Monteverde
Monteverde is the twelfth canton of the Puntarenas province of Costa Rica, located in the Cordillera de Tilarán. Roughly a four-hour drive from the Central Valley, Monteverde is one of the country's major ecotourism destinations, with the Reserva Biológica Bosque Nuboso Monteverde being the largest, in addition to several other natural attractions which draw considerable numbers of tourists and naturalists, both from Costa Rica and abroad.
National Geographic has called the Monteverde Cloud Forest "the jewel in the crown of cloud forest reserves". Newsweek ranked Monteverde the world's No. 14 "place to remember before it disappears"; by popular vote in Costa Rica, Monteverde was deemed one of the seven natural wonders of the nation, along with Isla del Coco, Volcán Arenal, Cerro Chirripó, Río Celeste, Tortuguero, and Volcán Poás.
Santa Elena is the head town in the region, serving as the area's principal tourist and visitors' hub. Together with the nearby neighborhood of Cerro Plano, and the community of Monteverde proper, visitors have diverse options for accommodations, dining, guided tours, and more when visiting the area's numerous reserves and natural attractions.
Toponymy
Monteverde translates directly to "green mountain", in English, a tribute to the region's wealth of natural beauty. For comparison, the word's French equivalent would be vermont, or montanha verde in Portuguese. Officially, the name is Monte Verde — written as two words.Climate
Monteverde rests at roughly at above sea level, located in a lush, misty and wet, yet breezy and cool, spot in the mountains. The region's mean annual temperature is . Annual precipitation averages around, and ambient humidity oscillates between 74% and 97%.History
Various pre-Columbian artifacts testify to the existence of early populations of Clovis Native Americans, who once farmed in villages in the area and hunted the forests, ca. 3000 BC. From around 3300 BC to 2000 BC, nearby tribes of the Arenal area experienced a population decline, but re-established villages in the region between 2000 and 500 BC. Agriculture intensified in the centuries between 500 BC and 300 CE, with simple chiefdom societies replacing the formerly smaller, tribal settlements; some level of deforestation accompanied this rise in population, farming and horticulture. Early stone foundations dating to this period can also be found. Jade, and creating valuable objects with the stone, was a prized material and defining characteristic of these villages. From 300 to 800 CE, complex chiefdoms supplanted simpler chiefdoms as more intricate villages appeared; along with early modern examples of cemeteries, businesses and public squares, goldsmiths were seen as extremely valuable. intertribal trade and conflict. Around 1300, a general decline in population occurred, possibly due to the Arenal Volcano's increased activity.After the Spanish made landfall in 1502, Costa Rica endured two generations of warfare. Total indigenous populations in what is now Costa Rica fell drastically, from an estimated 400,000 pre-European contact to 80,000 within less than 50 years of contact. Countless innocent people lost their lives for a multitude of reasons, from deplorable living conditions brought about by enslavement to outright sadistic punishments, and even murder, of anyone who challenged the conquistadores. Many thousands more quickly succumbed to the vast array of Old World pathogens and infectious diseases that their systems had no immunity against, including diseases such as measles, influenza, chickenpox, bubonic plague, typhus, scarlet fever, pneumonia, syphilis and malaria. However, in a somewhat cruel "twist of fate", unlike neighboring Nicaragua and Panama, Costa Rica did not yield considerable amounts of indigenous labor or mineral resources, and thus the region experienced colonization at a much slower rate than many other Spanish colonies.
