Private Limon Shore Excursion: Tortuguero Canals Tour
Recommended by 94% of travelers
Limon, Costa Rica
- 5 hours (approx.)
- Pickup offered
- Group discounts
- Mobile ticket
- Offered in: English
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Overview
When your cruise ship docks on Costa Rica's Caribbean coast, don't waste time making your own way between its highlights. Maximize your time and spend a half day exploring local culture and the wildlife-rich canals of Tortuguero with this private shore excursion from Limon. Spot famous rainforest residents on a river boat cruise, and learn about Costa Rica's banana and coffee industries with a visit to the Chiquita Banana plantation and a village market.
- This private tour promises undivided attention from your guide
- Shop for coffee and other local products at a village market
- Try fresh Costa Rican cuisine at a restaurant with a view (own expense)
- Great way to explore the nature and culture of Costa Rica's Caribbean coast
What's Included
- Professional guide
- Port pickup and drop-off
- Private tour
- Gratuities
Meeting and Pickup
Pickup point
- Administración Tributaria de LimónXXRF+GF7, Av. 1, Limón, Costa Rica
Itinerary
Meet your driver and guide at Limon's cruise port, and travel to the smaller port of Moin, situated near the mouth of the Tortuguero canals. Climb aboard a shaded riverboat for a leisurely 1-hour cruise through the narrow canals that descend from Costa Rica's high country out into the Caribbean Sea. Glide through this lush, fertile part of the country past cocoa plantations and floral gardens while a guide helps you spot native wildlife such as crocodiles, monkeys, iguanas, sloths, and a vibrant array of birds.
At the end of the boat ride, step back onto solid ground and embark on a tour of the surrounding area for a glimpse into eastern Costa Rica’s commerce and culture. The tiny country is the world’s second largest banana exporter, with 80% of its banana fields in Limon province. Stop outside the famous Chiquita Banana plantation to learn how the fruit is cultivated, processed, and shipped all around the globe, and then treat your senses to Costa Rica’s other celebrated export with a chance to purchase coffee from a local market in Tortuguero village.
Finally, taste simple but fresh Costa Rican cuisine with a stop for lunch at your choice of a beachside restaurant or one with a stellar view of Limon (food and drink own expense). With a satisfied stomach, relax on the return drive to the Limon port and your waiting cruise ship.
At the end of the boat ride, step back onto solid ground and embark on a tour of the surrounding area for a glimpse into eastern Costa Rica’s commerce and culture. The tiny country is the world’s second largest banana exporter, with 80% of its banana fields in Limon province. Stop outside the famous Chiquita Banana plantation to learn how the fruit is cultivated, processed, and shipped all around the globe, and then treat your senses to Costa Rica’s other celebrated export with a chance to purchase coffee from a local market in Tortuguero village.
Finally, taste simple but fresh Costa Rican cuisine with a stop for lunch at your choice of a beachside restaurant or one with a stellar view of Limon (food and drink own expense). With a satisfied stomach, relax on the return drive to the Limon port and your waiting cruise ship.
1
Tortuguero Canal
1 hour • Admission Ticket Included
Additional Info
- Confirmation will be received at time of booking, unless booked within 4 days of travel. In this case confirmation will be received within 48 hours, subject to availability
- At time of booking, cruise ship passengers must provide the following information: ship name, docking time, disembarkation time and re-boarding time
- Not wheelchair accessible
- Most travelers can participate
- This is a private tour/activity. Only your group will participate
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Cancellation Policy
You can cancel up to 3 days in advance of the experience for a full refund.
Traveler Photos
Reviews
4.7
based on 17 reviews
Kathryn_C, Mar 2026
Great tour. Very informative and
excellent tour guide! Loads of fun.
Highly recommend this tour to all.
Robert_S, Feb 2026
Carlos was an excellent tour guide! He personalized our tour and delivered a wealth of knowledge. Great job and a very fun day!
