We did a 2-hour stop here on our way to the airport in San Jose. I wouldn't have wanted this to be our only experience of the rainforest, as seeing toucans, parrots, poison frogs, sloths, and monkeys in the wild is much cooler. But we all really enjoyed the chance to see and photograph birds and butterflies close up. The waterfalls are pretty spectacular too. Yes, this is a Disney experience, but it's well done the way much of Disney World is. (Even the faucets in the bathroom were cool--the water runs down a "waterfall" into your hands.)

I was glad we arrived early in the morning, as we had the place largely to ourselves.

Two hours, by the way, is really about the shortest time you could spend here. We could easily have spent another hour or two.

Wonderful place to walk around and enjoy the beauty.

If you are heading to La Paz Waterfall Gardens to see Costa Rica in a NATURAL state, you will be disappointed. If you want to see some animals up close and enjoy waterfalls, you will like it. . We spent 3 nights at the hotel in February 2008 for our honeymoon.

The gardens consist of animals in enclosed spaces and in cages amid tropical gardens that were meticulously planted along fabricated concrete rocks. The benefit is that you can see the animals up close, just like at a zoo or nature center. The drawback is that it is more of an Disney/Epcot experience then a Costa Rican one.

The Aviary is packed with about 200 birds and is well done. Many of the birds were species we saw throughout our travels. The toucans are in a cage inside the aviary and also in an area that you can walk into and take pictures as they each sit on a perch for tourists photo ops. I was surprised to learn that the toucans were separated because they would kill the other birds.... and they are fed live mice. So much for Fruit Loops! They have a few macaws and other parrots in the aviary as well, the "Hola!" you will hear from one of the parrots is quite cute. It was very cool to watch the macaws fly from one end of the aviary to the other - certainly they have a better life then in a cage in someone's house.

The monkeys are in a large barred cage. This broke my heart. For three weeks we watched monkeys play throughout Costa Rica in every place we visited....free and having fun. The monkeys here are VERY limited in activity compared to what you will see on your travels throughout Costa Rica. One Howler Monkey, Paco, was so affectionate. When I would visit his cage he would jump down and stick his tail through the chicken wire and hold my hand with it. My heart would just melt! So the plus is you can see the monkeys up close... but you can see them up close and free throughout Costa Rica.

There are a zillion hummingbirds. There are hummingbird feeders everywhere, so you will be sure to see plenty. They buzz past your head and seem to have no fear of humans at all. I had fun feeding them out of my hand with a tube filled with sugar water. The closest II have been to a hummingbird in my whole life, for sure.

The wild cats are also in small enclosures. They certainly cannot run or romp as if in the wild in these small enclosures with glass panels. One cat did nothing but moan and growl as we watched him, and paced back and forth like the lions did in small cages in old zoos. The plus is that you can see them, we did not encounter wild cats during our trip unless you count the feral cats on the beach. (I believe only guests of the hotel can visit them, not if you are just visiting for a day as the cats are limited viewing.)

The frog room was like walking through a giant terrarium. It was humid and since the frogs are active at night they were easy to spot on the leaves of the plants. Each frog was on a leaf with a tag so visitors could quickly find them. I thought it was interesting that a leaf could be tagged and that the frog would remain there all day.

The snakes were in aquariums in a room under the lunch restaurant. Many venomous snakes were present. Funny side note: the only snake we encounter (thankfully) in Costa Rica was at La Paz Water Gardens! It slithered past us on the road in front of the aviary on our way to the Trout Bar. So if you are in to snakes you will like this attraction, it is informative and the staff here, as in all of the Gardens, were awesome.

Butterflies are everywhere inside their enclosure and the employees cut the cocoons from the leaves daily and pin them on strips of wood so they can be viewed. If you are lucky you will see one emerge (we were either unlucky or impatient). Walking through this tent was pretty cool since there were so many butterflies. The early morning is when you will see them flutter around the most.... towards the afternoon they are not flying as much and it is sort of ho-hum.

The hike to the waterfall consists of climbing up and down hundreds and hundreds of metal and concrete stairs with hardly a straight line in sight. I am in very good shape and was winded and breathing hard towards the middle, so pace yourself!!! The views are spectacular of the waterfalls and the stairs will even have side detours that will take you down to decks for better viewing. Once you climb all the way down to the last viewing point you have to climb back up the stairs. Throughout our travels we saw one awe inspiring waterfall after another, seeing 5 more did not bore us. Most of the waterfalls we did see around Costa Rica were more interactive; we swam, jumped off of, touched, etc. You can't do that here, plus it is so cold here you probably wouldn't want to.

