Come find sea turtles in Ostional, Camaronal and Tortuguero! Would you like to see literally hundreds and maybe thousands of sea turtles nesting all at once? Ostional beach in Costa Rica is one of only a handful of places in the world where these mass arrivals happen! The exact days when they happen are unpredictable, but tend to happen once or even twice a month, mostly in the rainy season between August and December.

The turtles that nest in mass in Ostional are Olive Ridleys, but it’s possible in Costa Rica to witness the nesting of five out of seven species of sea turtles known in the world: Olive Ridley (Lepidochelys olivacea), Loggerhead (Caretta caretta), Hawksbill (Eretmochelys imbricatta), Green (Chelonia mydas) and Leatherback (Dermochelys coriacea).

Tortuguero means roughly “Land of Turtles”, and it’s an especially good place to spot the highly endangered Leatherback turtle, which is the only sea turtle with a soft shell, as well as the largest and most endangered of them all worldwide.
Besides Ostional and Tortuguero, sea turtles nest throughout both coasts in Costa Rica, but these are the two places where you’re most likely to see them.