Tortuga Island lies fifteen nautical miles southwest of Puntarenas, a crescent of bleached coral sand and dry tropical forest anchored in the Gulf of Nicoya. The island—officially Isla Tolinga on older charts—was declared a biological reserve in 1999, protecting its shallow reefs and nesting colonies of brown pelicans and frigatebirds. No permanent structures mark its shores. The few tour operators licensed to land here depart from Puntarenas and intermediate coastal towns, carrying day visitors who arrive mid-morning and leave before dusk. The Tortuga Island day trip from Jaco emerged in the late 1990s as Jacó's hotel strip expanded northward along Playa Herradura. Operators recognized that backpackers and package tourists staying in Jacó—thirty kilometers south of Puntarenas by road—would pay for a Gulf crossing if the logistics were seamless. Today's itineraries bundle coach transfer, catamaran passage, beach time, and lunch into a single departure window, typically leaving Jacó at seven in the morning and returning by late afternoon. The crossing itself takes ninety minutes to two hours depending on swell and wind, threading between Isla San Lucas and the Nicoya Peninsula's mangrove deltas. The island's appeal rests on transparency. Visibility in the shallows averages twelve to eighteen meters during dry season, when silt from the Tempisque and Tárcoles rivers settles offshore. Snorkelers encounter parrotfish, sergeant majors, and occasional spotted eagle rays over coral heads and volcanic boulders. The sand slopes gently for thirty meters before dropping into deeper channels patrolled by jacks and barracuda. On shore, the forest canopy is sparse—gumbo-limbo, strangler fig, and wild cashew—adapted to the prolonged dry months that define the Nicoya microclimate. Trails are minimal; most visitors anchor themselves under palm-thatch palapas or wade in the shallows. Tour operators serve a buffet lunch on the beach—grilled chicken, rice, plantains, watermelon—prepared on portable grills hauled from the catamaran. By mid-afternoon the boats re-board passengers for the return crossing, often motoring north along the coast to catch the late-day light on Herradura Bay. The island itself remains uninhabited, its only infrastructure a few mooring buoys and a composting toilet maintained by the reserve authority. Access remains free; the cost of the Tortuga Island day trip from Jaco reflects transport, meals, and guide services rather than admission. The model has held for two decades, balancing volume tourism with the ecological constraints of a protected, roadless islet.