The Blue Flag Program - Arenas del Mar

Since 2006, the beach located in front of Arenas Del Mar (known as Playitas) has coveted the prestigious Blue Flag (Bandera Azul Ecolgica) award. This program, based on a similar model developed in Europe, works towards the sustainable development of Costa Ricas beaches through strict criteria dealing with water quality, environmental education and information, environmental management, and safety and other services.

Whenever you see a Blue Flag located on one of Costa Rica beaches, you will know that the surrounding community is working rigorously to better its:

Water Quality by assuring that sea water is suitable for swimming and other recreational activities.

Waste Management, assuring that no untreated waters go directly into nearby steams and oceans, and that a recycling and trash collection program is in place.

Environmental education by providing workshops and training to students and the surrounding population.

Safety and administration, assuring that beaches are safe for the general public.

The Bandera Azul is a volunteer certification that incorporates both private and public sectors. In the case of Playitas Beach specifically, Arenas Del Mar has taken a leadership role in obtaining certification. During your stay, we ask for your cooperation in maintaining our beaches clean and pristine. Thank you!

Hotel Grano de Oro - Thanks for such nice comments!

We would like to thank to our guests for the nice comments in our guest book, we would like to share some of these comments with you:

“Costa Rica is a beautiful and interesting country. This will be the first of many trips to Costa Rica. The hotel was outstanding and we were well looked after by your excellent staff.”

Jim & Jacky, Calgary, Canada

“This is a great place to stay. Service is good, the restaurant one of the best in San José, I will be back.” Juan Kivotos, California, USA

“A splendid beautiful stay. Strongly recommended. Will be top memory of trip to Costa Rica”. Brigitt & Harry, from Germany & Belgium

“This is a beautiful hotel, thank you for preserving the classic style along with modern convenience. Food is exceptional as is the service. We will recommend to all we know.”

Nancy, from USA

“Thanks for the two pleasant nights in this wonderful hotel. A good hotel mets the demands of its customer; a superb hotel, like Grano de Oro, exceeded our expectations by friendly personal…thank you!” Olaf, from Holland


“Our fourth visit to this hotel. We never leave Costa Rica without our visit here. Food was excellent as always.” Jack & Mary, Calgary, Canada


“What an awesome hotel! Beautiful! And your staff amazing! I communicated via internet from the United States and everyone was so nice and helpful! We will be back and we’ll stay much longer!! Thank you for such wonderful hospitality!” Chris & Slisha, Florida, USA


“We are on our honeymoon and we found this hotel to be beautiful and a great start in Costa Rica. We would love to come back and visit. Thank you for the great service and wonderful food.”

PJ & Sasha, Arizona, USA

“On our 20 day honeymoon here in lovely Costa Rica we have traveled all over the country, and have met wonderful Costa Ricans and also people from the USA whom we will continue to be in contact with. Hotel Grano de Oro was great and fantastic. PURA VIDA! And may God bless the land of Costa Rica.”

Bill & Patricia, California, USA

“This was our last trip on our honeymoon and we wish we could have stayed longer. The staff is amazing and very helpful to whatever your needs may be. Have a drink at the bar and you will be very relaxed. Muchas gracias to all the people here! Made a wonderful ending to our amazing honeymoon!”

Allison & Walker, North Carolina, USA

“I love the Grano de Oro with its old world charm, elegance and décor. I loved the attention to detail at every turn, the well appointed rooms, the woodwork, the tropical flowers. Most notable was the restaurant. The courtyard was delightful, what a relaxing atmosphere for breakfast. The food was superb and the service refined. The staff was friendly and accommodating, making our stay all the more pleasurable. I would highly recommend a stay at this hotel.”
J. from New York, USA

AGREEMENT HOTEL CASA TURIRE –ICE & FITNESS TRAIL

Just a few days ago, Hotel Casa Turire had the opportunity of signing a new agreement with ICE, who is in charge and management of all the lands surrounding La Angostura Lake, a hydroelectric project located just a door step from our hotel and surrounding our property on the north and south sides.

The ICE has two hydroelectric projects in cascade, Cachi and Angostura Lakes, which both together generate 277 MW per hour and provides 38% of the national hydroelectricity.
This agreement allows us to built two trails one of 1.5 kilometers and the other 2 kilometers of length.

First trail, 1.5 km. Will have emphasis in ethno-botany, as matter of fact, information concerning how plants are used as medicine for humans, whether it has been studied or is information passed from generation to generation as a cultural practice.

This trail will have the modality of Auto-guided trail, therefore clients will have the chance to purchase the booklet at our reception and follow the stations at their own pace.

