Going from Monteverde to Cahuita/Puerto Viejo by public bus is quite straight forward, albeit a long day. It only requires swapping bus once in San Jose. Below we outline everything you need to know to catch the public buses from Monteverde to Puerto Viejo in one day or overnight – your choice!)
We‘ve looked into shuttles to compare the prices – currently it doesn’t seem there is a direct shuttle from Monteverde to Puerto Viejo. You’ll have to take the same route going Monteverde – San Jose ($59 USD through Interbus) and then San Jose to Puerto Viejo ($57 USD through Caribe Shuttles). It looks like these shuttles take as long as the public bus and they still require a swap in San Jose so there seems to be no benefit to taking a shuttle over taking the MUCH cheaper public bus route aside from ability to book the second bus in advance and ability to choose pickup/drop off location.
For us saving $94.21 USD was worth taking the public bus FOR SURE.
Public Bus | Shuttle | ||
Monteverde to San Jose | Time | 4.5 hours | 4 hours |
| Cost | $8.14 USD | $59 USD |
| San Jose to Cahuita/Puerto Viejo | Time | 5.5 hours | 5 hours |
| Cost | $13.65 USD | $57 USD |
Monteverde – San Jose
- 4.5 hours
- $4135 Colones (approx $8.14 USD)
You’ll first need to take the Transmonteverde bus from Monteverde to San Jose. This bus leaves twice a day at 5.30 am or 2.30 pm. If you want to do the entire journey in one day you’ll need to take the 5 am bus. We took the 2.3o pm bus and stayed overnight in San Jose next to the bus station (more on that below).
You can buy tickets in advance on the Transmonteverde website – we recommend doing this at least 1-2 days in advance. You don’t need to print the ticket, having it on your phone is enough.
The bus arrived on time and was comfortable with aircon. It took about 4 and a half hours to reach San Jose Terminal 710. We arrived around 7 pm.
San Jose
If you caught the 2.30 pm bus you’ll be arriving at around 7 pm this is too late to get a bus to Cahuita/Puerto Viejo as the last one is at 4 pm. We stayed at W’s hostel which is literally across the road from Terminal 710. We got Uber Eats for dinner and the next day there was a supermarket within a minutes walk to grab breaky. The hostel is in a kinda sketchy area but we felt safe getting there from the bus station and the next day it was fine.
If you caught the 5.30 am bus you should be arriving around 10 am giving plenty of time to take one of the next buses (10 am, 12pm*, 2pm, 4pm) to Cahuita or Puerto Viejo.
In San Jose you’ll arrive at Terminal 710. The bus to Cahuita/Puerto Viejo leaves from Alantico Norte about a 7 minute walk away. Walk here and go straight to getting your tickets for the bus.
*the schedule on the website doesn’t list a midday bus but at the station we were able to take a bus at midday.
San Jose to Cahuita/Puerto Viejo
- 5 hours to Cahuita
- 5.5-6 hours to Puerto Viejo
- $6005* Colones to Cahuita (approx $11.82 USD)
- $6985* Colones to Puerto Viejo ($13.65 USD)
*See latest tariffs on the MEPE website
The bus is run by a company called MEPE. You can’t buy tickets online, only at the station, but you can see the schedule here. When we caught the bus (Feb 2024) they left at 6am, 8am, 10am, 12pm, 2pm and 4pm.
Note: The bus can book out. We got to the Terminal Atlántico Norte around 9.30 am to get our tickets for the 10 am bus to Cahuita. They were fully booked until the 12pm bus. We were kicking ourselves as we’d been at our hostel only a 7 minute walk away all morning so we should have just popped over and bought the tickets earlier.
We took the midday bus which took about 5 hours to reach Cahuita. If you’re going to Puerto Viejo add another 45 minutes to this time.
And there you have it – how to get from Monteverde to Cahuita/Puerto Viejo by public bus. We hope you found this helpful. If you have recently taken this route and have anything to add leave it in the comments for other travellers.
