If you would like a leisurely hike though the forest canopy and want to learn all about what lives there, then this is the hike for you. Compared to the extreme zip line adventures, here you are encouraged to go slow, listen and look at the exquisite details of life in the forest. Because this is a guided tour, your attention will be directed to a myriad of beautiful tiny orchids, interesting bugs, the sound of a bird call and perhaps a family of monkeys.
You will cross over 8 hanging bridges at varying heights within and above the giant trees that make up the cloud forest canopy. The five feet wide suspended bridges were built to the highest standards of safety recognized by Costa Rica’s College of Architects and Engineers. With genuine concern for this irreplaceable environment, construction of the bridges was performed off site, then each piece was brought in and assembled in place without damaging the delicate balance of existing flora and fauna. They are safe and secure and do not sway in the wind. Most people with a fear of heights have felt surprisingly at ease when crossing over the bridges and looking out at the magnificent sights surrounding them.
Some of the hanging bridges provide views from within the canopy and some from high above looking down. Then there are some where you will be very close to the uppermost part of the trees like a bird perched on the highest branch. The course allows you to explore the forest from differing heights, altering your perspective and relationship to the size of this venerable old growth forest and what lives within.
The almost two mile trail connecting the bridges is mostly flat with only short periods of climbing required. The pathways are comprised of embedded lattice concrete blocks for enhanced traction and ease of walking. People of all ages and physical conditions typically find this unhurried hike comfortable and enjoyable. Occasional benches are available for contemplation.
The expert guides are passionate about sharing their experience of the area’s abundant biological treasures with you. With a wealth of local knowledge they are very observant and will find the wildlife that is available to you at the moment.
Here you will be among the largest concentration of orchids in the world. Rare ferns and epiphytes abound as does the clever camouflage of insects maintaining their protection from potential predators. Exceptional birding opportunities are found in this locale and, if you are lucky, you may encounter an occasional monkey or family of monkeys.
High up on the continental divide, this private reserve shares the same corridor as the Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve. Ninety percent of the trails you’ll be walking on are in virgin cloud forest woodlands. The possibilities for what you might see are endless. Take the time to go slow and absorb the atmosphere of this enchanted setting. Costa Rica creates memories and your guide will ensure you take a few home with you from your visit to this remarkable rain forest.
The half day tour includes round trip transportation from the Monteverde area, naturalist guide, and park entrance fee.
The Hanging Bridges Guided Hike - Selvatura is available from Monteverde
Latitude: N 10° 20' 33.26"
Longitude: W 84° 47' 55.34"
11/11/2023
Incredible!
08/07/2023
The hike was a bit boring. We didn’t see many animals and the hanging bridges were ok, not that exciting. Should have gone with the zip line.
07/28/2023
It was a nice adventure but more walking and less bridges than expected. Guide was good but difficult for everyone to hear as we were spread out on the walk and bridges sometimes when he was talking.
07/18/2023
Juan Carlos our guide was amazing! His English was wonderful, and again we saw a fascinating about of wildlife. Juan Carlos could do just about every Costa Rican birds call, so we saw tons of beautiful birds in addition to butterflies, insects,and more along the way.
06/30/2023
Fantastic - guide was superb.
06/27/2023
The guide from Selvatura was one of the best nature guides I have ever had. Very professional, patient and knowledgeable. The cloud forest is a beautiful place.
06/25/2023
Guide had good eyes to spot lots of wildlife.
06/21/2023
Nature at its best. Our guide was amazing.
04/23/2023
This tour was excellent and met all of our expectations! The tour guide, Mauricio, was amazing and pointed out so many unique diversity. We saw 3 different tarantulas (2 female, 1 male), both a female and male Quetzal, Bellbirds, Black bats, Hummingbirds and more. He explained the damage taking place to the environment due to Global warming.
04/11/2023
Very nice, the guide Juan was really good
04/08/2023
overall good experience except for crowds due to Semana Santa week
01/31/2023
Exceptional guide
01/23/2023
I could have done this hike without a guide, but our guide knew a lot about birds and plants and I learned a lot. Again-beautiful place, like everywhere in Costa Rica.
