FAQ
Acommodation
It’s possible for volunteers to live within a guest family. We can initiate the contact for you. Living in a guest family costs you about 10$ per day for acommodation and food (three meals a day). This is espacially recommended for those of you who don’t speak spanish at all or only very less, because you then really can live in a spanish-speaking surrounding.
Many volunteers live together in shared places, where the rent (ca. 100$ per month) is parted between all flatsharers. Please tell us about your plans of living early, so we can arrange everything for you.
Visas
You will get a tourist-visa when entering Costa Rica which lasts for three months (pricesely: 90 days!). When the 90 days are over you got to get out of Costa Rica for at least four days before you are allowed to re-enter for another 90 days. This is the way almost all the volunteers handle the visa-topic, and it allows you to visit and take a lookaround in other countries of central america.
It’s theoratically possible to get a visa for one year with a working permission, but it means real big efforts for Vida Nueva and especially for you, that’s why we highly recommend the other option.
Costs
Depending on your life-standard and usual habits you can live very cheap or very expensive in Costa Rica. Based on our experiences you will need 300-400$ per month.
Arrival
If your flight is landing at night and you due to that are forced to stay in San José for one night, we like to recommend the relatively cheap hostel „Tranquilo Backpackers“ which is located centrally.
If you’re coming to Costa Rica for the first time, we recommend you to take a taxi to the hostel or to the busstation called „MUSOC“, which means you got to pay 15-20$. Always discuss the price before departing, or even better: insist on using the taxameter, because otherwise you will pay much more than you have to.
To get from San José to San Isidro, you have to take the bus MUSOC (every taxidriver knows that). The busline is departing every hour between 5h30am and 6h30pm (except sundays) and it takes round about three hours to get to San Isidro over the „Cerro de la Muerte“. We recommend you to call a volunteer before you arrive at San Isidro so we can collect you from the busstation here.
Your other option is to tell a taxi driver the way to El Comedor, they will find it with this description:
„La cuarta entrada del Prado, despues de la Ulatina la primera calle a la derecha, la penultima casa blanca con un signo del PANI.“
