Monteverde Reserve

Monteverde is one of Costa Rica’s most interesting locations, and is also an important rainforest (actually called a cloud forest due to the cloud-like mist that deposits moisture directly onto the leaves of the plants). Monteverde supports more than one hundred mammal species, four hundred species of bird, tens of thousands of different insects and two-and-a-half thousand different plants, including more than 400 different kinds of orchid. Monteverde Reserve's most famous resident must be the resplendent quetzal, but howler monkeys, jaguars, ocelots, tapirs, macaws, snakes, butterflies etc. also make their homes here, to name but a few.
Multiple trails cross the Monteverde Reserve, most which are well marked. The protected part of the rainforest is only open between 7am and 4pm. Monteverde’s neighbour, the Santa Elena Cloud Forest Reserve, has a higher elevation and is cloudier than Monteverde, but the habitat supports similar species. Neither of these reserves is an official national park, but operates as not-for-profit enterprises, which also run several conservation projects. This is one of the world’s greatest rainforest experiences, and one of the few that is relatively easy to visit.