Osa Peninsula

The southern pacific coast of Costa Rica, has long been known as the remote jewel of Costa Rica. The Osa Peninsula, of which half is protected by national park and local and international private reserves, is considered by the National Geographic to be “one of the most biologically diverse places on the earth”.

Thanks to aggressive conservation efforts, the forests of the Osa remain home to endangered species such as Baird’s tapir, the white-lipped peccary, jaguars, America crocodiles and the harpy eagle. It boasts the largest population of the endangered scarlet macaws in the entire country, and is the center of the very restricted distribution of the endangered Central American squirrel monkey. This small peninsula is host to almost half of Costa Rica’s 860 species of birds (that is almost 5% of the world’s species!), 140 species of mammals, and 117 species of reptiles and amphibians. Almost 750 species of trees have been catalogued in the area, more trees than in all of the North temperate regions of the world combined.