St. Vincent-St. Mary High School
Sample Itinerary
Key Information
This is Costa Rica and our dedicated Team
A sample week built around Spanish immersion, cultural exchange, and community service in the Costa Rican highlands. Students live with local host families in Turrialba, practice Spanish in real daily life, work alongside a rural Indigenous community, and get out into the Pacuare River valley for the rafting and rainforest side. This is the shape of the week; dates, length, and every activity adjust to your group.
Day 1 — Arrival
Welcome to Costa Rica. The group lands at Juan Santamaría International Airport, where our team meets you at arrivals and drives you out to Turrialba, home for the week. Students meet their host families, settle in, and share a first dinner at home. A light orientation closes the day.
Day 2 — Spanish in Real Life
No classroom Spanish today. Students spend the morning around town with small missions that get them talking, ordering at the market, asking for directions, buying fruit, and the afternoon cooking a Costa Rican dish with their host families. The Spanish they bring from class starts working for real, which is the point of the whole week.
Day 3 — Cacao & Coffee
Out to a nearby village, where the community welcomes the group. We visit a local cacao farm, learning the full process from pod to chocolate, and a certified fair trade coffee farm, walking the plantation and seeing how a sustainable farm runs. Spanish all day, in real conversations.
Day 4 — Community Service
Today is about giving back. Students run a community market with clothing and goods they bring from home in good condition, everything priced at a dollar or fifty cents, and all the proceeds go directly to the local Cabécar Indigenous community. The community hosts the group for a shared celebration with music and food before we head back.
Day 5 — Rafting the Pacuare
An active day in the Pacuare River valley, one of the most beautiful river settings in Central America. Students take on a guided whitewater run with our own guides, surrounded by dense jungle, howler monkeys, and toucans. Everything is optional and the day works just as well at an easier pace, with calmer sections and time at our ecolodge above the river.
Day 6 — Cartago & Farewell
A cultural day to close the loop. We visit the Basilica of Our Lady of the Angels in Cartago, home of La Negrita and the most important pilgrimage site in Costa Rica, with time for Mass if the group wants it. Back in Turrialba, the host families and the group share a farewell dinner, the goodbye most teachers tell us is the hardest part of the week.
Day 7 — Departure
Last morning together. After breakfast and a final reflection circle, we say goodbye to the host families and drive to the airport in good time. Students leave with stronger Spanish, a real connection to the community, and a week they will be talking about for years.