12/24/2022
Amazing forest!
Lots of great informations with our tour guide!
Though... we felt like we were always running late on his schedule. We had to cross every bridge very fast... For our kid, who does not speak a great english (his spanish is worst!), it was quiet long...
We added the Slots sanctuary when we were done with the bridges, and this experience was incredible! It saved the day! :-)
11/02/2022
Incredible
06/09/2022
Guide was very knowledgeable and taught us a lot about the forests themselves as well as about creatures that we might see. Great tour, very pretty location.
02/08/2022
Amazing trip and guide
01/15/2022
At this point we had experienced many things but our guide was still able to provide new and interesting information. My only complaint was hearing the zipliners go by when we were enjoying a moment in the clouds or trying to get a better view of a bird.
11/24/2021
A bit crowded with people and disorganized at the start, finding a guide, etc. but overall great guides and wildlife!
11/01/2021
My husband liked this the best. The guide was quite good and pointed out a lot of things we would never have seen without him. Tarantula, orchids, etc. The cloud forest is pretty cool!!
07/29/2021
knowlegeble tour guide, great hike
01/18/2021
Very informative tour. Not a stressful hike. Excellent covid precautions throughout.
02/27/2020
Another beautiful experience.
02/22/2020
Excellent tour!
02/13/2020
This tour was fabulous!!! Another extremely friendly and knowledgable guide!!! Seeing the cloud forest and walking through it was breathtaking!
02/05/2020
Favorite tour of our trip. The guide was excellent. Met a family from Switzerland and we have already exchanged emails.
02/04/2020
Fantastic guide!!
02/03/2020
Our guild took a little getting used to. He did point out many amazing creatures that inhabit the cloud forest and was very knowledgable.
01/11/2020
Beautiful park, guide knew every inch of the park and took his job very serious. Not the most exciting part of the trip but appreciated the beauty of the park on a sunny day.
12/31/2019
Not much to see but that comes and goes with time of day and the animals. Hummingbird garden part was the best.
12/03/2019
Our tour group was small but the guide was totally disinterested. We saw plenty of interest but mainly down to our own observations. At the end of the tour, he didn't even explain about the return transportation which was a bit chaotic.
11/09/2019
The ride to the hanging bridges took a long time as we picked up many people. Our guide was excellent and informative about the cloud forest and wildlife. We didn’t see many as it was raining jbut it was a great experience.
10/14/2019
Great adventure! Our tour guide was AMAZING! He was so intelligent and wonderful. He taught us so much about this hometown and we loved how passionate about what he does.
08/08/2019
The guide very knowledgeable. We enjoyed the park.
08/02/2019
Guide excellent and he pointed out as much wildlife as he could but because we were so close to the zip wire experience and there were several visitors just running around the trail and shouting we couldn't experience as much of the wildlife that we expected. Possibly we had the wrong expectations of this tour.
07/25/2019
This place was a bit of a zoo (no pun intended,) We did not like the craziness of all the people and tours going this way and that. For a company that handles such large crowds, they should really have a better system for all of us rather than having us pick a line and hope that it's not a slow one. They should have one line and as a ticket station becomes available, the next person/people in line advance.
The guide for the bridges was great-- I'd give him a 10. Tour was fun, but not a whole lot of wildlife to be seen. We understand that that's how it goes.
After the bridge tour, though, we went into the Butterfly Garden and this was kind of a joke. There were hardly any butterflies--- really! Maybe 10?? Our guide spoke so fast, no one could understand him. He had no inflection and was just rattling off facts and information. I finally asked him to speak Spanish, hoping it would be more intelligible, but it barely was. The other three people in the group did not understand the English or the Spanish. This was very much a disappointment.
The open-scheduled transportation back to the hotel worked well.
07/11/2019
This was a good walk through and above the forest on the bridges. There was not as much to see in terms of wildlife, but that was most likely the time of day the hike started. The guide was the least interested, and least interesting on our entire trip. In comparison to all the other walks we did - this is the one we enjoyed the least.
