Ocean
Night Mangrove Tour
Same mangroves after dark. Caimans, owls, fireflies. Costa Rica's nocturnal side.
The same canals, a different set of animals.
The Damas estuary runs a day tour and a night tour, and they are not the same trip with the lights off. The animals that make the mangroves worth visiting after dark are mostly asleep at eleven in the morning, and the ones you photograph by day have gone quiet by six.
You leave at twenty to six, so the boat is on the water as the light goes. The guides work the banks with lamps: roosting birds, snakes wrapped on branches at eye level, the eyes of a crocodilian above the waterline.
The good part is what the lamp finds on the bank.
More about this tour
It is a boat trip rather than a walk, and an easy one. Three hours, sitting down, with the engine off for most of the good bits.
Two things are worth treating as a possibility rather than a promise: fireflies in the trees, and bioluminescence in the water when conditions are right. Both happen. Neither is something the guides can turn on for you.
What might you see out there?
Your naturalist knows where they hide, when they move, and how to find them.
Likely 
If you are lucky 
Likely Wildlife sightings are nature, never a guarantee. Your guide knows where to look.
Here's how the 3 hours unfold.
Every step is planned so you can focus on the experience, not the logistics.
Picked up at the hotel.
Collected from the lobby and driven out to the estuary. The timing moves with the tide, so confirm your slot with us.
Onto the boat.
A guided boat trip into the canals as the light goes, with a bilingual guide and spotting lamps.
Working the banks.
Slowly along the channels, stopping whenever the lamp finds something. Water and fruit aboard.
Back to the hotel.
Dropped back at the lobby, in time for a late dinner at Coconuts by The Falls.
Everything that's included, and everything to bring.
What is included
- Hotel pickup
- Boat tour
- Spotting equipment
- Light snack Fruit snacks, provided during the tour.
What to bring
- Long sleeves and pants
- Closed shoes
- Bug spray
- Camera with low-light capability Those Instagram posts aren't going to post themselves!
Photographs from this trip
Real photos from this tour. Click any image to open the gallery.
The local shortcut.
We watch the tide
The departure moves with the tide, and we confirm your slot before the day.
Same rate, no markup
You pay what the operator charges direct. Our value is the coordination.
Door to door pickup
Collected at the hotel lobby and dropped back the same way, which matters more when it is dark.
A late dinner
Back around half past eight, and the kitchen at Coconuts by The Falls runs to nine.
Before you book, a few answers
Let us get you out there.
Reserve your spot, or message the concierge team with questions.