• Pacuare River raftingGuided one-day trips run Class III–IV rapids through a forested canyon, with about four hours on the river. Turrialba outfitters pick up early, and the put-in near Tres Equis is about an hour east. Book ahead, and give it the whole day.
  • Turrialba VolcanoThe cone is often limited or closed. Ask that morning, and do not assume the rim road is open. It is not the same trip as Irazú.
  • GuayaboA pre-Columbian town with stone mounds and a raised road, a short drive from the city. It is a morning. Ask the hours that day.
  • Town squareThe center is a park and a church, enough for a walk after you get back. It is not why you stay the night.
  • Cheese and coffee farmFarms on the hills sell cheese and a cup. Go to one that expects you. An hour, then you leave. It is not the river.
  • CATIEThe research gardens are a flat walk through crops and trees outside town. Morning is better. It is not a national park and not a hike.
  • Reventazón RiverThe other river is a different day from the Pacuare. Do not book both. Ask which section is running before you commit.
  • AquiaresCoffee hills above town, with a view back toward the valley when the cloud lifts. Drive up. There is no crater here.
  • Irazú is the other conePeople mix the two volcanoes. Irazú is the paved rim above Cartago. This cone is farther, and the road is often closed. Ask before you drive up.
  • Back from the riverYou return tired, and later than the brochure says. Do not book Guayabo for that same afternoon. Eat, and leave the ruins for the morning.

The landscape is a warm valley, coffee hills, and rivers in forest. You are likely to see toucans, motmots, hummingbirds, butterflies and sloths in the riverside forest. The plants around them are coffee, pasture, and wet forest along the rivers.

Around Turrialba, the square is the town. Birds are on the river and at Guayabo in the morning. Do not expect them from a soda at noon.

Guayabo National Monument and the forest along the Pacuare, which is why the river day still runs through trees.

In Turrialba, stay on the trail and do not feed what you came to see. That is the rule that keeps this place the way it is.

The climate is a warm valley. Temperatures are about 16–28°C. Wetter than Cartago, with afternoon rain through most of the year. Turrialba sits at 646 m (2,120 ft).

A river day still runs in light rain. A white volcano is a different problem. The countrywide calendar is in the best time to visit Costa Rica.

The airport is Juan Santamaría in Alajuela. Turrialba is past Cartago, and the last stretch is slower than the highway into the city.

Book the river before you leave San José. Buses, shuttles, and rental cars are compared in getting around Costa Rica.