This is one of the few Costa Rican National Parks where walking quietly isn’t necessarily the best way to see things. The marked trail along the beach is used mostly for observing turtle nesting, but the best way to see most of the park is from a boat. That doesn’t mean you can’t get a workout while nature watching; there are plenty of places to rent canoes and kayaks (cayucas or botes).
The area protected by Tortuguero (turtle catcher) National Park was an archipelago of volcanic islands until alluvial sediments from the interior mountains filled in the spaces and formed a network of marshy islands.
Sand piled up where the river deposited land met the sea, and the turtle nesting beaches of Tortuguero formed.
The exceptionally high rainfall, and rich environment where the freshwater meets the sea makes the beaches, canals, lagoons and wetlands of Tortuguero areas of exceptional biodiversity and opportunity for nature lovers
The Sea Turtles of Tortuguero
The main attraction of Tortuguero National Park is the turtles. Green Sea Turtles (tortuga Verde, Chelonia mydas mydas ), leatherback (tortuga Baula, Dermochelys coriacea), and Hawksbill (tortuga Carey,Eretmochelys imbricata) turtles nest on the beaches here. Green Sea Turtles neared extinction due to hunting of the adults for meat (they are easy prey when they mass to nest) for turtle soup, and poaching of eggs for their supposed aphrodisiac qualities.
Dr. Archie Carr of the University of Florida formed the Caribbean Conservation Corporation in 1959 to study and protect sea turtles, and the turtle-tagging program he began at Tortuguero in 1955 continues today.
It’s possible to see stragglers laying eggs during the day, but the majority of the arrivals occur at night. You will need a guide to visit the beaches at night (no one is allowed on the beach unaccompanied after 6:00 pm). For independent travelers, this can be arranged through the kiosk in the middle of Tortuguero village or through your hotel.
When you and your guide walk out onto the beach under the starlight to watch the turtles struggle up the beach, dig their nests and lay their eggs, think about their future.
If you are exceptionally lucky, you might chance to see an even more spectacular event, the newly hatched turtles race to the sea. There is some overlap of the nesting and hatching seasons for the different varieties of turtles. The eggs incubate in the warm sand for 7 to 10 weeks before the babies hatch, dig their way to the surface and make the long dark scuttle from the nest well above the high tide mark, across the beach to the surf.
When to visit
The Green Sea and Hawksbill turtle’s nesting season runs from July to October with the peak in August, and the Leatherback turtles nest from February to April. It is possible to see individual turtles at any time of the year.
The weather in Tortuguero National Park should not be much of a consideration when deciding when to visit.
It rains here all the time, and the peak nesting season is in the rainy season when Caribbean rains can blow in on a north wind and stay for weeks. This is one of the rainiest areas of Costa Rica, and even in the dry season afternoon showers are common.
Use the drop down menu to see weather patterns and other seasonal information for the month you are thinking about visiting the National Park.
Tortuguero National Park is you MUST Stop while in Costa Rica. Discover its Network of canals, lagoons and dense rainforests and see the turtles hatch. The park stretches north along the Caribbean coast up to the village of Tortuguero, which has a small population of around 500, no cars, and is located on a relatively narrow spit of land between the beach and a canal. Just north of Tortuguero are the various lodges and hotels. All these sections consist of a canal running parallel to the beach on the east, and fed by a maze of serpentine streams and channels from the west...
http://costa-rica-guide.com/nature/national-parks/tortuguero/
http://www.tortugueroinfo.com/