Early 20th century
During the first three decades of the 20th century, from roughly 1900–1930, Creole populations arrived in small numbers to the area that is now Monteverde; many men worked within the Guacimal gold mines; many more, still, with their wives and families, provided these miners and their greater communities with needed goods and services. Some families also settled in the lower, warmer valley of nearby San Luís.1950s and forward
What is now considered Monteverde was founded by Quakers from the United States whose pacifist values led them to defy the American draft before the Korean War. The majority of these settlers hailed from Fairhope, Alabama, and included some non-Quaker pacifists and conscientious objectors. The spokesman of the group was Hubert Mendenhall, a dairyman who had visited Costa Rica in 1949 as part of a farmer's tour. These Quakers and pacifists chose the area for its cool climate, which would facilitate dairy farming, due to the country's non-violent, army-free constitution, and its friendly Costa Rican inhabitants. The Quakers stewarded and farmed a large tract of land, part of which they eventually set aside for conservation, today the Reserva Biológica Bosque Nuboso Monteverde. This has become a major tourist attraction.2005 bank raid
On March 8, 2005, a group of three armed Nicaraguan men raided and attempted to rob the Santa Elena branch of the state National Bank. A guard killed two of the armed men. However, one assailant held bank customers hostage for 28 hours. When authorities successfully attempted to retake the bank, a senior police officer and nine civilians died, and only one of the attackers survived. This event raised tensions between Nicaraguans and Costa Ricans nationwide and prompted higher security in many national banks.Canton creation
As a district of Puntarenas canton, Monteverde had its own local government, a Municipal District Council, due to the long distance from the offices of the municipality of Puntarenas canton. As a result, its inhabitants pushed for Monteverde to become its own canton.On 4 August 2021, the Legislative Assembly approved the file N.º 21618, which was then signed into law N.º 10019 by President Carlos Alvarado Quesada on 29 September 2021, which segregates the district from Puntarenas canton to become Monteverde canton. However, due to law N.º 6068 the change was deferred to after 3 April 2022 as it was not possible to change the Territorial Administrative Division fourteen months before elections, which was the case due to the second round of the 2022 Costa Rican general election held on that date.
The canton voted for its first municipal government and mayor in the 2024 Costa Rican municipal elections. PRSC won the local election.
Today
In recent years, the area's rapidly increasing numbers of tourists has brought a sizable influx of Costa Ricans from other towns and cities. Now, an estimated 250,000 tourists visit Monteverde a year. Improved goods and services, including partially paved roads, have arrived in recent years. In 2007, Costa Ricans voted Monteverde one of Costa Rica's Seven Wonders, along with Isla del Coco, Tortuguero, Arenal Volcano, Cerro Chirripó, Rio Celeste and Poás Volcano.Geography
The district of Monteverde has an area of km2 and an average elevation of metres.Administrative territorial division
The canton of Monteverde is subdivided into only one district, occupying the same area as the whole canton:- Monteverde, with postal code 61201
Demographics
According to the 2011 census, Monteverde had a population of inhabitants.The official and most-spoken language is Spanish, as in the majority of Costa Rica. However, English-Spanish bilingualism is widespread due to the presence of Quakers and three bilingual schools.
Education
The area has several public grade and middle schools. These include the Escuela Santa Elena, the Escuela Cerro Plano, and two schools in San Luis. The Colegio San Rafael and Colegio Técnico Professional are responsible for the majority of secondary education in the area.Private education is fairly robust in the Monteverde region. In 1951, the Quakers constructed a Quaker Meeting house, which served as classrooms and a general store. This became known as Monteverde Friends School and today offers bilingual education to Pre-K through 12th grade to roughly 120 students.
The Cloud Forest School, or Centro de Educación Creativa, founded in 1991, is a bilingual, secular, environmentally-focused private school that enrolls local and international students from Pre-K through 6th grade. The school sits on 106 acres of cloud forest. Over 80% of students are Costa Ricans, the majority of whom receive scholarship funding. The CFS is accredited by the government of Costa Rica.
The small private Adventist school, the Escuela Adventista, is also bilingual.
While there is only one institution of higher education in Monteverde, the Distance State University, the region is home to a considerable number of local and foreign undergraduate and graduate programs. These include the Monteverde Institute, EAP, CIEE, and the University of Georgia. Most residents of Monteverde pursue higher education in the Central Valley at institutions such as the University of Costa Rica.
Monteverde is also home to a substantial number of foreign-born scientists. A long-term resident of the town is the former lead guitarist of British new wave band Japan, Robert Dean, working as a professional ornithology writer.