Scientific Tourism
Experience our work through a short visit while traveling.
You are a traveller wanting to experience the Costa Rican nature off the beaten track? You are a group of students seeking for practical insights into fieldwork on marine and tropical studies? Then we have the right offer for you! Support us and our work, learn scientific information about marine animals and take a wonderful experience with you!
Scientific tourism for visitors of Punta Descartes
Scientific tourism is a great way to discover our beautiful nature and its habitants on close range. For one or multiple days, you can witness or participate in our work and collect hands-on experience with scientific guidance. Have a wonderful time while supporting ETC and the community of El Jobo!
At ETC, we mainly monitor sea turtles and rays. During the day, you can learn about how we catch the animals with special nets, how we weight, measure and identify the individuals and why they are so important for the ecosystem. You can either participate in snorkelling and searching for the animals or just lean back on the boat and observe the process. At night, you can join our beach patrollers and look out for nesting turtles. See how they are identified and measured and how the eggs are re-located to safe places. If you are lucky, you might witness a hatchery! Apart from sea turtles and rays, we also offer whale watching tours.
There is so much to discover!
Scientific tourism for student groups
Scientific tourism is a great way to get practical insights into our fieldwork on marine and tropical research. Your student group can participate in our work for one or multiple days and collect hands-on experience on our research activities. Get valuable impressions of a marine biologist's daily life in a small village while supporting ETC and the community of El Jobo!
At ETC, we mainly monitor sea turtles and rays. Depending on the season, we see olive ridleys (Lepidochelys olivacea), the endangered hawksbill turtle (Eretmochelys imbricata), the black turtle (Chelonia mydas) and phenotypic alterations of these species. Talking about rays, we have observed over 24 different species with the main one being from the Urotrygonidae family, which are commonly known as round stingrays. For more information on the species, read our research projects.
On a scientific tourism activity, you can help us catch these turtles and rays with special nets, weight them, measure them and identify the individuals with titanium ID tags. At night, you can also join our beach patrollers, look out for nesting turtles and help re-locating nests to safer places. Meanwhile, you can ask us anything that interests you and we will provide you with more information on the species. If you stay for multiple days, you can even develop your own little project with BSRC guidance!
Interested?
You can find more information about the specific trips and their prices on the website of our booking agent and partner Bahia Salinas Research Center!