Felicia_W, Feb 2026
Rosa was an excellent guide. She met us at our ship and was on time. Even early. She was very knowledgeable about her city and was able to answer all of our questions. The canal tour was very interesting. Highly recommend the tour and Rosa.
Laura_B, Feb 2026
Fun and informative tour with a great guide, Yendry (Jen). Beautiful ride through the Tortuguera canals where we saw sloths, howler monkeys and a variety of birds. We stopped at the banana plantation and it was so fun and trying different fruits - delicious.
Lisa_M, Feb 2024
We saw about 6-7 sloths. Some baby iguanas and black moneys. Everyone had a great time.
It rained all day but the tour guide said that gave us an advantage to see more sloths.
We were given delicious fruit and water. Had a4 stops and lunch at the beach. Nice tour!
Enza_E, Jan 2024
It wasn’t too exciting, hard to see creatures,
guide was good, and knowledgable!
It really didn’t go too long on the canal
Avery_S, Dec 2023
Great trip! Very east to meet the tour company right fter you get off the cruise ship. Our guide Ron Lobo was amazing! Very conscious of getting us back to the cruise ship with plenty of time and very flexible to anything we wanted to do. River boat was amazing, saw so many animals. Even stopped and had local fruits.
Mary_B, Apr 2023
Great tour of the canal where we saw howler monkeys, giant sloths and more. Unfortunately it rained a bit so the animals weren't as active. Both our driver and guide were very helpful and informative. Even with the rain our driver picked us up in a covered location so we wouldn't get wet!
David_T, Feb 2023
We were met at the designated spot by our driver Hector (aka Yi Yi) and guide Enrique. After a quick group picture, we were off on our Costa Rican adventure. After a few secluded stops where Hector knew we could see some sloths, we hit the fruit/coffee stand for some samples and education on the local plants. From there we hit the banana plantation where we learned even more. The boat trip through the canals was amazing. We saw monkeys, sloths, cayman, iguanas and other assorted wildlife. After the canals we went to the designated ocean front restaurant on the beach. We asked Enrique and Hector to join us for lunch, our treat. They appeared humbled by our offer. They did indeed join us which allowed us to learn more about them and life in Costa Rica. We had a fantastic meal. After lunch we were given a tour of Limon on our way back to the ship.
Enrique was a fantastic guide who is very knowledgeable. Hector was a character. This private tour was the highlight of all the excursions we took on our cruise. I would highly recommend this tour and if you are lucky enough to get Enrique and Hector as your guides you won't be disappointed.
David_P, Feb 2023
Unfortunately, this private tour was not what we expected from Viator. Instead of a minivan, we got a beat up taxi van. The driver was not a guide, just a taxi driver with limited English. After driving us non-stop through the town, we went to the canal, and joined 20 other tourists on a boat. We saw some Sloths in trees, heard monkeys in the jungle, and a Heron. Our driver did stop and we got pics of some brilliantly colored frogs. After that, one of our group was feeling ill due to the erratic driving of our driver. We told her to take us back to the ship.
David_A, Jan 2023
We took this as a private tour off of a cruise ship stop. We met ENRIQUE right at the port (inside security waiting with a sign with our name on it). From the very start Enrique was engaging and informative, we had a driver too- not quite as engaging. Enrique asked what we wanted to be sure to see, and assured us he would do his best (We wanted to get to the canals and see Sloths and Monkey's- of course nothing is assured).
We drove from Puerto Limon around town, thru Banana Plantations, stopped for Coffee and Cocoa (don't miss the Cocoa Sweeties), then off to the Canals. We had an additional two guides in our boat (3 guides to 4 passengers). The captain of our boat was Randy Jackson and his son Manuel was his spotter along with Enrique. We saw EVERYTHING we asked for and so much more, close enough to almost touch sloths, saw a baby and momma, saw sloths moving (rare), Howler Monkeys, Crocs, Cayman and too many birds to name.
