What’s New in Costa Rica

Montverde: A Quaker Community

If you have not yet been privileged to visit Montverde while you are in Costa Rica, you are among a very small minority. Montverde is a settlement in the rainforest that attracts millions of tourists. But it was not always like that. Almost half a century ago, some Quakers from Alabama, U.S.A. settled in that area naming it ‘Montverde,’ or ‘Green Mountain.’

They have devoted their lives to studying the extensive biodiversity of Costa Rica and now that is also available to you by visiting a new website www.montverdenow.org. This is a project by the Montverde community and the United Nations Mandated University for Peace and is a series of short videos featuring the lives of those who live in Montverde. The site will be available from April 19, 2011.

More Visitors from the UK

Over the years Costa Rica has experienced a large number of visitors entering the country for tourism. Although these tourists often come from several parts of the world, the vast majority of them have always been from the United States and Canada, with a very low rate of visitors from the United Kingdom (UK).

However, this no longer the case as the number of British visitors to Central America destinations increased significantly with Costa Rica getting the bulk of these visitors. Costa Rica is definitely becoming even more popular as a tourist destination.

New License Plates for Vehicles in Costa Rica

Vehicle drivers in Costa Rica need to see about getting their license plates changed. A public decree published in the gazette on April 8 made it compulsory for Costa Rica vehicle drivers to have their license plates changed to the new one.

There are several reasons for this. One of them is to regularize the system, to get all vehicles on the road to carry the same type of license plates. Another reason is to minimize the cases of forgery when it comes to license plates.

The issue here which causes some form of discontentment is that the vehicle owner would have to be responsible for the costs of changing the license plates and the cost is not at all cheap.