Parque Nacional Manuel Antonio
I went back down to Quepos from Cerro Nara and stayed in a small hostel there. Then the next day I did a day trip to the very popular Manuel Antonio National Park. To me, I could as well have gone to a zoo in any big city in the tropics. The place was packed with tourists, the “trails” were concrete sidewalks, and the monkeys were well trained to entertain the tourists there. If anyone believes that Manuel Antonio will give you the flavor of a tropical rainforest, forget it!
The site itself must have been beautiful before all the tourist development. There are beautiful beaches and steep Pacific coastal bluffs.
I did see a few very common Costus species there but really the highlight of my visit was when I got to see a sloth on one of his (or hers?) weekly trips to the forest floor to relieve himself. (I have got to remember that the videos only work in landscape mode. The trees do not really grow horizontally here.)