Jennine Hamilton Went to Costa Rica Expecting Luxury — The Jungle Had Other Plans

Jennine Hamilton had a clear picture of what great travel looked like. All-inclusive resorts. Beachfront comfort. The kind of trip where the biggest decision is whether to order a second drink by the pool. She had built a career helping clients find exactly that kind of escape, and she was good at it. Then she won a G Adventures trip to Costa Rica, packed her bags with her newly graduated daughter in tow, and watched that picture quietly dissolve in the best possible way.

The trip began as a celebration. Hamilton's daughter had just completed her degree at the University of British Columbia, and a mother-daughter adventure felt like the right way to mark the moment. What neither of them anticipated was that Costa Rica would not simply be the backdrop for a milestone. It would become the experience that rewired how Hamilton thinks about travel entirely.

From San José to the Cloud Forest

The G Adventures itinerary carried them north from San José toward Monteverde and then east to La Fortuna before looping back to the capital. From the very first day, Hamilton noticed something she hadn't expected: a sense of belonging. The G Adventures model, built around local guides and community connection, pulled her out of the observer's seat and placed her squarely inside the rhythm of Costa Rican life. She visited coffee plantations run by local families. She ate handmade food at roadside restaurants where the cuisine was native to the region and made with the kind of pride that no resort buffet can replicate.

Then came the zip line.

Suspended above the cloud forest canopy, moving through mist and green, Hamilton found something she hadn't gone looking for: courage. She describes being caught in torrential rain downpours during mountain treks but "not caring for one second because of the gorgeous waterfall at the end." That sentence, casual as it sounds, is something close to a philosophy. The mud underfoot, the rain soaking through, the howler monkeys bellowing from somewhere unseen in the canopy above. None of it was comfortable in the conventional sense. All of it was unforgettable.

The Eco-Lodge That Changed Everything

When the G Adventures portion of the trip ended, Hamilton did something that speaks volumes about the experience: she booked more. She and her daughter added an independent G Adventures extension to Tortuguero, a remote Caribbean coastal region accessible only by boat or small plane, where the roads run out and the jungle takes over.

It was here that Hamilton's understanding of luxury shifted permanently. The accommodation was an eco-lodge with walls made of nothing but screens. No solid barrier between the room and the rainforest. At night, the jungle filled the space completely: rain on leaves, frogs calling, insects moving through darkness just beyond the mesh. Hamilton describes it plainly and with quiet certainty: "The most pleasant stay during our experience was actually an eco-lodge with walls that were just screens, listening to the jungle and the rain all night long."

She had spent years recommending five-star resorts. She had assumed that was where comfort lived. Tortuguero rearranged that assumption gently and completely.

The Sea Turtles

One of Hamilton's long-held travel dreams was to witness sea turtles nesting. Tortuguero is one of the most significant sea turtle nesting sites in the Western Hemisphere, and the evening excursion to the beach delivered something she still hasn't fully finished processing. Hamilton says that "to actually see the sea turtle nesting was phenomenal and something I never in my life expected to see." The words are measured. The admiration behind them is not. This is not the adrenaline of a checked bucket-list item. It is the quieter, more lasting feeling of having witnessed something ancient and unhurried and real.

She photographed insects in the mud during nocturnal rainforest walks. She watched spider monkeys leap between trees with an ease that made the canopy look like a highway. She rafted down a river through jungle that pressed in from both banks. And somewhere along the way, without quite planning to, she fell in love with a landscape she had never considered pursuing.

"I fell in love with the rainforest," Hamilton says. "Something I may have never wanted to be as engaged with in the past." The confession is offered quietly, as though she is still turning it over, still a little surprised by it herself. That quality, the absence of performance, is precisely what makes it land.

The People Around the Table

The G Adventures group that travelled alongside Hamilton and her daughter was drawn from across the globe. Travellers from Australia, Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom. Different ages, different backgrounds, different reasons for being there. They shared meals, guides, river currents, and rain. They became, briefly, a community of their own. Hamilton reflects on this with a warmth that rises above every other moment in the trip. "It was an amazing experience to share with people." Simple words, and yet the feeling behind them is the emotional high point of everything she describes. Not the zip line. Not the sea turtles. The people.

After Tortuguero, the trip closed with several days at an all-inclusive resort on Costa Rica's Pacific coast. Hamilton leaned into it fully and without apology. The contrast, she says, is not a contradiction. It is the point. Costa Rica holds both experiences, and the ability to move between them in a single itinerary is one of the destination's greatest underappreciated strengths.

What She Knows Now That She Didn't Before

Hamilton is direct about what she would have missed had she not taken this trip. Costa Rica, in her previous mental map, was a luxury resort destination at best, a physically demanding adventure destination at worst. Neither version matched the reality she found. "What I get to share with clients," she explains, "is the part of being able to know what adventure travel also looks like, but on a level that can be achieved by many." The trails through Monteverde are not reserved for athletes. The zip lines are accessible. The eco-lodges are welcoming. The river rafting is guided. What's required is not fitness. It is willingness.

For clients who have made multiple trips to Mexico's all-inclusive resorts and are ready for something that offers a little more texture, Hamilton now has a specific and personal recommendation. She has done Costa Rica from both directions: boots in the mud and feet in the sand. She can design an itinerary that holds both, and she understands where the balance point lives.

Her insider tip is the one most clients would never encounter on their own: Tortuguero. It does not appear on the glossy resort comparison sites. It has no nightlife to speak of. Getting there requires intention. "The hidden gem truly is the Tortuguero area," Hamilton says. "It really isn't full of luxurious resorts and lots of city life. It was a quiet, very off-the-beaten-path adventure." The reward for that intention is something harder to find than luxury. It is stillness. It is proximity to the wild. It is screen walls and rain.

What Comes Next

Hamilton is already moving. A Virgin Voyages cruise through the Caribbean is on the immediate horizon, an adults-only sailing through islands she has not yet seen, adding another layer of firsthand knowledge to what she can offer clients in that market. Beyond that, Australia calls her back, a destination she has loved before and wants to share with family, friends, and clients. Spain, Greece, the Amalfi Coast, and the broader sweep of Europe sit further out on the wish list, patient and waiting.

She is not a travel advisor who reads brochures and passes on descriptions. She is one who zips through cloud forests in the rain, sleeps to the sound of the jungle, and stands on a dark beach watching a sea turtle choose land over sea. Every trip feeds the next recommendation. Every experience becomes a client's better holiday. "I love the idea of balancing holidays for my clients," she says, "so that they can get the best of all of those worlds." Costa Rica showed her what that balance looks like when it's done right. She has no intention of forgetting it.