Christmas in Costa Rica is a little different than what I experienced growing up in the Pacific Northwest. How, you ask?

Well, for one thing, it doesn’t get cold. In fact, summer in Costa Rica is just beginning in December. So, if anything, it’s actually getting hotter. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it doesn’t feel like Christmas to me.

People have told me that in San Jose (the capital and most major city) it’s different. But my experience of Christmas in Costa Rica has been in Quepos so that’s all I can tell you about.

What Christmas in Costa Rica is not

There isn’t any Snowflake Lane, there aren’t any Zoolights, and there aren’t any fireplaces so there’s certainly no “stockings hung by the chimney with care”.

The only people who eat turkey are die-hard gringos that are willing to pay $30 a pound for a turkey. (I’m exaggerating, of course, but it is extremely expensive to buy turkey).

Of course, Costa Ricans have tons of their own traditions surrounding Christmas. It might not “feel” too much like Christmas to me, but that doesn’t make their traditions and time spent with family any less special. So what is Christmas in Costa Rica like?

Well, there are pig roasts, tamale making parties, and, in Quepos, the Bright Lights Boat Parade. If I ever make it to a tamale making party I’ll definitely do a post about it. It’s a big process to make tamales that the whole family gets involved with. I’m interested to see one in action.

But anyway, back to the point of this post. The Bright Lights Boat Parade.

The Pez Vela Marina

Quepos/Manuel Antonio is a bustling tourist town. There are lots of people here, but not much in the way of your typical city stuff. There’s no mall and no movie theater. In fact, there’s so little here that the installation of the fancy new BM supermarket caused quite a stir.

So you can imagine that the Pez Vela Marina is a pretty big deal for the town. It’s got restaurants, shops, and a blow-up movie screen for outdoor movies during the dry season. It is literally the closest thing Quepos has to a mall and movie theater.

Sports Fishing in Quepos

The Marina brings a lot of tourism to Quepos. Pez Vela is Spanish for sailfish and people come from literally all over the world to try their hand at catching them and other fish species. Costa Rica has some of the best fishing in the world.

My husband has worked in sports fishing for over 10 years. He’s fished in Maryland where the water is horrendously choppy and the days are long because they have to go so far to find the fish. He’s also fished in The Bahamas where the water is beautiful and calm, but the fishing is terrible.

Right here in Quepos, he enjoys the best of both worlds. The water is smooth and the fishing is excellent. They never have to run very far to find them either. He routinely catches sailfish, marlin, mahi-mahi, and tuna. Needless to say, during the season we eat a lot of fish ?

By the way, contact me if you want to go sports fishing in Quepos. Even if my husband’s boat isn’t what you’re looking for he knows all the best boats and fisherman. We can hook you up with the right team (pun intended ;)).

Anyway, the Marina is a big deal in Quepos. They attract a lot of tourists, which is the bread and butter of this town. They also hold lots of little festivals throughout the year as a way of connecting with the community. One of the big, exciting ones is the Bright Lights Boat Parade.

The Bright Lights Boat Parade

What is it, exactly? The crews of many of the fishing boats and yachts deck out their boats with Christmas lights. Some of them really go all out to compete aggressively for first place. To be honest, I don’t actually know if there is a prize, other than bragging rights, of course.

Which, if you know fishermen, bragging rights is a pretty big deal in and of itself.

Anyway, the whole thing is a pretty big deal for the town. Space is limited so to get a free ticket you have to wait in line to get an entrance bracelet.

A friend of mine arrived right when they started handing them out. The line was already so long that she waited an hour and a half and her group was the second-to-last family to get bracelets before they ran out.

If you don’t want to wait in line you can pay for VIP seating. This year it was $30 a person if you paid in advance and $40 the day of.

This year they had a big band concert play and fire dancers perform before the boat parade began. At the risk of sounding old and crotchety, I don’t understand why they always blast the music so loud.

I could barely stand to just walk through on the way down to the dock, there was no way I was going to hang around. And there was certainly no way I was going to subject my baby’s 4-month-old ears to that level of noise.

My friend who did stay up there said she couldn’t hear anything for a couple hours afterward. We were able to hear the concert just fine all the way down at the docks and didn’t suffer any hearing loss :).

The Main Event

We wandered around, looking at the boats up close and chatting with people we knew until the big event started. We found a strategic spot so I could take photos and my husband sat on the dock behind me with our daughter.

…and then it started to rain.

December is (usually) a sudden end to the rainy season. October is dumping buckets…no more like industrial sized oil drums. November is starting to let up, and boom! December is hot and dry and summer has obviously begun.

It wasn’t that way this year and it was, quite literally, raining on our parade. It had been sprinkling lightly here and there leading up to the parade. But it really began to fall, right when the parade started.

I thought I wasn’t going to be able to get many pictures. But after a few moments of touch and go, it let up again and I ended up getting a few good shots.

Once all the boats passed and had been judged, the marina finished it all off with a spectacular fireworks show. So, not quite what I’m used to, but this is what a small piece of Christmas in Costa Rica looks like.

Christmas in Costa Rica

Do you think you might want to spend Christmas in Costa Rica next year? Unfortunately, it’s one of the more expensive times to come, but experiencing Christmas in a different country might be worth it!

Be sure to make your bookings well in advance. Hotels and tours fill up as people come looking for a tropical Christmas! Feel free to drop me a line if you want advice on where to stay!