07/05/2019
This tour was also a top favorite for our group. The weather was wonderful and the cloud forest was magnificent from the hanging bridges. Our guide Manuel was excellent in identifying many varieties of wildlife, from the micro orchids to the large fern trees. He carried a tripod and telescope with him the entire tour and took his time as we wandered the trails. We got to see a howler monkey at the end. Also the hummingbird garden was amazing...we didn't want to leave!
06/28/2019
The hanging bridges were really cool, but that was about it. The guide only really showed us the smallest flowers in Costa Rica and some moss. I felt we would have see just as much if we did this hike on our own. The hummingbirds were really cool as well, but again we could have seen this on our own.
05/28/2019
cool insects and bugs
05/19/2019
The guide was excellent. We saw a resplendant Questsel as well!
It was all very well organised and the restaurant was nice for lunch afterwards.
05/05/2019
The area and the guided walk as well as our guide (Juan) were excellent.
Unfortunately, the experience was significantly marred by the commercialization and overcrowding of the whole place which puts profits before the environment!
Eco-tourism and adventure tourism don't mix well and this is one of the worst examples I have seen. We were hoping to enjoy nature and were consistently subjected to the obnoxious noise from ziplines and the wannabe tarzans screaming in the forest.
Add to that the 1 1/2 hours of transfer time getting to and from our lodge.
Overrated and not something I would recommend to anyone.
04/03/2019
More explaining on logistics would b appreciated
04/02/2019
Our family loved this tour. It was a perfect group size and the guide talked about the ecosystem and challenges they are facing in the cloud forest, talked about the birds, wildlife, their food source etc.. I liked how it wasn't just walking across the hanging bridges, but very educational as well.
03/21/2019
Exceeded our expectations. Saw a quetzal fly over the canopy!!
02/09/2019
This tour seemed rushed. The guide pointed out only a few things and didn't explain much. I felt we could have done a self-guided tour and got almost as much out of it.
01/26/2019
Again, an amazing experience. The guide took us the opposite way...we had just stepped into the path and saw a small family of coati. We saw the rare quentzel bird, twice. So many memories. The bridges added unexpected adventure to the tour...walking up in the canopy. The staff in the main building were friendly and able to answer any questions we had.
01/15/2019
My only issue for this activity is that in choosing between bridges and zip lining it was not clear in the planning stage that Choosing both would have been a logistical possibility since they are in the same place.
12/31/2018
This was a great experience too. It was a good nature hike- peaceful and calm. Maybe a little more info about the plants/trees would add to this tour
12/29/2018
The guide was very knowledgeable and did not rush us through the park.
12/13/2018
Awesome experience. Loved the Hummingbird Garden. We also stayed a while longer and went through the butterfly garden, which was ok.
11/19/2018
Our guide was so knowledgeable and you could tell he was passionate about his job. The views were spectacular.
11/18/2018
I think this was the best activity on our vacation. The guide, Hector, was excellent and so knowledgeable about the rain forest, animals and vegetation. He spoke excellent English. If you take this tour without a guide, you are wasting your money. My only complaint is, I wish we had a little more detail on the length and intensity of this tour. If we had known that it was approximately 3 mile and had a 600 foot change in elevation we would have prepared a little better. Lunch at the restaurant was very good.
10/30/2018
guide was great and very informative
08/15/2018
Unfortunately, this was the least favorite of our activities and this was due to the guide. He wasn’t very engaging, but more importantly, he had somewhat of an arrogant attitude. I’m really sorry about the negative review, but all the other members of my family expressed the same sentiment with me quietly while we were on tour with him. I have his name if you need it.
08/14/2018
Gave the guide a $10 tip, and he barely thanked before walking away. Not sure if we did something to offend him, but from about halfway through the tour he seemed ticked off.
10/17/2017
Awesome park and guides
10/03/2017
Didn't really see any wildlife, but that's not anyone's fault. just bad luck. Logistically, timing had to be correct to get a ride back to the hotel. Had we missed the ride back due to staying in the butterfly garden or souvenir shop too long, would've had to wait another 1.5 hrs or so for the next one. would've been upset at wasting our day that way.
