I used a previous edition of this book as a guide when I was an exchange student in Costa Rica. This book contained everything that I needed. I spoke little Spanish in the beginning of my stay, and this book helped me to travel the country with easy. It contains information about everything from restaurants to travel to ecological information. Prior to using the New Key, I had never used a travel book. After using it, I wanted to buy a travel guide for every trip. Though I have now used several travel books, unfortunately, I have never found another book that is so comprehensive and useful as the New Key. This book explains a lot of inside information that one needs to know and hotel and restaurant tips. I highly recommend it. I only wish the makers of the New Key would do New Key books for other places,especially other Central American countries. I would buy any New Key book even if it were over my own home city so that I could let my visitors use it. I would buy the full set without hesitation. My few words can hardly do justice to this excellent book. If there were a nobel prize for travel books, this book would have won it. If you are taking a trip to Costa Rica, buy it!

I traveled to Costa Rica for a study abroad program with my college, and I found The New Key to Costa Rica to be the perfect guide book. I loved all of the recomendations the book offered while I was in Costa Rica: places to visit, places to eat, places to stay, etc. So, when I planned to return to Costa Rica I consulted the book again. However, I do not suggest using Americas Tours and Travel to buy tickets to Costa Rica, as the book suggested. I did, and I regret it. This is my only complaint about the book. Otherwise, it is the best that can be offered.

Also newly updated is Beatrice Blake and Anne Becher's New Key To Costa Rica, which promotes eco travel and outdoor adventures. Opinionated reviews cover both historic sites and outdoor adventure journeys, making for an absorbing and revealing guide.