Peninsula Papagayo, shining quietly on Costa Rica’s North Pacific coastline is one of those enchanted corners of the world where for us time seems to stand still.
Think of the most wonderfully created of gated communities and you begin to get an idea of what might lie in store for you when you come to stay here.
It begins at the gates themselves were a sculpture as imposing as the parkland itself dominates the entrance. Called Life Archipelago by Jorge Jimenez Deredia, it illustrates in four stone sculptures a drop of water turning into a woman holding the earth.
The recognition of Peninsula Papagayo and its superyacht facility at Marina Papagayo as one of the most desirable and sought-after destinations in the world today represents the culmination of years of sensitive planning in creating a unique residential resort community that embraces the exotic nature of its remarkable coastal setting.
It seems incredible to many in the western world that Costa Rica set this land aside for high end tourist development way back in the 1970’s long before there was talk internationally of eco friendly development.
A mere 30 minutes from Costa Rica’s Liberia International Airport, Peninsula Papagayo teems, as it has for centuries, with boundless beauty.
Formed by volcanic activity and sculpted by wind, rain and sun, this jagged peninsula reaches southward in a near perfect geological form. Close by the tip of the peninsula, an isthmus as narrow as a large back garden brings east and west back-to-back at the Four Seasons Resort.
To the east, the Bay of Culebra is coloured peach at sunrise, broad and glassy and ringed with beaches.
To the west, a five-minute walk across the isthmus, the Gulf of Papagayo comes ashore in waves of sunset lavender.
The ocean laps at three sides of this willowy peninsula, in coves and inlets and satin strands, or at brooding cliffs that meet it vertically.
Throughout the day, seabirds dive and soar with the updrafts between picturesque offshore islets. Nature had a field day shaping this peninsula: 21 beaches line 15 miles of coastline in this paradise of Costa Rica
Dwarfed by the larger peninsulas north and south, Santa Elena and Nicoya, Peninsula Papagayo was the country’s great secret, bathed in mystique, a mote on the map.
Only those who approached by boat, or by foot or horseback on primitive dirt paths and cattle trails, had an inkling of what lay under wraps.
In 2004, Peninsula Papagayo was unveiled as Costa Rica’s luxurious new residential resort community. Its marriage of nature and sensitive planning has drawn worldwide attention to Guanacaste.