Uvita Day 3 / Marino Ballena National Park (16.5.22)

Day 3 in Uvita - today we plan to explore the 'Whale Tail' in Marino Ballena National Park.

Marino Ballena National Park was founded on 06.02.1989 as Costa Rica's first marine national park. Over time, the boundaries of the national park have been expanded, and today Marino Ballena Park encompasses over 5,300 hectares of water and 115 hectares of land.

Twice a year, humpback or pilot whales migrate through the waters of the park to raise their young in the warm waters, until they have accumulated enough fat to swim to colder areas.

And nature has played a joke here: right in front of Uvita, at the entrance of the park, a sandbank forms at low tide, which looks like a huge whale tail.

The length of the sandbank is 700m and it is 250m wide. The walk to the 'tail tip' at low tide is about 2km from the park entrance. We are super early, standing at the entrance at 7:30. However, the sun is already scorching us until we reach the tail. The view is amazing, there are hardly any people around, and the Pacific rolls in from two sides towards the sandbank. Along the way, we pick up some plastic trash and by 10am we are back at the hotel, from where we head to Manuel Antonio after a short dip in the pool to cool off....

PS: The aerial view image is not ours - it's just to show the whale tail ;)