Second trail, 2 km. It is focus as a new approach to nature, “healthy tourism” (vita Parcour fitness trail) we considered it is totally new in Costa Rica and certainly will be followed by many other hotels, perhaps private reserves around the country.

Vita Parcour fitness trail give you the opportunity to stay fit at your level, free of charge, at whatever time suits you. Every circuit features different exercises aimed at muscle training, flexibility and/or endurance. Alternatively, you can simply go for a jog along the sign posted trails.

It consists of 15 stations along the trails and in everyone of them a different exercise to perform, all them marked with colors which indicates the difficulty of it, besides showing the exercise possible for the station. Stations will be built with bamboo and other natural materials found at the property, meaning that the settings will be totally natural.
CIRCUITO DE VIDA.

This idea of enjoying nature as well as the possibility of staying fit without charge was created in Switzerland and the idea was brought to us by Mr. Daniel Allemann.
The name we are adopting for this type of trails will be “CIRCUITO DE VIDA”.
Consequently, we are creating or enhancing the activities our clients can perform at Hotel Casa Turire without leaving our property.

Weddings in Florblanca

Florblanca is keeping the Santa Teresa area filled with fiestas! Kicking off the month of August, Florblanca hosted Carolina Ortíz and David Guiterrez of San José for an exquisite wedding. Filling all of Hotel Florblanca and many other small boutique hotels throughout Santa Teresa, Carolina and David´s wedding party took over the town beginning with a formal catered brunch by Florblanca´s Nectar Restaurant chefs. After the afternoon wedding ceremony, the celebration began with a small band on the beach and over a hundred guests dancing around beds of green and white orchids.

In addition to this private fiesta, Florblanca has been hosting local musicians on Saturday nights with a special menu provided by Nectar Restaurant. Every Saturday from 6:00 pm to 9:00 pm live music is performed while visitors are invited to experience a pre-fixed menu at $30.00 a person. The menu includes your choice of an appetizer, entrée and dessert. The turnout in Nectar Restaurant on Saturday nights has been such a success that Florblanca please asks that those attending make a reservation! We invite you to join us sometime before the festivities end on October 31, 2008!

Birds and Hotel Casa Turire

Lovely Cotinga

If there is something we assure to our guest is the great diversity of avifauna we can offer at our hotel.

Our location between two very important mountain ranges makes Hotel Casa Turire a very special birding spot. Turrialba Volcano on the north side providing middle elevation to higlands species (600 to 3350 mts asl) and the beginning of Talamanca mountain range (600 to 1500 mts asl) on the southeast; were most of the endemism occur in Costa Rica, not only with avifauna but botanically as well, since it is part of the oldest lands of Costa Rica.

We have create a birdchecklist for the Hotel grounds so do nearby areas where our guest can discover and learn about our local avifauna. Only for the area of Hotel Casa Turire over 180 species have been recorded up to this moment, and be sure as the migrant species approach many other sorprises will engrose our checklist.

For the sorrounding areas such Tuis River Valley, CATIE and Cerro Silencio, another 137 plus different species has been added so far.

The most important about the species that can be found in our area is that several of them are very hard to find elsewhere in our country.

To name a few of them:
Lanceolated Monklet
Lovely Cotinga
Rufous Browed Tyrannulet
Red Breasted Blackbird
Tropical Mockingbird
Sharpbill
Resplendent Quetzal

Therefore we invite you to visit the Turrialba area, stay at Hotel Casa Turire and enjoy all the attractions located just around the corner and of course discover and learn about the treasure we have at our door step, the birds.

Heliport construcction

In its constant desire to exceed the expectations and to serve our guests in an efficient and fast manner, the Villa Caletas Hotel has begun with the construction of a Heliport.
A heliport is the elevated area or land surface, to be bound for landing, take-off or moving in the helicopter area.
Due to the increase of guests asking for this method of transportation, the heliport will become an effective form to make easy to our guests the arrival at Villa Caletas Hotel in a more fast and efficient way.
At the same time, and because of the appropriate space needed for the construction of a heliport, the presidency and management of the hotel, in its continuous wish and effort of reforestation and respect for our ecological system, has tried above all to maintain its surrounding nature, always keeping its magnificent tropical vegetation.
We will welcome and wait for you to enjoy Villa Caletas with its constant progress, always thinking in the well-being of our guests, letting them feel every time closer to heaven!

“Live music at Restaurante Grano de Oro”

We are happy to announce that July is the “month of the music” at Restaurante Grano de Oro. We are having daily evening live presentations (Monday through Saturday), and at lunch time on Sundays, with musicians from “Editus”, Grammy Award winning Costa Rican group. Presentations include violin, guitar, sax and flute. We invite you to experience an unforgettable evening at our lovely restaurant, enjoy the exquisite food and the live music!