07/17/2017
It started raining towards the end, like torrential rain and so all we could do is run to get off the metal bridges and back, beautiful though and would go back. Saw some monkeys and an owl.
07/12/2017
A great tour - I think we were lucky because there was very little cloud and the walk was not busy at all. We had a guide all to ourselves who spotted birds and animals that we would never have seen without him pointing them out. A great place for families for a day out as there is lots to do and it is well organized.
06/21/2017
Good guide
04/21/2017
Fun tour even through the bridges were a bit terrifying. There was a loud group ahead of us so we had little chance of seeing any wildlife. We felt a little rushed through but honestly we could have gone back through on our own too.
03/17/2017
Our guide knew where to look and went out of his way to set up his scope for bird viewing, et. Our group was a decent size of about 10 people. I saw a group of 30...way too many and not all guides have a large magnify scope so you can see the birds, et better. Ours did!!
03/12/2017
would have loved more time here but we had to leave immediately after the walk in order to catch the ride all the way back to our hotel that left in time for us to catch our next pick-up
03/04/2017
Best part of the trip. The guide was amazing.
02/27/2017
able to substitute several activities for my wife who did not do the hanging bridges. Her guide was very good and mine likewise
02/24/2017
Excellent guide
02/20/2017
Juan Carlos was wonderful!
02/16/2017
Our guide was so great and the surroundings beautiful. I think it would be great to go on the hike right at dawn.
02/05/2017
So worth it.
02/04/2017
Our guide was extremely knowledgeable, learned a lot about local trees, plants. He did find a tarantula hiding in a hole. That was unfortunately all the wild life we got to see. It is a beautiful park and we did enjoy the views.
01/15/2017
Awesome. Great guide again.
12/23/2016
Outstanding guide
11/23/2016
This was the most awesome part of our whole trip. Our guide was friendly and very knowledgeable. A fun time even though we got drenched!!
11/12/2016
A perfect first tour. Highly recommend it before the night walks or more focused Ag tours: Coffee or Sugar tours. Gave a great overview of the Selva. Transportation to and from the hotel was flawless even though our tour ran over time.
09/17/2016
very nice tour, very good guide
08/21/2016
Fantastic experience in this stunning cloud forest which was really enhanced by the guide's experience and interesting information.
08/18/2016
beyond imigination good
07/12/2016
I loved this activity! What a lovely walk, a lovely experience, a superb guide!!!! Hector was incredible! He was kind, passionate, honest, and told us that this was more to look at and understand flora, rather than fauna. It was a breathtaking hike, and I learned so much, and really appreciated the beauty of the jungle through Hector's eyes. What a terrific guide, who is passionate, good at his job, and really there to help you feel and understand nature,
07/05/2016
there is a lot to see, we took a lot of pictures i wont be using them all
07/03/2016
Our guide (Hector?) was truly amazing! So knowledgable and very passionate about his job. We learned and saw a ton with him - fantastic!
07/02/2016
It was pouring rain the entire time. This made it difficult to enjoy the scenery. The tour guide was very informational.
05/28/2016
Enjoyed the tour. Looking over tree tops was amazing. Heard and then saw Howler Monkeys. The guide brought a special scope so we could see birds, etc. up close. He even took pictures with our cameras using it so we got clear, bright pictures of the birds. It was amazing how he could spot wildlife.
03/28/2016
Park bridges were great. Guide was superb and really took time to involve the children. Only wish is that if you already have vouchers you can bypass the general line at the park office. That took 25 minutes when we already had prepaid vouchers.
03/18/2016
Great tour. Great guide
03/09/2016
the only thing missing was the mist and rain! we had great weather although not typical apparently.
03/08/2016
Loved it....
03/03/2016
Loved it. The hike was awesome. Set at a great time, in the morning, so that it wasn't too hot. Also, during this tour, if we decided to stay and enjoy lunch, they had transportation coming and going at different times so that we could go back to the hotel without getting a taxi.
02/17/2016
another great experience....only one other couple and the guide so very one on one with the guide
He is VERY good at what he does
02/16/2016
I was disappointed
that we saw such limited Wildlife.
