PHOTOS BY ROBERT W. BONE

Top, a swing bridge in the Rain Maker Nature Refuge; watching the ocean from a villa at Villa Caletas.

Hiking the rain forest,
or sunning by the coast --
there's a world of ecological
opportunity in Costa Rica.

By ROBERT W. BONE

 "The best thing about San Jose is that it is close to Costa Rica," he said.

 We were sitting in the garden of the Grano de oro, the small but decorative hotel named for the "Grain of Gold," -- the poetic term for the coffee bean that for so long dominated Costa Rica's economy.

 My fellow guest, who didn't want to give his name, was an American expatriate, one of many who have settled here in Latin America's only true democracy.

 He doesn't think much of San Jose, Costa Rica's capital city, however, and he was eager to to return to his home in oneof the villages on the Pacific Coast.

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