All rooms have an ocean view with a private terrace.  Upon your arrival, Ocotal's bilingual staff, eager to show you the Costa Rican hospitality, greets you with a complimentary tropical fruit cocktail! 

With fresh flowers to welcome you to your room and evening bed turn down service with chocolates, Ocotal is a step above the rest.  All rooms have air conditioning, cable TV, coffee makers, hair dryers, and direct access international telephone service.  You can enjoy the year round summer weather at one of three swimming pools or Ocotal Beach and relax every evening with dip in the whirlpool.

Ocotal Beach Resort offers the best scuba diving safaris in Costa Rica.  It founded the first PADI Gold Palm Resort in the country with 13 years in operation.  Safety oriented and bilingual, all divemasters are Certified Divemasters and all instructors are PADI instructors.  Ocotal offers daily dive trips to Catalina's and Bat Islands on one of it's four 32 foot diesel powered dive boats. 

Visibility ranges from 20 feet to 100 feet, depending on the plankton and nutrients in the area at the time.  Water temperatures range from 75 to 80 degrees F and depths range from 40 feet to more than 100 feet with an average of 45 feet of spectacular underwater exploration of reefs, caves, and rocks. 

There are over 40 dive sites in the Gulf of Papagayo in the Ocotal area of Costa Rica.  Some of the more popular sites are Aquarium, Surprise, Virador, Monkey Head, Punta Gorda, Baja Tiburones and Los Meros and Escorpiones for shallow dives.  All sites showcase an abundant array of marine life such as spotted eagle rays, white-tip sharks, mobule and cow nosed rays, frogfish and sea horses alongside a backdrop of volcanic rock formations. 

At other sites in the area divers experience once in a lifetime adventures with green and Ridley turtles and white-tip reef sharks.  Most sights showcase large manta rays and black marlins weighing upwards of several hundred pounds and the occasional pod of pilot whales.  At specific sites like Las Corridas and Surpresa photographers surface having snapped pictures of tiny sea horses swimming amongst 200 to 300 jewfish and 20 to 80 pound amberjacks. 

Some key dive sites are: 

Islas Murcielagos or Bat Island:

Bat Island is north of the archipelago known as the Catalina Islands and due to its exposed location guarantees an abundant variety of sea life that is rarely found in one location anywhere else in the world.  The largest attraction at Bat Island are the bull and whale sharks, schools of cow-nosed rays and other varieties of large fish swimming in and out of the beautiful rock formations.  The Bat Islands are recommended for advanced level divers only because of the frequent strong currents.

Catalina Islands:

The Catalina Islands is an archipelago made up of 20 rocks just south of Bat Island.  Both the Catalina Islands and Bat Island have only recently become popular among divers- somehow the word got out!  The Catalina Islands are a short distance from the mainland and are popular all year long, but the islands are very popular from December to May where divers encounter 50 manta rays with wingspans from 14 to 20 feet in one single dive.  It is recommended to descend to 60 feet where the visibility improves and the larger species hang out.