- Introduction:
Hotel Bosque de Paz is a small and exclusive hotel tucked away in the middle of lush cloudforests offering a unique natural experience in the mountains of Costa Rica. The hotel is run by the friendly Costarican Gonzalez family who have created this wonderfull place, paying special attention to the specific desires of the more serious natural history enthousiast, birdwatcher and nature photographer. Surrounded by pure air, crystal mountain water and rolling hills with dense cloudforest Hotel Bosque de Paz is another place that can’t be missed while birdwatching in Costa
- Location:
Hotel Bosque de Paz is located a few kilometers south of the small town of Bajos del Toro, west of the Poas Volcano and right on the continental divide of Costa Rica. From San José it will take about 1,5 hours by car to get to Hotel Bosque de Paz, passing by beautiful authentic rural Costa Rican scenery.
- Facilities:
Hotel Bosque de Paz offers 12 spaceous rooms all with a nice balcony with chairs from where one can enjoy beautifull forest views. All rooms have a private bathroom. A small restaurant provides tasty home-made meals and there is a living room with a sitting area and TV and a natural history library available for hotelguests.
The hotelgardens have sugarfeeders attracting up to 8 species of Hummingbirds, while the cornfeeders attract beautifull birds and also mammals. The hotel owns a private reserve of about 100 ha crisscrossed by several well maintained trails ecluively accesable for htelguests. There is also a beautifull orchid garden.
- Birding and wildlife attractions:
The vast tracts of cloudforest surrounded by Hotel Bosque de Paz makes this the ideal place to spend a few days to enjoy some of the most spectacular birds of Costa Rica. Mostly highland species can be seen here. Around the hotelgardens, one can do some very relaxed birdwatching at the cornfeeders where Black Guans, Yellow-thighed Finch, Chestnut-capped Brush-finch, Common Bush-tanager, Blue-gtay Tanager and Silver-throated Tanager can be seen from just a few meters away. Also, White-tipped Dove and sometimes even the rare Buff-fronted Quail-dove might show up in search of an easy corn-snack. During the day White-nosed Coati’s, Variegated Squirrels and Central America Agouti’s are common sights around the corn feeders and at night one can enjoy observing one of the hardest mammals to see in Costa Rica: the rare Paca: a big rodent, mostly restricted to the forest interior and exclusively active at night. Besides that sugarfeeders attract several hummingbirdspecies. Most common are Violet Sabrewing, Green-crowned Brilliant, Purple-throated Mountain-gem and Green Hermit, Scintillant Hummingbird, Magentha-throated Woodstar and Magnificent Hummingbird are also around but a bit harder to see. It is no wonder that Hotel Bosque de Paz is also a favourite among nature and bird- photographers.
For the more active birdwatcher there are several kilometers of well-maintained trails starting from the hotel going through precious birdhabitat. Birds mostly hang out in mixed species flocks with Red-faced Spintails, Spotted Barbtails, Spot-crowned Woodcreeper, Tufted Flycatcher, Gray-breasted Wood-wrens, Ochraceous Wren, Ruddy-capped Nightingale-thrush, Black-faced Solitaires, Common Bush-tanagers, Silver-throated Tanager, Yellow-thighed Finch. Slate-throated Redstarts, Three-striped Warblers, Tropical Parulas and Flame-throated Warblers. During the northern winter other migratory warblers might also be around like Golden-winged Warbler, Blackburnian Warbler and Black-and-white Warbler. Other targets in the cloudforests surrounding Hotel Bosque de Paz are Slaty-backed Nightingale-thrush, White-throated Spadebill, Olive-striped Flycatcher and Silvery-fronted Tapaculo. If you are lucky you can also spot some of the most colourfull birds of Costa Rica like Collared and Orange-bellied Trogon; even the Resplendent Quetzal has been reported here on several occasions. Golden-browed Chlorophonia and the colourfull Spangle-cheeked Tanagers sometimes can be seen feeding in fruiting trees like ficus of clusia, where sometimes also Emerald Toucanet, Long-tailed Silky Flycatchers show up, Prong-billed and even Red-headed Barbets. The Scaled Antpitta is one of the most timid and rare birds of Costa Rica and might be seen hopping around on the forest floor. When you are lucky to encounter raiding army ants you might be rewarded with Immaculate Antbirds, the rare Azure-hooded Jay and even Black-banded Woodcreeper.