town bustling with activity and surrounded by fertile farmland and green, mountain pastures. The world renowned Pacuare River attracts many white-water rafters and kayakers. In 1998, teams from countries all over the world competed in the White Water Challenge on this river.

Turrialba is also famous for its cheese, hand-sewn baseballs used in the World Series, and for open air fruit and vegetable markets with some of the freshest, best-looking produce available in Costa Rica. It is also home to CATIE, the Centro Agronómico Tropical de Investigacion y Enseñanza (Center for Tropical Agronomy Research and Teaching), which covers 2,000 acres (808 hectare), has more than 5,000 varieties of 335 species of crops with economic potential, over 2,500 varieties of coffee, 450 varieties of coffee, and a number of research projects concerning the critical problems of environmental conservation like deforestation, overgrazing, and the sensitive ecology of river basins.

12 miles east of Turrialba, on the slopes of the Turrialba Volcano lies Guayabo National Monument, the most significant archaeological ruins in Costa Rica. This pre-Colombian site preserves a town site inhabited between 1000 B.C and A.D. 1400. when the city was mysteriously abandoned. Now more than 2000 years later, a working aqueduct, paved roads, stone bridges, temple foundations, houses, grave sites and petroglyphs still exist. The surrounding jungle is a bird lover’s paradise.

 

 

 

Other surrounding features to Turrialba include Parque Viborana, a snake farm with educational exhibits, horseback/ hiking trails to the summit of the Turrialba Volcano, and customized adventure tours like canyoning, waterfall rappelling, hot-air balloon flights, mountain biking, and jungle expeditions.