Life at the organic vegan farm and animal sanctuary Planet Costa Rica

If you are up for learning a lot about animal care, vegan nutrition & cooking, plants and permaculture, Planet Costa Rica is the perfect place. It is a vegan farm and animal sanctuary near the little village of Tucurrique, run by Allan & Patty, a couple from USA who have been living in Costa Rica for the last almost 10 years. These people are absolutely amazing and the world would be a better place if there were more Allan and Pattys out there. They take in injured and sick animals, give them the food, shelter, love and care that they need.

If you do want to come here though, be sure to apply in time as they get plenty of volunteer inquiries every day. We booked our stay several months in advance and have just finished our 3 week work stay at this lovely place.

Getting there was easy because of the detailed instructions we had received beforehand. We got a bus from San Jose to Cartago first and then another bus towards Tucurrique (the village that is known for the delicious Pejibaye, a vegetable or fruit or some kind of different coconut, that doesn't at all taste or look like coconut. I still don't know what it is exactly. All I know is that it is yummy with mustard and as spread on bread).

The view form this bus journey is stunning. It felt so great coming from the really hot weather on the coast into the mountains, where it was still humid but way more manageable.

The bus stops just outside of the farm, just as long as you let the bus driver know that this is where you want to get off, of course, otherwise you will end up somewhere else.

We were greeted by Allan (Patty was on a trip in Colombia during our time at the farm) and the barking dogs when we got there and it made us feel welcomed from the start. Allan showed us around the property and we got to meet all the animals; the seven dogs, the cat, three pigs, three hens, a rooster and one horse.

The daily routine

We thought that getting up early every day was going to be a struggle for us, but it really wasn't. We got into the daily routine really quickly, because in the evening we felt so exhausted in that good way when you feel like you've actually done something in the day.

So at 5:30 the alarm clock went off and that was about the same time the pigs, Gumby, Rosanna and Yolanda also woke up, feeling super hungry and weren't afraid to let us know by making loud noises that we heard clearly from the little casita where we slept.

Every morning when we opened the door to our casita we were greeted by Palomo the horse who was also feeling hungry, and usually some of the dogs would be outside waiting for us as well. So feeding the pigs and Palomo and cleaning out the pig homes was usually the first thing we did in the day.

Then it was ours and the dogs turn to get food. All of the dogs gets vegan food served every day, usually consisting of boiled rice, lentils or chickpeas mixed with blended veggies such as carrots, cucumber, capsicum, spinach, cilantro and chayote. Us humans got to have a wonderful mountain of fresh fruit with oats for breakfast, topped with coconut flakes, cinnamon and raisins. Bliss.

My favourite part of the working day was definitely feeding the dogs. They were all so excited about their food, but were so polite that they just sat quite around the table to wait to get their bowl served to them.

After breakfast it was time to take Kendall for a walk. We took her up the hill and down to the river close by, and usually some of the other dogs would come along as well. Actually, Lyca would come along every day to have a swim in the river with us.

After letting the chickens out for the day, and cleaning their house, we started with daily projects. During the 3 weeks we were there we did all kinds of different things and had a lot of firsts. Such as using a machete to cut down banana trees, making concrete and building fences.

One day we planted tomato plants and gave them shelter to grow. Allan and Patty have so many different plants around the farm that it is impossible to mention them all. But some of the things that we found in the garden was mango trees, papaya plants, ginger, spinach, banana trees, yuca and yeah, like I said. A lot more aswell.

Another day we re-built parts of the chicken house, which was probably the hardest job we done since neither Guy or I have ever really built anything before. But it was nice being trusted with doing these things and it turned out to be a really fun project!

One day we emptied and refilled the broken jacuzzi, so that the dog Buddy could have some healing water therapy, which always made him more active afterwards (Buddy is almost completely blind and has trouble walking so he spends most of the day sleeping)

The biggest project we did was to change Palomos fence from barbed wire to wooden sticks that we chopped down from stick-land up in the woods, using machetes. Lyca loved following us to help us up in Stick-land as well.

Even though the work was fun, the highlight of our day was of course when time came for lunch. Allans cooking is incredible to say the least. He used to be a chef at the vegetarian restaurant he and Patty ran in New York, so we were extremely spoilt with different dishes every day, like;

Tacos with soy chunks and veggies

Chickpea burgers with mushroom gravy and home made burger buns

Red bean burgers, again with home made burger buns and quinoa

Vegetable curry in a creamy coconut sauce

Spaghetti with soy chunks in tomato sauce

Yuca patties stuffed with refried beans served with cauliflower cheese and veggies

Pizza with home made wholewheat flour crust and cauliflower cheese

Mac and cheese

Home made bagels made with wholewheat flour

Sooooo. You can probably understand that we felt stuffed and, very happy, after every single lunch. It was the perfect finish to a work day.

On our time off

On the farm.
After lunch at around 1 pm, we usually just hung around the farm because we simply loved it there so much and couldn't get enough of cuddles with the animals.

