You can get to the Osa by land, an eight-hour road trip from San Jose , or take a 50-minutes commuter flight into Puerto Jimenez, the gateway to the peninsula. Residents (there are few foreigners) and visitors alike consider the Osa to be the "real Costa Rica" - lush, tropical, unspoiled nature, spectacular wildlife, deserted beaches and untouched forests. Its unique bio-diversity consists of cloud forests and lowland wet forests where jaguars still roam and the Scarlet Macaw can be seem flying overhead. The largest trees and monkey colonies in Costa Rica are found here. Outside magazine calls it "the last best peninsula."

This is the tropics after all, so the weather is warm year around, but because it is a peninsula, surrounded by water, the climate is more favorable. The land is green year round. Like the rest of Costa Rica, the greenest season (when it rains most afternoons) runs from May through October, with daytime temperatures in the 70's and 80's and nights in the 60's. The "summer" temperatures, from December through April, are in the 90's with little or no rain. Bugs abound but with proper repellent, you will not be troubled by them.

The area hosts a unique array of animal life. In addition to the endangered jaguar, the squirrel monkey, Baird's tapir and three species of sea turtles are found here. There are more than 375 species of birds on Osa and it is home to the harpy eagle and the yellow-billed cotinga.

The rain forest is made up of 700 tree species, the largest tree species in all of Central America . A quarter of Costa Rica's tree species are found on the Osa Peninsula . There are more than 4000 vascular plant species in the area.