7 of the mostvaccinated places to visit in the U.S.
The road to Nosara is unpaved, with good intentions.
After a two-hour highway journey to Costa Rica’s Pacific coast, the route turns rocky, potholed and narrow. You begin to slow down, dodging trucks and livestock. In arid February, dust coats the lush roadsides, creating a clay-colored trench in the tropical dry forest. There is no indication that this is a road to anywhere – certainly not a sprawling paradise for vacationers, surfers, yogis and expatriates.
Still, the GPS voice eventually instructed me to turn left, so I guided my rental Toyota up an even rougher, snaking trail to the Hotel Boutique Lagarta Lodge,
where the
If trying to maintain a low risk of exposure to the coronavirus is on your list of travel musts, you may find yourself buried in tracking data before you purchase a plane ticket.
As of Feb. 1, over 63% of the U.S. population was fully vaccinated, but some states and territories have inoculated a bigger share of residents than others. Some domestic destinations – San Francisco and Hawaii’s Maui County – have started to require proof of booster shots for indoor activities and border crossings.
Federal rules for international travel to the United States apply to foreign visitors, and various attractions may also have their own mask or vaccine requirements, so be sure to check before you go. Coronavirus statistics reflect the numbers compiled through Jan. 31.
Below, we have rounded up some of the mostvaccinated places to travel in the United States, and some of their relatively of what I paid in 2020. All adult tourists are required to either show proof of vaccination or purchase insurance for medical and quarantine expenses. Private establishments may also require vaccination, and the country is serious about masking on public transportation and in public spaces. But as we found in Nosara in 2020, there was little reason to interact with people indoors – or even be indoors, beyond our king suite.
Many landing at Liberia will turn inland for a classic Costa Rica experience of volcanoes and rain forests. Others will look west to the beaches, where the path of least resistance (and least potholes) leads to megaresort towns like Tamarindo. Those in the know head farther down the Nicoya Peninsula, to Nosara and beyond.
I had heard about Nosara for years, thanks to fitness instruc
Q: Last year, I bought roundtrip tickets through MyFlightSearch for my husband and me on Sun Country from Minneapolis to Newark. MyFlightSearch charged us $477 for tors raving about its yoga retreats and surf camps, to name two of its key pursuits. Its community of American hippie expats dates at least to the 1970s. It’s still not uncommon to hear a story about an American family packing up and moving there permanently – and that was before the pandemic.
Modern lodging ranges from four-star resorts to low-key beach hotels and hostels. I chose Lagarta Lodge when I learned that it boasts its own wildlife reserve and a commitment to sustainable tourism. I’d been to ecolodges, but having your own reserve sounded next-level. All of the guest rooms have that same soaring balcony view, but every spot feels secluded. The whole place blends clandestinely into the cliffside – Frank Lloyd Wright in the tropics.
A sign in our room advised locking our sliding patio doors, or the coatis (a sort of long-nosed raccoon) would cleverly open them and steal the sugar for the espresso maker. I shooed one trying to do just that while waking up one morning. But most nights, we were content to turn off the AC, throw open the glass doors and fall asleep listening to the wind and crashing surf, followed at dawn by the guttural growls of howler monkeys.
A Lagarta guest could spend most or all of their time in the resort bubble, lounging by the infinity pool, and that plan sounds perfectly enchanting – especially with one of the best restaurants in town, Chirriboca, on the broad open-air deck. Every morning we would start with the national breakfast dish of gallo pinto (black beans and rice) with eggs, plantains and a slab of fried cheese – or switch it up with the spicier “Huevos a caballo” ranchero version, all while gazing down at early-bird surfers on Nosara Beach.
At nightfall, Chirriboca brings in people from all over Nosara for relatively dressy, contemporary Latin dining; I’m still remembering the chef’s artsy, substantive fusion of a trout filet and a whole avocado, served over an elote corn risotto, or the Caribbean snapper coated in a tangy ginger-coconut sauce – all enjoyed while a brilliant planet Venus descended nightly upon that same beach.
What tourists call Nosara is a tangle of neighborhoods hidden behind two main beaches: long Playa Guiones and cozy Playa Pelada. The secret to Nosara’s beauty is that it sits along the Ostional National Wildlife Refuge, a prime nesting ground for sea turtles where development is restricted within 200 meters of high tide. Whereas in towns like Tamarindo the hotels and restaurants abut the beach, in Nosara all new development is nestled in the woods, and the broad beaches are the better for it.
Come early evening, intimate Playa Pelada becomes a social hub. Seawater erupts through a tidal blowhole formed in volcanic rock. Horseback riders ply the sands, and would-be influencers stage golden-hour photo shoots. Diners fill up the sandy courtyard of the Mediterranean-inspired La Luna – one of the only “grandfathered” structures on the beach – and Costa Ricans gather on blankets for the nightly sunset-watching ritual. At dusk, everyone disappears back into the jungle.
While I had been blissed out for four days in Nosara, I vaguely sensed that people were starting to freak out about the coronavirus.
I turned off my phone and put it away. The world’s problems felt thousands of miles away, and I wasn’t ready to wake up to it yet.