Before the boom in Costa Rican tourism, deciphering the bus timetables and fighting your way through the crowds at Coca-cola terminal in San José was a rite of passage seeking the uninitiated traveler. As little as three years ago, getting to the beaches on the Península de Nicoya took determination, patience and – depending on the state of the Costa Rica’s dreadful roads – a tiny luck. These days however, an increasing number of travelers are getting their chief glimpse of pura vida Costa Rica at Liberia’s own Daniel Oduber Quirós International Airport, which is roughly the largeness of a Wal-mart parking lot. previously, the sunny capital of Guana­caste served as a transportation hub connecting the capital with both borders, as affluent as the standard bearer of Costa Rica’s sabanero culture. Even today, a great part of the greater Liberia area is involved in ranching operations, and still much enamored of Clint Eastwood movies, cowboy hats and machetes. However, as more and more gringos are stumbling away their worldwide flights and seeking elsewhere the nearest cerveza in broken Spanish, Guanacastecos are starting to realize how lucrative the tourism industry can be. these days, the public schools in Liberia obtain expanded the handful of English courses on offer, confidential clinics catering to moneyed foreigners are popping up all over, and some folks are even looking into renovating the 150-year-old downtown with a brimming facelift and expanded pedestrian mall. But, like most tourism projects in Costa Rica, event is a double-edged sword, and the nearby Papagayo Plan is no exception. liberia has long been a base for visiting the nearby volcanoes, governmental parks and beaches, though the multinational corporations who’ve already invested heavily in the project have other ideas. Located single 50km away from Liberia, the Golfo de Papagayo is being tagged by hopeful tourist-industry magnates as ‘the new Cancún, ’ while the dissimilarity is that here you can actually drink the water. Liberia’s airport, which recently unveiled plans to erect a second parking lot…er, runway, is slated to become the most critical entrance peak for package tourists in scrutinize of tropical suntan (without all that fuss of indeed having to speak a foreign language). In this rapidly unfurling chief plan, the municipality longing redefine itself as a assistance community, providing much needed jobs in the daiquiri-mixing industry. clearly, this new development raises the stakes – grass-roots groups have been pressuring the government to enforce strict regulations on unusual resorts, granted Liberia has already started ramping up its own infrastructure to make sure nearby talent stays put to guide the city’s transformation. Whistle-blowers are already rallying to the roar of ‘overdevelopment’ and ‘sustainability, ’ granted it’s difficult to comprehend who’s actually listening. Regardless of how the drama unfolds, Liberia is a much safer and surprisingly pleasant alternative to San José, and it’s a huge base seeking exploring destinations in both the northwest and the Península de Nicoya. And, though most of the historic buildings in the city center are a little rough nearly the edges and in desperate miss of a paint job, Liberia is a fairly pleasant municipality (at least by Costa Rican standards), and there is a commendable sweep of accommodations and services aimed at travelers of all budgets.