Guy loved reading books about Costa Rica and to do some serious Sudoko-ing in the afternoons, whereas I did yoga and read books about animal care that Allan lent me and I also made my own necklace from beads that I found growing in the garden!

On really hot days, we enjoyed just going up the hill to the river to have a refreshing swim there.

Feria Verde de Aranjuez

One Saturday, Allan invited us to go with him to the weekly organic market Feria Verde in San Jose. We took the bus there after we and all the animal had had breakfast. I do however feel like I didn't really need breakfast that day as there were plenty of food for us to try here.

We had some yummy lattes with cashew nut milk for instance and tried vegan chocolate, ice cream, spreads, strawberries and delicious breads and much more. We browsed through cool clothing and jewellery stands and were able to buy fruit and veggies to take home aswell. The best buy was definitely the vegan pesto and cheap tahini, that I unfortunately couldn't resist to have a spoonful of every day back home at the farm, so it was gone pretty quickly.

Before we left the market we had a big lunch with gallo pinto, plantain and a potato filled tortilla wrap.

Shopping, eating and using wifi in Turrialba

The closest town to Planet Costa Rica is Turrialba. It's only a 30 minute bus journey away and on that journey we could spot the volcano on a clear day as well.

We went there to go shopping in second hand stores (called Ropa Americana) and to visit the loveliest man in town, Minor, where we could buy refreshing pipa (young coconut) and he was always there to help if we needed anything or had any questions about anything really. It felt safe knowing that he was always there in his veggie stand next to the bus stop.

At Cafeteria Merayo we could use wifi, have coffee and also eat the accidentally vegan cinnamon bread sent from above (or from the bakery next door to be more exact). I am probably known as the crazy cinnamon-bread-girl because I would ask about when the cinnamon bread would be ready probably 4 times in a day.

Turrialba is truly a town that has everything that you need. Even though there are no vegetarian restaurants, there are at least several little stores called Macrobioticas where we found many different vegan items to take home, such as soya pate, soy chunks, whole wheat flour, chocolate, nuts and seeds and more.

La Marta National Park

8 km from Planet Costa Rica is the oldest national park in Costa Rica called La Marta. If you are really lucky you can spot some wildlife (there are jaguars living there!), but you can be sure to have an adventurous jungle walk.

We went here on one of our days off and went up one of the view points where we could have stayed forever because of this amazing view where we could spot Turrialba volcano.

The only problem was that we had already exhausted ourselves with walking almost all the way to the national park from the farm, so when we got into the national park our feet were already aching loads. So we were happy that we were able to catch a ride back with two nice men who let us sit in the back of their truck full of veggies.

Swimming in Rio Pejibaye
Allan and Patty have many fun and friendly friends that stopped by the farm once in a while, to just hang out or to offer to take us to karaoke nights. One of these friendly friends is Hugo, who invited us to come with him to have a swim in a quite area of the beautiful Pejibaye river and we also visited the sugar factory nearby where we got to try the dulce and sneak peak on the process of making it. Afterwards he took us to his ranch where we had coffee and got to practice our Spanish a little bit.

Football at Soda Rita

Planet Costa Rica is just outside the tiny village Las Vueltas and it takes about 10 minutes to walk here. There is only one small restaurant here called Soda Rita, where they make delicious vegan gallo pinto for a very cheap price and where we spent some afternoons watching English football and to have coffee.

Experimenting in the cafe

Yes it's true. Planet Costa Rica has their own cafe, which is mostly used as a kitchen for volunteers and for Allan and Patty. Sometimes on occasions they have the cafe open for the public and they sell soy cappuccinos and other things. It was probably the best kitchen I have ever cooked in, with the best blender ever, so I did spend a lot of time in here, just trying to learn more vegan cooking and baking.

Allan taught me loads. We made a banana bread using just ripe banana, baking soda, oats and cacao one day and he also revealed the secret wholewheat bread recipe that he uses for when he makes the pizza dough, burger buns and the bagels.

But yeah, the VitaMix blender was definitely my best friend in the kitchen and so I made ice cream from just frozen bananas and cacao powder which turned out to be so yummy and creamy that it was easy to overindulge, and we also made our own almond milk from scratch.

Another first we could have because of the Vitamix (and thanks to Allans cooking skills) was making cheese from just cauliflower. All I did was grate cauliflower, boil it until it was soft and then put it in the blender along with jalapeños and a tiny bit of turmeric. So we did have many dinners topped with this creamy cheese, along with many glasses of banana smoothies.

The worst part of this whole experience was of course leaving the farm. We fell in love with all of the animals and have loved living on the Costa Rican countryside. I especially miss my little Mexican, Bello, who always loved to cuddle up in our laps (especially when we sat down for lunch and/or breakfast). Even though he is a tiny dog, that once got his legs broken by a machete, he would always run after us wherever we went.

But although goodbyes are always hard, we do know that all of these animals have the best home in the world which makes it a lot easier.

Thank you again Planet Costa Rica for the awesome three weeks. We would come back in a heartbeat and would highly recommend coming here to anyone who is thinking of visiting Central America. Visit their website and get more information about the work, the farm and the animals here.