This is an exciting tour combining sea adventures in one day. You will have the opportunity to snorkel at a reef and enjoy watching dolphins play in their natural habitat. A boat will take you just off the western coast of the Nicoya Peninsula from a beach called Playa Samara.
Your tour begins with transportation from your hotel to Samara Beach. You will meet your friendly guide who will pass out life jackets and explain where you’ll be going and what you will be doing. Then you will board a typical Costa Rican open motorized boat cruising up to 6 miles out into the Pacific Ocean to a coral reef.
While en route to the reef you will also be watching for dolphins who are known to enjoy playing in the wake of speedboats. The Bottle Nose Dolphin is a common sight year round and are very entertaining. Many other species of dolphin also frequent these waters. You will get a very close look at their smiling faces if they come up to swim around the boat. Be sure to have your camera ready!
During certain months you might even be lucky enough to see a whale on their annual migration from Antarctica and Alaska escaping the colder weather. Typically they can be seen between the months August and October then again between December and March as they come to these warm waters to rest, feed and mate.
Next you’ll arrive at a living coral reef. After putting on high quality, clean snorkeling gear, you will plunge into the clear aquamarine water to swim around the reef and explore the underwater realm of colorful marine life. Your guide will help point out and identify some of the tropical fish and other sea creatures you may encounter.
Afterward you’ll head back by boat to Samara, having a second chance to watch for dolphins along the way. At some point, a fresh fruit snack will be offered and bottled water will be made available.
Samara is a small beach village that is a favorite for tourists and locals alike. Here you’ll find a beautiful beach that stretches about 3 miles tucked in a cove surrounded by shady palm trees. Its calm, warm waters are perfect for swimming, boating and snorkeling.
This tour includes boat transport, bilingual guide, snorkeling gear, bottled water, fresh fruit and transportation from Punta Islita, Nosara, and Samara. One way transportation from your hotel to the beach can take between 10 and 45 minutes depending on where you are staying. Combined time for round trip boat ride, snorkeling and round trip transportation to your hotel can take between 3.5 and 4 hours.
Please wear your bathing suit and sun protective clothing as the sun can be quite strong when you are out in an open boat. You’ll also want to have a towel, sunblock, sunglasses, camera and maybe your binoculars. This is a perfect opportunity to take photos with an underwater camera if you have one.
The Snorkeling and Dolphin Watching Tour is available from Nosara, Punta Islita, and Samara and Carrillo
7 and up
Latitude: N 9° 52' 6.57"
Longitude: W 85° 31' 16.58"
02/27/2023
Saw a lot of dolphins which was fantastic and guide made sure everyone had a chance to sit at the front of the boat for a time in order to be close to them. Snorkeling was poor. The guide just said , "If you want to snorkel, go in that direction (and pointed)". No. reef, could not see bottom
08/05/2019
This tour had a land and sea component. Both were excellent for different reasons. The land was the transportation to and from Nosara Beach Hotel to Cabrillo Beach landing. It was necessary to travel over the same horrible gravel/pot hole filled roads that I experienced the night before. These roads considerably slowed down the trip which took approximately 1.5 hours one way. The guide, Romel (with his brother,
Roberto driving) made the going part of the trip very enjoyable. We discussed a number of travel issues, Costa Rica facts, family facts, centenarian facts, etc. Romel made the sleepiness I felt go away. On the return trip, Romel's aunt lived closer to Nosara so she picked me up and in wonderful broken English-Spanish we delightfully communicated about the same things and included flora, fauna, different beaches and banking in Nosara. She was a delight.
The water part of the tour was surprising and exciting. Of course we saw dolphins, but more than that we were fortunate enough to spot green turtles mating in the ocean and the true highlight was a large pod of dolphins that accompanied a hunchback whale that dove 4 or 5 times in front of our boat. We were all thrilled with the sight. We included the Canadians, Dutch, and other American tourists who joined the boat tour. We voted to spend more time watching the whale rather than to go snorkeling. Still, the guide knew the children wanted to use the slide on the boat and he provided them (and the adult males) with extra time to swim off the shore. The guide's English was not as fluent as Romel which is the reason I gave the guides an 8 instead of a 10. Romel, I would give a 10 to.
08/24/2018
A perfectly organised tour! We were lucky enough to see mum and baby whale, a turtle and some dolphins. We were able to swim near the dolphins - the boat had a slide which was good fun! Snorkeling was unfortunately a bit disappointing as it had rained a lot the day before and the water wasn't particularly clear. It was still good fun!
11/22/2017
amazing tour - i just got seasick LOL
02/24/2015
There was no fishing, that was not offered. We didn't see any whales, but that is just the luck of the day. Snorkeling was beautiful. We spent too much time searching for whales. So it was a 1 for 3. The day was beautiful.