Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
The park's
Sector Murciélago
(Bat Sector) encompasses the wild northern coastline of
the Península Santa Elena and is not accessible from Santa Rosa. Here you'll find the isol-
ated white-sand beach of
Playa Blanca
and the trailhead for the Poza el General watering
hole, which attracts birds and animals year-round. The famous surf break Ollie's Point is
in this sector near Playa Portero Grande, but it can only be reached by boat from Playa del
Coco or Tamarindo. Or you can do as Patrick and Wingnut did in
Endless Summer II
and
crash-land your chartered plane on the beach (ahem, not actually recommended).
SANTA ROSA IN HISTORY
This stretch of coast is famous among Ticos (Costa Ricans) as a national stronghold.
Costa Rica has been invaded three times, and the enemy has always surrendered in
Santa Rosa.
The best known of these incidents is the Battle of Santa Rosa, which took place on
March 20, 1856, when the soon-to-be-self-declared president of Nicaragua, an uppity
American named William Walker, invaded Costa Rica. Walker was the head of a group of
foreign pirates and adventurers known as the 'Filibusters' that had already seized Baja
and southwest Nicaragua and were attempting to gain control over all of Central America.
In a brilliant display of military prowess, Costa Rican president Juan Rafael Mora Porras
guessed Walker's intentions and managed to assemble a ragtag group of fighters who
proceeded to surround Walker's army in the main building of the old Hacienda Santa
Rosa, known as La Casona. The battle was over in just 14 minutes, and Walker was forever
driven from Costa Rican soil.
Santa Rosa was also the site of battles between Costa Rican troops and invading forces
from Nicaragua in the 20th century. The first - in 1919 - was a somewhat honorable at-
tempt to overthrow the Costa Rican dictator General Federico Tinoco. Then, in 1955, Ni-
caraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza led a failed coup d'état. Today you can still see So-
moza's abandoned tank, which lies in a ditch beside the road just beyond the entrance to
the park.
Santa Rosa's military history didn't end with Somoza. In the 1980s US Marine
Lieutenant-Colonel Oliver North illegally sold weapons to Iran and used the profits to fund
the Nicaraguan Contras during the Sandinistas-Contra war. The troops' staging area was
right here in Santa Rosa (near the famous surf break now known as Ollie's Point).
Sights & Activities
