Rancho Pacifico, a Slice of Costa Rican Paradise
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After solidifying our wedding plans, I was exhausted and definitely tired of making decisions, so I decided to fully hand over Honeymoon planning to Drew. He’ll tell you he went on a week long brides.com bender trying to find the best spot for us to travel. We’re notorious for traveling to and staying directly in the heart of cities, and he knew he wanted something different this time around. Our biggest bucket list item is a trip to Oktoberfest, but that includes my entire family, so we really didn’t have anything else in mind.
Drew went to Costa Rica on a mission trip in 2009 which gave him the bug for travel & adventure. He loved the culture, food & coffee of Costa Rica and was always on his list of places to return to but could never convince the right travel partner. He stayed in San Jose for his mission trip so really wanted to explore outside the city and the coastline for the Honeymoon.
He eventually landed on Rancho Pacifico, a 5-star treetop resort owned by a couple originally from Chicago, Illinois. I headed into the trip with ZERO expectations. Drew obsessed over Rancho’s Instagram + watched anyone’s story who was tagged. I refrained, I wanted to be surprised. We landed in Costa Rica on a flight from Miami, and stayed the night in town to avoid missing out on a day of our all-inclusive honeymoon packaged stay. The next morning, Rancho had arranged for a shuttle to pick us up and take us to the resort, 4 hours from San Jose. This shuttle experience was great, it had wifi, the drive was beautiful, and he stopped us at “his favorite road-side stop” where I got an awesome fresh fruit smoothie (yes, at a “truck stop”).
Upon arrival to Uvita, we were transferred into a 4x4 car, this time a truck, for what they mentioned was a step trek up the mountain. It was. BUT it was so worth it. Rancho Pacifico welcomes you into an open air “lobby” that’s not much more than a (really, really, expensive and nice) covered pergola. From the lobby you can see down to the Whale’s Tail on the beach, and along the surrounding jungle mountain side, which is actually absent from the below pictures, whoops!
After checking in, we were escorted to our villa, which we eventually found out was the hotel's original owner's private residence. We had our own plunge pool, a kitchenette, open-air bathroom, and an upstairs air-conditioned bedroom. This was PERFECT for us, we loved being able to use the pool and being away from other guests (lol). However, we were super close to the lobby which made it easy to head up for meals and happy hour drinks.
As I mentioned, we elected for the honeymoon all-inclusive package, so all of our meals were included (but not alcoholic drinks, or Drew’s favorite bubbly water). At Rancho without this package, you can choose which meals you want to eat on property or you can head down to town to eat. Let it be known that its about a 15 minute drive down to down, and you do have to pay for a taxi, so we only went down once outside of our planned excursion.
The meals were insane. I mean truly some of the best food I’ve EVER had and I LIVE FOR FOOD. Insanely creative, unique, flavorful and FRESH as can be. I’m so picky I thought I would be lost, and I literally licked clean every plate every time. The breakfast and lunch menus are a great mix of Costa Rican staples and “American” favorites, but dinner is the true star of the show. It’s a four course meal, that at least while we were there, always started with the most amazing soup!! Soup in the heat? YES… it doesn’t make sense but it was amazing and refreshing every time. I’m literally drooling thinking of it again, or maybe I’m writing this hungry… either way, the food was SO amazing.
While on property, we hiked to a waterfall which was quite challenging but fun. We did yoga both on their yoga platform and on the deck of our villa. We took an excursion to go zip lining where we did our first ever tarzan swing (so much fun and I would highly recommend this spot as they were VERY professional and fun), and we went down to town to check out the National Park Beach, Parque Nacional Marino Ballena. Our trip to the beach was well worth the cost of a taxi and the time spent in the car, as it was truly gorgeous. Completely untouched by development with palm trees growing right up to the beach. We loved finding a shady spot and wading into the warm ocean. Outside of the park there are plenty of restaurants and we headed to one picked by the Rancho staff, Restaurante Las Esferas. Our entire meal with a smoothie and a beer cost $11USD… and was another phenomenal experience.
Overall, we loved our stay at Rancho, a once-in-a-lifetime experience for us. If you are planning a big trip or a honeymoon, please check out this resort, and tell them we sent you!
If you have a favorite city or resort to sharing in Costa Rica, please let us know. I’ve always had Hawaii on my list, and never Costa Rica, but I must say I’d choose to go back to Costa Rica again before making plans for Hawaii. I loved the culture, the respect and love for tourism, and most importantly, the absolute unwavering support of being outdoors and loving nature.
