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Travel Guide
I will touring Costa Rica in a couple of weeks and was interested in hiring a birding guide while there. What I was looking for was a tour of half a day or a few hours, probably a private tour, to fill available time in my schedule. I did some research and have some partial answers now about this, and thought I would post some points here. If anyone can add info, that would be great.
Initially I found and contacted some highly-recommended guides who organize big tours lasting several days or a couple of weeks. I wasn't interested in those longer tours but those tours only happen a few times a year, and I thought a guide might have time in between those big tours to do a short tour for me.
What I found was that these tour leaders are super busy all the time, so much so that they are unable to give proper attention to my queries. Their responses are delayed and often make no sense. Example: I ask if they are available for a tour (with rough time/place) and the response is "I'm so glad you like my photos." I conclude that these people are mainly set up to conduct multi-person multi-day tours and can't deal with an ad-hoc outing.
Another issue with the famous guides is that they are unlikely to be near where the customer might be when the customer wants a tour. Travel times in Costa Rica can be significant.
Then I looked at tours that the hotels might give. And this gave much better results. So far I have only investigated one hotel, but I think most of the big places will offer nature tours of a few hours. They will be led by unknowns, but guides in Costa Rica all have to be licensed and will probably all be well-qualified. The hotel I was looking at offers private tours and regular tours. Private in this context does not mean one-on-one but your own small group, perhaps a couple or family. The private tours are expensive at over US$ 200 per person with a minimum of 2 persons for a 3-hour outing (meaning over $200 x 2 = $400 if it is just me). The regular tours are more reasonable. I think I will opt for a regular outing and hope that there are not too many birdwatchers with life lists.
For those who are interested, some names of the well-known tour guides follow.
Juan Diego Vargas of Lifer Nature Tours
Sergio Vargas, owner @pizotebirdingcr
Dennis Valverde of Osa Photography
Juan Carlos Vindas of Neotropic Photo Tours
Pablo Rodriguez Alvarado
Initially I found and contacted some highly-recommended guides who organize big tours lasting several days or a couple of weeks. I wasn't interested in those longer tours but those tours only happen a few times a year, and I thought a guide might have time in between those big tours to do a short tour for me.
What I found was that these tour leaders are super busy all the time, so much so that they are unable to give proper attention to my queries. Their responses are delayed and often make no sense. Example: I ask if they are available for a tour (with rough time/place) and the response is "I'm so glad you like my photos." I conclude that these people are mainly set up to conduct multi-person multi-day tours and can't deal with an ad-hoc outing.
Another issue with the famous guides is that they are unlikely to be near where the customer might be when the customer wants a tour. Travel times in Costa Rica can be significant.
Then I looked at tours that the hotels might give. And this gave much better results. So far I have only investigated one hotel, but I think most of the big places will offer nature tours of a few hours. They will be led by unknowns, but guides in Costa Rica all have to be licensed and will probably all be well-qualified. The hotel I was looking at offers private tours and regular tours. Private in this context does not mean one-on-one but your own small group, perhaps a couple or family. The private tours are expensive at over US$ 200 per person with a minimum of 2 persons for a 3-hour outing (meaning over $200 x 2 = $400 if it is just me). The regular tours are more reasonable. I think I will opt for a regular outing and hope that there are not too many birdwatchers with life lists.
For those who are interested, some names of the well-known tour guides follow.
Juan Diego Vargas of Lifer Nature Tours
Sergio Vargas, owner @pizotebirdingcr
Dennis Valverde of Osa Photography
Juan Carlos Vindas of Neotropic Photo Tours
Pablo Rodriguez Alvarado