Guanacaste hotels collection

Once the rains have gone, the forest of Guanacaste sheds its leaves, and the province, dry and straw-coloured, stops resembling the rest of Costa Rica until April. The tree that gave it its name then spreads its broad, bare crown, and its brown pods, curled into the shape of an ear, drop onto pastures where the sabaneros still move their cattle on horseback. At Playa Grande, leatherback turtles come ashore at night to lay on sand that nothing lights. The potters of Guaitil, heirs to the Chorotega, still burnish their jars with a stone before painting them with curiol, an earth rich in oxides.