Summer Season coming to Costa Rica

The summer season is coming in Costa Rica and I can’t wait to come back for it and feel the color of the beautiful beaches of Santa Teresa and Mal Pais. I anticipate a great season as more transportation options will be available to get to Costa Rica from Europe, Canada and the United States. In the Nicoya area there are many beaches that have different characteristics for surfing. I would like to talk about those as I often use them for the surf lessons.

Mal Pais

Mal Pais is a rocky beautiful beach south of El Carmen. It is not exactly for beginners as the waves’ point break could be close to the rocky bed during high tide. But during the low tides, the waves are nice for advanced students to practice their carving and cutback techniques.
If you keep going down south of the beach you can find the tide pools Mal Pais is known for, when small marine wildlife thrives.

El Carmen – Santa Teresa

Here these names could cause confusion sometimes for visitors and tourists. Santa Teresa is the town but the beach is split in two, El Carmen is the southern part while Santa Teresa Beach is the northern one.
This seems to have no importance at all but locals and experts know both could develop different kinds of waves. While Santa Teresa has a nice beach break that could develop strong waves sometimes, El Carmen is more prone to crumbling waves, nice for beginners.
Both are the most popular beaches for surf tournaments and other surf-related events in the area.

Playa Hermosa

I already talked about Hermosa in another post but it is impossible for me not to talk about it as it is still one of the best beaches for surf lessons in the area.
Hermosa waves cause a sandbank in the bottom that helps to create stronger and faster waves during the high tide. The waves get slower as the tide gets lower becoming very nice for surfing rookies.
For advanced students, Hermosa Beach is a nice opportunity to practice their snap and off-the-lip tricks. For intermediate one is a good chance to learn how to control your speed.

Other beaches for surfing in the area

In the area of Montezuma and Cabuya, there are also some cool beaches for surfing, everyone with their unique qualities. Same for the zone north of Playa Hermosa. I’ll write about those in a future article.
I need to take into consideration that only certain beaches have the waves to practice advanced maneuvers such as the kickflip or the tailslide, so I need to check those myself before recommending them. Stay tuned.