Manzanillo
Manzanillo: Exploring the Park & Getting There
By Explore Costa Rica Staff
Nov 1, 2006, 16:29

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Exploring the Manzanillo National Park

The park is easily explored simply by walking the beaches; trails also wind through the flat, lowland rainforest fringing the coast. A coastal track that skirts the swamps leads south from the east side of Manzanillo village to Gandoca village (two hours), where you can walk the beach one km south to Gandoca Lagoon. Beyond the lagoon, a trail winds through the jungle—teeming with monkeys, parrots, sloths, and snakes—ending at the Río Sixaola and the Panamá border. A guide is recommended.

You can hire a guide and boat in Sixaola to take you downriver to the mangrove swamps at the rivermouth (dangerous currents and reefs prevent access from the ocean). If you pilot yourself, stay away from the Panamanian side of the river, as the Panamanian border police are said to be touchy.

Entrance costs $6.

The Manzanillo ranger station (tel. 506/754-2133), is 200 meters south of the village.

Getting There
Located South of Puerto Viejo and Cahuita. See section Puerto Viejo Getting There. or Cahuita: Cahuita Getting There. You can drive to Gandoca village via a 15-km dirt road that leads north from the Bribrí-Sixaola road; the turnoff is about three km west of Sixaola. Keep left at the crossroads 1.5 km down the road.

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Things to Do	Cahuita	Puerto Viejo	Tortuguero
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