La Fortuna Waterfall

The water drops clean off a volcanic shelf at the base of Cerro Chato, Arenal's extinct sister cone, and falls 70 meters into a canyon walled in rainforest. From the overlook you feel the spray before you hear the roar catch up; from the canyon floor it's the opposite, a wall of white noise that swallows conversation. Getting down means about 500 concrete steps cut into the hillside, switchbacking through tree ferns and heliconias — a short walk on paper, a real workout in the humidity, and the return climb is the part nobody mentions until they're on it.

The reward at the bottom is a rock-ringed pool off to the side of the main plunge, fed by the same river but calm enough to swim — cold, glass-clear water that resets you after the descent. Swimming directly beneath the falls is closed off for good reason: the base current is strong enough to hold a person under. ADIFORT, the local development association, runs the site and reinvests the entrance fee into San Carlos canton, so the ticket price is doing double duty. Most visitors pair the falls with the Arenal hanging bridges or a soak in the hot springs to fill out a full La Fortuna day.