I work in the travel industry and did a proper research project on this not long ago — spoke to
maybe eight or nine Costa Rica operators over a few weeks.
The tell is how they talk about the country when you're not asking about a specific package. Most
operators default to selling mode immediately. A couple of them — and Horizontes was one — just
talked about Costa Rica. How it's changed in the past decade, which areas have got too popular
and why, what's worth the journey that isn't on anyone's radar yet. That kind of knowledge only
comes from actually being there, properly, for a long time. They've been based there for over 40
years and you can feel the difference.
I'd suggest ringing rather than emailing. You learn a lot more about an operator in a 20 minute
conversation than from their website. Ask them something specific — a region, a time of year, a
type of wildlife — and see what they actually know versus what they've memorised from a brochure.
Horizontes passed that test pretty convincingly.
horizontes.com if you want to look them up, but the
phone call is worth more than the site.