There are some nature trails as well that were pretty.

All these above items can easily be done in one day or even a half day... depending on how good of shape you are in.

That takes us to the gift shop. It is a huge temperature drop once you get to Peace Lodge/La Paz. I was freezing at check-in. The sweatshirt I bought was 62 dollars! It was just a normal run of the mill hooded black sweatshirt...but what could I do. (Make sure you pack a light sweater if you are heading here) I noticed the wood placemats we purchased in La Fortuna for 16 dollars a piece - they were 40 dollars a piece here. The pottery I purchased in Montezuma for 14 dollars was 45 dollars here. The mask I purchased in La Fortuna for 20 dollars was 49 dollars here. The gold plated jewelry were ridiculously priced (and gold plated!) We spent about 400 (or more) in the gift shop during our stay; I would chalk that up to boredom though. The gift shop did not have anything unusual, you will find these same items all over Costa Rica and much cheaper.

I would not recommend staying here, but if you do, three days is WAY too long. The accommodations and amenities (the ones that work) are nice features, but really there is not enough to do to warrant a long stay (probably why they have a Maximum 3 night stay.)There is only so much you can do here, and you are pretty isolated from anything else, which means you are strapped in to eating at their overrated and overpriced restaurants for lunch, dinner AND breakfast! Plan at least an extra 150-175 dollars a day for food here for two people (We averaged about 250 a day because of drinks (they were expensive drinks - we never got drunk) and wine with dinner, hey...we were bored! AND it WAS our honeymoon! LOL)

I think people pick this place to visit as a first stop or last stop thinking it is close to San Jose and the airport. It is really not that close and is a bit out of the way. We chose the location because we wanted to see a rainforest and did not want to drive to Monteverde. We also figured it was closer to SJO so a good ending point. In hindsight, the drive to Monteverde would have been worth the extra time. But it did allow us to see a rainforest and some animals up close.

I am not sure how to word this last part so bare with me.... Older people will more then likely have trouble with the stairs...there are a lot of them, and it is quite a workout. People with disabilities would also have a rough time here. Young children would be able to see a lot of animals in cages, but I don't think this place is really geared toward children. Our 6 year old would have been bored and I was thankful that we chose La Paz for our honeymoon part of the trip, as he went back with grandmom after 10 days in Costa Rica. Older children would probably like it, and I am sure would love to show their parents how much faster they could climb the stairs LOL!

I guess my point is... if you came to Costa Rica for a real Costa Rican adventure, you wont find it here. If you came to see things like birds and butterflies, take photos of animals up close, spend lots of money, and like theme parks; then this place is right up your alley. Also, if you only have a few days in Costa Rica and are based in San Jose - then this would be good to do. Nothing wrong with either of the choices..... it just was not what we were expecting... and not our cup of tea.

Let me start by saying this: take this place for what it is. I am an avid hiker and hate to see wildlife caged or man-made structures around natural landscapes. That is what you will get here. That being said, I enjoyed this part of my trip as much as any other in Costa Rica. On our way from San Jose to Volcan Arenal, we had our taxi driver take a detour and let us spend 2.5-3 hours at La Paz. The bird observatory was great. I was close up with Toucans and many other small birds, of which I got great pictures. The monkeys were in decent size cages (and this is the main part that bothered me about the entire place...I hate to see animals like this caged). The hummingbirds were awesome. You can feel them zip by your head and they sound like little WWII military planes flying all around you. It's really cool to be that close to so many of them. The frog observatory let me get some great shots of the Poison arrow dart frog, which the Tico's call the blue-jean frog due to the blue back legs.

Now, on to the waterfalls. In Georgia, where I live, I drive to the mountains and hike for 3 hours to see 1 waterall that is 40 ft. tall. At La Paz, I hiked just over 1 mile and saw 5 waterfalls, 4 of which were over 100 ft. each. It was amazing to see the power of the falls, and to be able to get so close to them. I will try to post my video later, but we walked down a hanging bridge right next to one of the waterfalls and were almost underneath it just under the top. Great views, and well worth the money. I did hike while I was in Costa Rica around the Volcan Arenal area, but didn't see anything like this on my hikes. Given more time, I may find sites just as amazing on my own, but most people are not in the country with the time to hike more than a few days. This gives you a good view of the nature in the country, while retaining somewhat of a natural setting. I would definitely recommend this place to anyone in the area.