Santa Teresa is a beach town surrounded by dense jungle on the Nicoya Peninsular about six hours drive directly from San Jose and depending on your taste you’ll either love it or hate it! It was always going to be on our itinerary as its one of the best places to surf in Costa Rica with plenty of excellent accommodation options, fantastic restaurant’s, boutique shops and a great nightlife.
If you’re into beach culture, yoga, art classes, world class surfing or learning to surf or want somewhere to check your emails in a hip cafe/workspace followed up by watching one of the most spectacular sunsets you’ll see in Costa Rica, then Santa Teresa is for you.
It has one main road that runs along the beach for circa 2 miles / 3.2km which is only partially paved so it can be dusty and noisy as quad bikes and motorbikes are the most common form of transport by the locals and tourists. The road is slowly getting paved but it’s also limited in street lighting and footpaths which is something to be mindful of.
Santa Teresa is a step away from the traditional Costa Rican culture you’ll experience anywhere else but this place is truly fascinating as it has an old surf town vibe with surf hostels next to five star hotels, Soda’s next to a Michelin star worthy restaurant, surf shops next to boutique clothing stores. All of which may be the reason why celebrities such as Mark Zuckerberg, Matthew McConaughey, Tom Brady, Mel Gibson, Matt Damon, Miley Cyrus and the Kardashians have property here!
We spent three nights in Santa Teresa at a quiet villa at the further end of town set back off the main road but to get a flavour of the types of accommodation available check out Airbnb | Santa Teresa.
Santa Teresa does seem to get quite a lot of bad press for being noisy, dusty and having expensive restaurants and bars and not a very good beach. It’s very much a personal judgement but for us it was exactly as we expected and we loved it and wished we’d stayed there longer. The vibe is great, the food options are endless and fantastic and the beautiful sandy beach is lovely and wasn’t full of rubbish like many blogs state and it was never really crowded except when people came out to watch the amazing sunset.
Surfing here is excellent as the waves are consistent with a water temp of 25c / 77f. As it’s a long beach you can also easily find yourself your own section away from any busy line ups. There’s plenty of places to hire decent boards (short, fish, mals, longboards) either on the beach for circa 10kCRC or £16 / €19 / $20 for the day or from many of the surf shops along the road. Surf lessons are offered from around 30kCRC or £47 / €56 / $59.
In this little but vibrant town you’re spoilt for choice for bars and restaurants from simple sodas like Soda Tiquicia or Soda Pura Vida to Kooks Smokehouse and Bar and El Tercer Ojo. Try Banana Beach or Rocama for a beach front restaurant and cocktails and they also have DJ’s and bonfire nights. Somos café and restaurant has a great vibe and does excellent food and is a good place to hang out if you need to sort some work emails or calls or to update your Insta!
A must stop for dinner is at La Cevicheria for arguably the best fish restaurant in Santa Teresa. Try the Tropical Ceviche with patacones with tuna and shrimp or the other options are octopus, squid or mahimahi or a combo of or, try the Asian stir fry with white fish. They’ll ask you your preference of how spicy out of 10 with 6-7 as a nice spicy option and 10 being genuinely super hot! Somos also is a bar with live music on a Thurs night and is very popular but they have very good table service and it’s a nice place to dress up and have a night out.
Check out Eat Street who also do takeaway which is often busy at night but there’s always tables coming available. Eat Street has four vendors under one roof; Nomad Tex Mex (recommend the chicken burger and fries), Sunrise Café (breakfast and coffees and pastries) and Happy Bowls (poke bowls, healthy salads) and; the Boule bar for cocktails and craft beers. The food options here are great and all delicious and it’s a really nice atmosphere.
If you’re looking for some new beach wear or surf hire definitely check out Kina Surf Shop and there’s also a laundrette next to Kinas that do a kilo of washing for 1800CRC or £2.80 / €3.40 / $3.50. Be mindful that they won’t separate your whites and they use a tumble dryer so keep your designer outfits for washing another time!
Santa Teresa is known as a surfing town but that’s what gives it its vibe but in reality this place is going to absolutely boom in the next few years. The hotels, residences, restaurants, bars and shops already have an upmarket trend to them and if we were going to invest anywhere in the world, and we don’t say this lightly, it would be here! Santa Teresa Pura Vida!
As we say goodbye to Santa Teresa and make our way to Manuel Antonio we make our last stop at the top of town, just before you exit, at the famous The Bakery for some great coffee and snacks to kick off our next journey. We recommend the almond and chocolate croissant!
It’s a 1.5hr pleasant drive via Route 160 to Paquera ferry terminal to get the boat to Puntarenas, and on to Manuel Antonio, and there is a toll to pay along the way of 210CRC or £0.30 / €0.40 / $0.41 and they take cash or card.
You can drive to Manuel Antonio avoiding the ferry but it’s at least a 7hr trip and you miss the relaxing and scenic boat trip.
Check out our highlight specifically on the ferry trip from Paquera to Puntarenas for more information.
