Land for sale in Bagaces, Guanacaste

What Bagaces actually is

Bagaces is a canton of about 20,000 people in the middle of Guanacaste, strung along Route 1, the Interamericana. It is not a resort town and it does not pretend to be. There is a hospital in Liberia, a clinic and schools in town, hardware stores, a Sunday farmers market, and the kind of quiet that people who move here say they came for.

What makes it interesting to a buyer from abroad is position. You are half an hour from an international airport with direct flights to Houston, Miami, Atlanta, Dallas, Newark and Toronto. You are an hour from Playa Hermosa and the Papagayo beaches. And you are paying for land in the dry interior, where the same parcel costs a fraction of what a comparable one costs within sight of the water.

The climate, honestly

This is the dry Pacific northwest. From December through April it barely rains, the hills go gold, and it is hot in the afternoons. From May through November it rains most days, usually in the afternoon, and everything turns green. If you are picturing rainforest, that is the Caribbean side and the south; Guanacaste is savanna and dry forest.

Anybody planning to build here thinks about water and shade first, and about breeze and orientation second. The guide on water availability is worth reading before you commit to any parcel in this canton.

What is nearby

Llanos de Cortés waterfall is a few minutes off the highway just north of town and is one of the better known swimming holes in the province. Palo Verde National Park, on the Tempisque river, is south of the canton and is the best bird watching in this part of the country. Rincón de la Vieja and the Miravalles hot springs are both within an hour.