Fun Facts About Costa Rica

It starts with a country that basically said, “No thanks” to a standing army and then spent that money on people and forests instead. Costa Rica has been doing the unusual thing for decades, and the results show up everywhere, from its beaches to its power grid.

In one small slice of the planet, you get 25 percent of the land locked into national parks and reserves, nearly all electricity coming from renewable sources, and five of the world’s seven sea turtle species nesting in the same general vibe. And then there’s the biodiversity part, because this place is only about the size of West Virginia, yet it holds roughly 5 percent of the planet’s species.

All of it gets even more interesting when you realize Costa Rica didn’t just protect nature, it actively fought to bring it back.

What Costa Rica Is Known For

Costa Rica is known internationally for a combination of things almost no other country shares:

-No military since 1948, with funds redirected to education and healthcare

-25 percent of land protected as national parks and reserves - roughly three times the world average

-Generating nearly all electricity from renewable sources - hydropower, geothermal, and wind

-5 of the world's 7 sea turtle species nesting on its beaches

-The first country in the world to reverse deforestation - forest cover dropped to 21 percent in 1983 and has recovered to over 52 percent today

Costa Ricans call themselves Ticos and Ticas - from the habit of adding the diminutive suffix "-tico" to words in everyday speech, a linguistic quirk that became a point of national identity.

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When people talk about Costa Rica’s “no military since 1948” choice, they usually skip the part about what that freed up, education and healthcare, and why that matters alongside the forests.

A Country the Size of West Virginia With 5% of Earth's Biodiversity

Costa Rica covers roughly 51,000 square kilometers - about the size of West Virginia. What it contains:

• Approximately 5 percent of the world's entire biodiversity
• Over 500,000 species of plants, animals, and insects
• Around 900 bird species and over 50 species of hummingbirds
• 220 species of reptiles and over 200 amphibian species
• 5 of the world's 7 sea turtle species
• More than 1,400 orchid species - some look so unusual they belong alongside plants that seem to come from science fiction
• 12 distinct ecological zones, from tropical dry forest to cloud forest to coral reef

The country sits on the land bridge connecting North and South America, the corridor through which jaguars moved south and giant ground sloths moved north when the two continents linked millions of years ago.

To protect this diversity, Costa Rica has designated 25 percent of its land as national parks and reserves - roughly three times the world average. That decision matters more every year: one in three tree species on Earth is now threatened with extinction, and the countries that chose early to protect their forests are the ones most likely to still have them.

Sea Turtles, Arribadas, and the Real National Animal

On the Pacific coast at Ostional National Wildlife Refuge, mass nesting events called arribadas bring tens of thousands of Olive Ridley turtles ashore simultaneously. A single arribada can see 100,000 turtles arrive on one beach within a few days. Five of the world's seven sea turtle species nest in Costa Rica.

The national land animal is not the sloth or the jaguar. It is the white-tailed deer. The national bird is the clay-colored thrush - chosen for its song rather than its appearance.

With over 200 amphibian species, Costa Rica produces the kind of variety that makes something like the grumpy African rain frog feel like a small preview of what evolution does when left alone long enough.

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The Ticos and Ticas might be best known for saying everything with “-tico,” but the bigger plot twist is that this linguistic habit sits next to a national obsession with protecting land.

Geography lovers should also check out Mount Roraima, the flat-topped “Lost World” mountain with species found nowhere else.

Coffee, Gallo Pinto, and Pura Vida

Costa Rica's relationship with coffee goes back over 200 years. In the 1800s, the government offered free land to anyone willing to cultivate coffee plants - a policy that seeded the entire agricultural economy. Costa Rican arabica beans are considered among the finest in the world.

Gallo Pinto - rice and beans mixed with peppers, onions, cilantro, and Lizano sauce - is the national dish, eaten most commonly at breakfast. "Pura Vida" - the phrase Ticos use as a greeting, farewell, and general philosophy - did not originate in Costa Rica.

It comes from a 1956 Mexican film about an unlucky man who says it every time things go wrong. Costa Ricans adopted it. Today it is a way of life.

The Stone Spheres Nobody Can Fully Explain

In the Diquís Delta, hundreds of nearly perfect stone spheres have been found since the 1940s. They range from a few centimeters to 2.5 meters in diameter, with the largest weighing up to 16 tons.

Dating places their creation between 800 and 1500 CE, made by the ancestors of the Boruca and Térraba peoples. They were added to UNESCO's World Heritage List in 2014. No one is certain what they were for. The civilization that made them collapsed around the time Columbus arrived in 1502.

Isla del Coco, around 550 kilometers offshore, was the opening shot location for Jurassic Park. Bahía Ballena off the Pacific coast is a beach whose shape, viewed from the air, exactly resembles a whale's tail.

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And once you connect the dots between reversing deforestation and the fact that one in three tree species is now threatened, the “fun facts” turn into a survival story.</p>

Living Longer in the Nicoya Peninsula

The Nicoya Peninsula is one of the world's Blue Zones - regions where people consistently live past 90 and 100 in far higher numbers than the global average.

Factors most linked to longevity there: strong social networks maintained throughout life, regular physical work into old age, a diet centered on beans, corn, and squash, and a sense of purpose locals call plan de vida.

The fun facts about Mexico and fun facts about Canada offer two countries from the same hemisphere that took very different paths.

Costa Rica’s best flex is that it treated forests like family, and the family is still here.

And while Costa Rica protects its turtles and forests, Mexico’s sinking capital tells another wild story: Mexico’s capital city that’s sinking.