02/14/2016
Although we were at the Hanging Bridges early, it got crowded very quickly. Thank Goodness our guide started at the end and walked against the traffic. Nice tour, a little too many people in the group for my taste, but still enjoyable. Would have like to have more time for photos, though. It felt a tad rushed.
02/01/2016
I was hoping for some of the old wood bridges. Thank goodness that the canyoneering had one.
01/22/2016
Certainly able to understand some of the impacts of global warming as part of this tour. The guide was very knowledgeable.
01/17/2016
Great guide!
01/12/2016
Sorry, but this did not meet our expectations, this was more like an amusement park in the cloud forest. The guide talked constantly about personal things rather than relating natural history about the place. We felt that we could have walked the bridges, like everyone else, and gotten more out of it. The best experience about the whole tour was hummingbirds sitting on our fingers to eat. I would not have been as disappointed if I had been warned about how commercialized it was, I may have chosen Monte Verde Cloud Forest instead.
01/05/2016
Great if you want to see a lot of green rain forest. The views of the rain forest were great but they did start to get old after a while. The group of people should have been smaller given our guide's speaking as he simply refused to raise his voice so if you weren't right next to him you couldn't hear what he was saying. Not so great if you expected to see a lot of animals, birds and butterflies like I did.
12/30/2015
Learned a lot about the jungle - went to see the hummingbirds before going over the bridges
12/28/2015
We added the Don Juan coffee and chocolate tour this day too. It was excellent. The tour guide was the best of our whole trip.
12/24/2015
There is no point in running this tour in the late afternoon as there is nothing to see at that hour. Run it first thing in the morning or not at all.
12/21/2015
Tour guide was very friendly and knowledgeable.
12/16/2015
Guide was excellent and very knowledgeable.
12/03/2015
I was very disappointed in the lack of any wildlife. The guide was helpful, but he spent a lot of time trying to locate a bird. He later found a snake that was along the path. We marveled at the bridges and wondered how they were erected in the first place
11/07/2015
Our guide Adam was fantastic!
10/07/2015
This guide knew this plants and the tour was a lot of fun!
08/26/2015
I would recommend highly
07/27/2015
While the bridges were an exciting way to venture the cloud forest we probably could have taken this tour on our own. It is mostly for lovers. Because it was a rainy day we didn't see many birds. However, the views were spectacular. We stayed in the park and ate lunch and visited the Hummingbird Gardens which were phenomenal!
06/20/2015
Again not such good weather but the guide was great at finding and describing everything
06/07/2015
Beautiful place. Tour guide was great. He just wasn't as great as the previous two who had spoiled us. They are tough acts to follow though.
05/06/2015
SO glad I went on this! Hiking level and pace was appropriate. Our guide was excellent! We saw everything! He did such a good job of finding the birds, getting us pics, etc. What a gorgeous place! I am so glad we went to this area. I would go back to this area again and explore more of what they have.
05/02/2015
The guide and experience was phenomenal. This was our highlight for Monteverde.
04/14/2015
Loved it! Bus to Selvatura.was awful. Very old and no shocks so really felt the bumps sitting at back of bus.
03/25/2015
Enjoyed the relaxing walk though the green paradise at a leisurely pace and crossing the hanging bridges was fun. guide took good care of the group.
03/21/2015
Hector was fantastic! We learned tons and even saw a Quetzal bird! Lovely lunch at the hotel there after.
03/07/2015
TRULY PERFECT!
03/05/2015
Another amazing tour. Hector, our guide, was so knowledgeable, enthusiastic and considerate. Super experience!
02/11/2015
The guide was very knowledgeable however my wife and I were a little disappointed on not seeing very many birds, animals or insects. The trees, undergrowth and views were all pretty good. To be honest, though we didn't see a lot of birds anywhere in Costa Rica. For some reason we expected to see them everywhere. I guess our expectations were a little high.
12/21/2014
The only disappointment was that we did not manage to see a quetzal, although the guide spent a good amount of time trying to find them.
12/10/2014
Excellent guide. Not a lot of birds due to afternoon and tough weather, but the guide made up for it with natural history, plants, and insects.
11/09/2014
We loved the Hanging Bridges tour.