Puntarenas

Puntarenas Ciudad de Puntarenas
Nickname(s): La perla del Pacífico, El Puerto
Puntarenas Location in the province of Puntarenas
Coordinates: 9°58′N 84°50′W / 9.967°N 84.833°W / 9.967; -84.833
Country	Costa Rica
Province	Puntarenas
Canton	Puntarenas
Government
- Mayor	Agnes Gomez Franceschi
Area
- Total	10 km2 (3.9 sq mi)
- Land	30 km2 (11.6 sq mi)
- Water	64.7 km2 (25 sq mi)
Elevation	5 m (16 ft)
Population (2000)
- Total	102,504
Time zone	Central (UTC-6)
Website	http://www.munipuntarenas.go.cr/ footnotes =

Puntarenas, which means "Sandy Point" in Spanish, is the capital and largest city in the province Puntarenas, Costa Rica, at the Pacific coast. The eponymous and oddly shaped province has its largest section in the South, far from the capital.

Its port, Caldera, is one of the main ports in the country. Some 100,000 live in the city and close towns. With beaches on the Pacific Ocean, it also attracts many tourists, especially surfers. It is also a possible stopover point for the touristy Monteverde, further inland.

History

First known as Villa Bruselas in colonial times, Puntarenas was discovered by Hernán Ponce de León in 1519. Despite the use of the Gulf of Nicoya as an entryway to Costa Rica's inland territory, the port of Puntarenas was not developed until 1840 when coffee production in the highlands reached exportable volumes. In 1845 the Congress of the Republic declared Puntarenas a duty free port (with the exception of Cognac and hard liquor). Originally, the coffee was brought to port in oxcarts via a trail through the mountains. In 1879, a stretch of railroad track was completed which connected Puntarenas with the town of Esparza (one of the country's earliest Spanish settlements, founded in 1554, a decade before the Central Valley began to be colonized) where the oxcart trail came out of the mountains. Eventually, the railroad was built all the way through to San José and service was inaugurated in 1910.

With the railroad connection to the Central Valley, the Pacific port's activities continued to be a major part of the region's economy throughout the 20th century. However, due to the aging and deterioration of the port facilities and the need to accommodate the much larger vessels of modern shipping fleets, a new port was constructed in the 1980s to the south of Puntarenas. The site chosen was Caldera, where ships had anchored during colonial times.

External links

• Sitio Oficial Comercial de Puntarenas - Costa Rica
• Puntarenas FC (Spanish) Puntarenas soccer team official site
• Carnavales Puntarenas (Spanish) Puntarenas carnaval official site
• Photos of Puntarenas (German) (English) (Spanish)
• Instituto Costarricense de Turismo (English) (Spanish) (Dutch) (French) Costa Rican Institute of Tourism
• Puntarenas City Search (English) Puntarenas population, elevation, road maps, satellite photographs and more.
• Tico Times Directory - Puntarenas (English) beaches, road maps, city maps, chamber of commerce and more.

Coordinates: 9°58′N 84°50′W / 9.967°N 84.833°W / 9.967; -84.833

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