The History of Manzanillo

Manzanillo sits at the southernmost tip of Costa Rica's Caribbean coast, in the Limón province, just kilometers from the border with Panama. It is reached by a single road that winds through banana plantations and small Afro-Caribbean communities before ending, definitively, at the sea. There are no roads beyond.

This geographic isolation has been, paradoxically, the village's greatest protector. While much of Costa Rica's Caribbean coast has seen rapid development and tourism pressure, Manzanillo has remained small, quiet, and stubbornly itself.

The people of Manzanillo are predominantly descended from Jamaican and other Caribbean islanders brought to Costa Rica in the late 19th century to build the Atlantic Railroad, the great project of entrepreneur Minor Keith, who would go on to found the United Fruit Company. These workers settled along the coast, establishing communities, planting crops, raising families.

“This is not a reconstructed heritage for tourists — it is living culture.”

They brought with them the music, the food, the faith, and the language of the Caribbean — English Creole mixed with Spanish, reggae rhythms, rice and beans cooked in coconut milk. Their descendants remain. You hear the Creole in the streets, taste it in the food, feel it in the rhythm of daily life. This is not a reconstructed heritage for tourists — it is living culture.

Long before the railroad workers arrived, this corner of Costa Rica was home to the Bribri, one of the largest indigenous groups in Costa Rica. The Bribri have inhabited the Talamanca region — the mountain and coastal lands between Costa Rica and Panama — for thousands of years.

Their cosmology, language, and agricultural traditions, particularly their mastery of cacao cultivation, represent one of the richest indigenous cultures in Central America. The Bribri Talamanca Territory remains one of the most significant indigenous territories in Costa Rica, and many Bribri communities still practice traditional farming, ceremony, and governance.

In 1985, the Gandoca-Manzanillo National Wildlife Refuge was established, protecting 9,449 hectares of terrestrial and marine ecosystems. Within its boundaries are some of the most biodiverse environments in Central America: coral reef systems that rival those of the Caribbean's best dive sites, seagrass beds that serve as feeding grounds for endangered green sea turtles, mangrove estuaries, tropical rainforest, and the Laguna Gandoca.

The Laguna Gandoca is one of the only natural spawning sites for the tarpon in all of Costa Rica. The refuge also protects critical nesting habitat for four species of sea turtles, including the enormous leatherback, which comes ashore at Playa Gandoca between March and July.

The establishment of the refuge was a turning point — it set a legal boundary around the village, limiting development and ensuring that Manzanillo would remain embedded in wilderness.

Cacao has been cultivated in this region for centuries — first by the Bribri, for whom it holds spiritual as well as culinary significance, and later by the Afro-Caribbean farming communities who integrated it into their agricultural economy. The dark, richly flavored cacao of the Talamanca region is renowned among chocolatiers.

Today, cacao farm tours offer visitors a chance to trace the journey from pod to chocolate, while supporting the farming families who have tended these trees for generations.

“The road still ends here. The reef is still intact. The turtles still come.”

Manzanillo today is a village of perhaps a few hundred permanent residents. There is a handful of small restaurants, a few guesthouses, a soccer field, a small church. The road still ends here. The reef is still intact. The turtles still come.

It is, by any measure, one of the last truly authentic corners of Costa Rica — and it is the privilege and responsibility of everyone who visits to help keep it that way.