Transportation Info

Travel Documents

Citizens of the US, Canada, and Panama may enter Costa Rica with a passport that remains valid at least 6 months after your travel date. Identification such as a driver’s license or birth certificate is no longer valid for travel in Costa Rica. A valid passport allows Canadian, American, as well as most Latin American, and European citizens to stay for up to 90 days.

Citizens of other countries may require a visa to enter Costa Rica. Before you go to Costa Rica, please make a copy of your passport, which you will need to carry with you at all times. You should leave your original passport in the safety box at Blue Spirit.

Flights to Costa Rica and Further Transport to Blue Spirit

In order to serve you best with all the important information about flights to Costa Rica and the various transport options between the airports in Costa Rica and Blue Spirit, please request from shuttle@bluespiritcostarica.com our “Getting to Blue Spirit” document This document also contains the ‘group shuttle reservations form’ that you need to complete if you like to use our group shuttle services from/to Blue Spirit.

Flying In and Out of Costa Rica

Blue Spirit is located in Nosara, Guanacaste, on the Northern Pacific Coast of Costa Rica. Depending on which Costa Rican airport you choose to arrive through, there are different options available for your travel onwards to Blue Spirit. The two international airports in Costa Rica are: Liberia International Airport (LIR) and San Jose International Airport (SJO). Both airports have frequent flights to and from all over the United States and Canada.

We recommend you fly into Liberia International Airport (LIR), as it is substantially closer to Blue Spirit and only a 2-hour scenic drive. Blue Spirit runs group shuttles on Saturdays from and to Liberia Airport. Current round-trip airfares from the New York City area to Liberia have averaged $450-$750 (including non-stop flights on Saturdays on Continental from Newark, NJ). Fares from the west coast are slightly higher. (There are also non-stop flights from Miami, Atlanta, and Denver.)

Flying to San Jose International Airport (SJO) is also an option as sometimes flights from the US or Canada to San Jose are less expensive or more direct than flying into Liberia. Getting to Blue Spirit from San Jose by ground transportation however is more costly and takes 4½ hours. We usually do NOT offer group shuttles from San Jose to Blue Spirit, but can arrange for individual transfers at different rates. An alternative is a short plane flight from San Jose on Nature Air to the airport in Nosara (only 20 minutes taxi ride from Blue Spirit).

Departure Tax: Each departing passenger must pay a $26 departure tax at either San Jose or Liberia airport before exiting Costa Rica. It can be in US dollars or Costa Rican Colones.

Transportation Between Liberia International Airport and Blue Spirit

From Liberia International Airport (LIR) to Blue Spirit is a 2 hour drive.

Blue Spirit Group Shuttle

Blue Spirit runs group shuttles from/to Liberia on Saturdays. You need to make advanced reservations for group shuttle services. For further details, read below about “Blue Spirit Group Shuttle”.

Please complete this shuttle form on pages 3 to 5 to book your shuttle.

Taxi / Individual Transfer

If you are not arriving or departing on Saturday with our group shuttle, you can hire your own taxi at the Liberia airport (one way: $120-$140) or you can make arrangements with Blue Spirit to be picked up at the airport by our driver (one way: $130 one person, $65 two people, $50 three or more people). The same rates apply from Blue Spirit TO Liberia Airport.

Rental Car

You may reserve your own rental car to drive from Liberia to Blue Spirit. However, a car is not needed during your stay with us. We recommend online bookings with Toyota Rent a Car or National Car Rental, as these car rental agencies allow one-way rentals for you to drop off your vehicle in Nosara. The cost of a one-day rental car with drop off in Nosara is usually around $100.

Transportation Between San Jose International Airport and Blue Spirit

From San Jose International Airport (SJO) to Blue Spirit is a 4-5 hour drive.

Taxi / Individual Transfer

There are always taxis available at the airport in San Jose that will take you to Blue Spirit in Nosara for approximately $200-$250. Or you can make arrangements with Blue Spirit to be picked up at the airport by our driver (one way: $240 one person, $120 two people, $80 three or more people). The same rates apply from Blue Spirit TO San Jose Airport.

Rental Car

You may reserve your own rental car to drive from San Jose to Blue Spirit. However, a car is not needed during your stay with us. We recommend online bookings with Toyota Rent a Car or National Car Rental as these car rental agencies allow one-way rentals for you to drop off your vehicle in Nosara. The cost of a one-day rental car with drop off in Nosara is usually around $100.

Flying to Nosara

You can also take a 40-minute flight from/to San Jose to/from the domestic Nosara Airport, which is only a 20-minute taxi ride from Blue Spirit. Taxis between Blue Spirit and Nosara Airport cost $20 one way.

Flight schedules from San Jose to Nosara usually require that your international flight arrives in San Jose at noon at the latest to catch the last flight at 2 PM from San Jose to Nosara. Another alternative is arriving the day before, staying overnight in San Jose and then taking a morning flight.

There are two airlines with daily flights to and from Nosara: Nature Air and Sansa Airlines. Both airlines can impose luggage restrictions. To avoid excess baggage fees at the airport read the information on their websites carefully.

We like to recommend Nature Air, as they are more reliable regarding their schedule. It does require however that you take a 20 min. taxi ride from San Jose International Airport to the local Pavas Airport. You can book a flight with Nature Air (one way $109, tax included).

For homebound flights on either airline out of Nosara we recommend that you plan ample connection time and give yourself at least 4 hours to make your departing international flight.