Sea Kayaking

The black stream, catching on sunken rock, flung backward on itself white wave, and the white water rode the black forever, gaining but not losing...

White water. It courses through stately corridors of giants tress sheltering jaguar and quetzal. It rages over jagged rocks and wraps itself around giant boulders. It eddies and swirls, sculpts immense holes and precipitous drops. To river kayakers, its sweet, sometimes dangerous, lure is inexorable.

As powder snow calls to the skier, as music to the dancer, white water calls to the kayaker. And the call in Costa Rica is specially compelling.

Costa Rica lends itself so well to this exhilarating sports due to the variety of swift rivers, reliability of stream flow, and the relatively warm waters, all offered on a year-round basis.

Given the number of swift rivers, reliability of stream flow, and the relatively warm waters, all offered on a year-round bias.

Given the number of swift rivers flowing down the four major mountain ranges in Costa Rica, kayaks can easily find the class of rapids they want-whether beginners seeking class II rapids or top experts craving hazardous class V and VI rapids.

Good arm sand a strong back will help you practice this sport. Offered up and down the Pacific and Caribbean coasts, sea kayaking is very popular. When the waves are rolling and easy, to provides a great to travel quietly to estuaries and mangrove for up close and personal viewing of wildlife. And when the waves begin to pound, it provides exhilarating sport for those with a penchant for wet fun.

Because Costa Rica has so many rivers and seasonal flow is far more predictable than any region in the U.S. or Canada, kayakers are seldom disappointed. Moreover, although many rivers become too low to paddle by the end of the dry season, The Pacuare, Reventazón, and Corobicí remain runable throughout the year.

The following is a sampling of some of the great white-water rivers of Costa Rica.

The Sarapiquí, running down the shoulder of Poás Volcano in the Central Mountains Range, offers class I to V rapids. The General, coming out of the massive Talamanca Range in southern Costa Rica, is the longest white-water river in Costa Rica, contains 100 miles of class III to VI rapids. The pristine Pacuare, also coming down the Talamaca range, has been rated as one of the five most wild and scenic rivers.