Back to our van after the canals and off to more touring, then we stopped at Playa Bonita for an amazing lunch, at a local restaurant on the beach without crowds. The food was very good, the only thing we paid for all day was lunch plus tips and souveniers.
The tour price was very reasonable. Enrique english was spotless and we would book with Syltravel again and request to get Enrique if possible.
We were back (even with very bad holiday traffic) with time to spare for some local straw market shopping- some from our ship struggled to make it back due to the local traffic.
Book this without hesitation.
MICHAL_L, Mar 2022
Our guide Enrique and driver Roberto were amazing. Enrique’s English was amazing and he was knowledgeable and fun to spend the day with. The tour was chill and we went at our own pace and didn’t feel rushed. We definitely feel like we were able to see the highlights of Costa Rica and saw sloths, tasted coffee, and had mini bananas. Definitely try the cocoa sweety’s- a must for gifts for people back home
Ruth_S, Feb 2020
This was a fantastic tour. The canal ride was incredible - cayman, sloths, howler monkeys and many varieties of birds. The rest of the tour was also wonderful with our tour guide Enrique and our driver. They went above and beyond helping with a wheelchair. It is unbelievable how knowledgeable and wise Enrique is - he is so young! We loved it.
Gerald_R, Nov 2019
Excellent tour led by our guide, Alexander the Great. Knowledgeable and fun. Everything went perfectly from great comfortable van with prompt arrival at cruise ship port. We would recommend this tour.. The river boat ride was great and filled with animal sightings.
Debbie_J, Mar 2019
Amazing trip. Anna, our tour guide, was so lovely. She made our day perfect for us. Anna lives locally, seems to know everyone, and had so much local knowledge to share with us. We were so pleased we booked this trip and not one our cruise ship offered. We had a much more personal experience. We did everything on the itinerary plus managed to get up really close to a sloth which we loved. We recommend this to everyone.
Don T, Nov 2017
We enjoyed our tour and excursion immensely and our highly recommend it to everyone! The price was lower than that offered on the ship excursion that left VERY early in the morning and needed a bus and large boat for the canal trip. Our tour was so much more personal..... we left at the time we selected, had only four of us in both the air conditioned van and on the canal boat trip! This private tour gave fabulous insight to areas most larger tours can not..... and Fabiana is extraordinary! Her knowledge of the area and the things to see is impressive! Don't miss this fabulous opportunity!!!!!
Carol P, Mar 2017
First let me say our particular guide was a wonderful gentleman of full of history and enlightening bits of interest about the region. But, our first experience was seeing that we could have booked this same experience on the dock area at the SylTraveler Kiosh for half the price! We paid 85 each and on shore 45 for the Tortuguero Canals Tour, Banana plantation, city tour. They hire local taxi's to take tourists to the various offerings. More importantly is that the guide was told where to take us, sort of and we had to fill in what else we were expecting to see. Including that we were to be allowed a stop for lunch. To his credit, our driver went back to the port and hunted down the owner of the excursion and let him know we were expecting more, for which the driver was then told to be sure and give us what we said we were to do, and of course the driver was happy to do so and he and we, felt the owner was trying to pocket extra cash by offering the driver and us less time for our excursion. We did do the canal tour, which was only slightly authentically in any rural area. Yes we did see a few monkeys in 1 tree, 1 sloth, an few birds, and what seemed like a rubber alligator in the tree line.... we also saw a small one in another shore area briefly. our guide offered little insights about the particular wildlife, such as their habits or traits. Just point and move on. The stop at the banana plantation was a brief stop roadside and a short walk into the banana field to see them growing and then the driver explained how it all worked when we asked enough questions. no real prepared tour or information beyond the lifecycle of the banana tree and harvest plan. All in all, our driver was charming and a pleasure, and the fact that it was a private drive and such, that made it enjoyable. Over priced.
From $229.00
per personup to 3 days in advance
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Private Limon Shore Excursion: Tortuguero Canals Tour
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