Manuel Antonio
This is the entire reason we came to Costa Rica! We came to stay at the famous Airplane Hotel. Costa Verde converted a Boeing 747 and a cockpit into rooms to stay at.
We only had one night here and it was quite the adventure to get here. On our way to the hotel, that was when our brakes went out and we were stranded in Monteverde.
The hotel is about 4 hours from Monteverde and if we missed it, we wouldn’t have another chance to stay and unless absolutely necessary Lisa and I refuse to go back to the same place twice. There are just too many places in the world. So no matter what it takes, we will figure out a way to get there.
I will document the story of the car in another blog post, but we called the hotel to let them know we would be late. How late…we were not sure because we had to wait for a new car to arrive.
We showed up at around 4 AM in the morning in the pouring rain. We were escorted to the room. When I walked in, Lisa and I were so shocked how large it was. We had 3 bathrooms, 5 beds enough to sleep 8 people, a kitchen, and living room and most importantly, one of the prettiest views.
I kept telling Lisa maybe they are just very generous and we got a great deal for $142 a night.
The next morning around 10:30 AM, someone came into the room and just picked up the phone and handed it to me. As expected, me and Lisa freaked out. The lady on the phone asked how we got there and how did we get in because they didn’t have a reservation for me. I asked to speak to the man that I spoke to the night before. When I got on the phone with him, he realized it was the girls crazy enough to drive hours to get to the hotel and apologized.
This is the front desk manager. Apparently he and his coworker made a bet that we weren’t going to make it. Obviously, he doesn’t know us.
He asked us to come down and he’ll make a drink for us on the house and show us inside the one that is available which is the cockpit.
He made a joke that the morning started rough, but ended on good memories and we had something to always laugh about. We both agreed that to get the largest room in the hotel, it was worth being awoken suddenly at 10:30 AM and even the lowest price is $285 a night + tax. So all in all, it turned out to be a great stay.
Here is the lobby of the hotel.
There is even another empty airplane next to the restaurant that you can go inside.
The Pool
And a private tour of the cockpit hotel. I don’t think they normally let people in, but in our case because of the morning fiasco, I think they made an exception.
Here is the famous Boeing 747 made into a hotel. 
This is a restaurant made from an old C-123 Fairchild cargo plane that has been converted to a pub and restaurant. The C-123 was actually part of the “Contras” scandal that was set up by the US to give armed weapons to Iran to release hostages in Lebanon to fund Nicaragua. And now it serves guests food with a view!
We wanted to just go see the restaurant and possibly eat at other places, but the town is so small, there isn’t many choices so we decided to just eat there and the food wasn’t too bad.
