While the Arenal Volcano area is better known for the iconic volcano, hot springs and adventure, this is an amazing birdwatching destination if you know where and when to look. Not only do we know where and when to look, but we will also set you up with a professional birdwatching guide for this morning excursion.
The tour takes place early in the morning at the Mistico Arenal Hanging Bridges Park. The park is located out of town, near Lake Arenal and also close to the boundary of Arenal Volcano National Park. This is an area with plenty of secondary rainforest, which provides valuable habitat to over 200 species of birds.
The tour will take you through the groomed trails which cover a few kilometers. Along the path, there are 15 hanging bridges which will allow you to explore the rainforest canopy for a birds eye view of the rainforest treetops.
Your bilingual guide will have a specialized spotting scope for up close observation. With a little luck and cooperation from Mother Nature you may spot species such as jacamar, motmot, chestnut mandibled toucan, keel-billed toucan, ant birds, hummingbirds and more.
This enlightening tour includes round trip transportation from your local area hotel. It lasts approximately four hours including transportation, though this is subject to change based on many factors. In addition to transportation the tour also includes guide and trail entrance fees.
The Birdwatching Tour is available from Arenal, Arenal Zone 2, and Arenal Zone 3
10 and up
Latitude: N 10° 29' 16.73"
Longitude: W 84° 45' 13.27"
04/15/2023
Was even better than expected.
03/11/2023
Flawless private transfer to arrive in plenty of time for the 6:30am tour. Fantastic guide with a relatively small party (9).so we all got to see through his telescope when he spotted a signature bird/animal. Loved the Mistico Reserve where the birding took place and the owners obviously are dedicated to nature is the quality of the experience they give to visitors. Paths are well kept and the 6 hanging bridges are an experience to walk over. Best part was the guide who was incredibly knowledgeable on birds and spotting them in the dense rain forest.
P.S. So glad this was the first tour of the day as by the time we ended the parking lot was getting filled with tour buses. It looked like the peace and quiet of our tour would not last much longer!
02/24/2023
Unfortunately, it was raining so not too many birds; guide was very knowledgeable and friendly.
01/20/2023
Amazing guide
10/12/2022
Great Guide - Bernardo - Great tour
04/13/2022
Courteous and helpful guide, once again knowledgeable about every species of birds and animals, pretty amazing. Our tour guide was upset that we had not seen enough animals on our trip and made sure we saw enough on this trip and he did!! Kudos to him.
11/05/2021
Donald, our guide, truly loves what he does and was a joy to be around. I would only recommend this trip with a guide or you won't see what we saw.
08/13/2021
Wished we saw more birds, but a nice tour & informative
08/10/2021
We actually had Jason, and were very happy with the tour.
07/19/2021
Our guide was amazing!!! He knew everything about all the birds and animals and we ended up with a private tour. It was perfect!
03/17/2021
Wonderful guide
03/06/2020
Our guide was amazing. We focused on the birds and not trying to walk on the hanging bridges. We saw 6 species of hummingbirds, 2 species of toucans, motmots, grosbeaks, and many more.
02/09/2020
Very knowledgeable guides.
01/07/2020
Rey, our tour guide was enthusiastic & very knowledgable in finding birds.
12/24/2019
It was a beautiful hike, our guide did his best, there just weren't that many birds to see
08/19/2019
Very good guide, however I thought we would see more animals. Again I know it depends on luck.
07/24/2019
Best guide we had all trip!
05/06/2019
Unfortunately it rained heavily for the tour, but it also added to it as it was nice to experience the heavy rainfall!Our guide was very sweet and chatty and pointed out frogs,snakes and other things we would never find out on our own!We didn’t see many birds but that’s life!!
05/03/2019
The guide was excellent, although the tour seemed rushed.
11/10/2017
Our guide was absolutely amazing. Very knowlegeable, and gave us a lot of time and effort even though there was only the two of us.
05/05/2017
Great tour and tailored to our needs! Highly recommend!!
03/03/2017
Great tour! Santos was a great guide--very good at finding and identifying birds! One of our favorite tours of the trip.
02/05/2017
Our guide was great!! willing to walk in the rain with us and helped point out many birds! However we thought we had booked the bird walking tour at hanging bridges (according to out itinerary) but we ended up at Observatory Lodge? Our guide did try to shift it but since it was so early in the morning no one was available. The tour ended up being wonderful but we were looking forward to the hanging bridge for the bird walk.
12/19/2016
Koren was a helpful, knowledgeable, accommodating tour guide. He was patient when we were late that morning due to a late arrival at the hotel the previous night. Then he was also flexible with the morning's itinerary. I also loved the knowledge he shared about the surrounding flora and fauna.
07/26/2016
The tour was booked as taking place at Hanging Bridges. The alternative was good, but the description in the offer needs to be changed.
03/20/2016
There were many photographers in the area, and it was somewhat difficult to see the birds at certain locations. However, we enjoyed this activity very much.
02/03/2016
We did not walk far, perhaps 1km, but we saw 49 different birds. And yes we did list them.
01/25/2016
It rained that day so we couldn't, see the birds.The guide was great and tried it later but still raining.
12/20/2015
We were rained out