The Island of Enchantment

Costa Rica, also known as 'The Island of Enchantment,' is definitely one of the countries that I'd love to travel to. So, I'm eager to share with you, my dear reader, the reason behind this passion of mine.

I would love to just spam pictures of the place, wildlife and scenery, but I must reach a minimum of 160 words.

Also, I must say that my first inspiration to talk about Costa Rica was the land and sea wildlife, but the lush forests and rainy season captivated my mind.

First of all, it's a culturally rich country in Central America and an entry-level destination if you want to explore Latin America. It boasts extensive coastlines along both the Caribbean and Pacific oceans.

You could say that it's like a different world when we talk about biodiversity. In fact, almost 5 percent of the world's species are found here. Scientists have even built zip lines to study the many layers of cloud forests.

I personally would love to travel to Costa Rica because I'm a sucker for biodiversity and exotic species, but it has something more to it. If it were just that, I would have chosen Australia. To provide some context, a long time ago, a little after the arrival of Columbus, there were so many new species to be seen, but they were hard to classify, so many animals were just 'Old World' and 'New World.'

The concept of the New World was used for any animal that was in the Americas but was known and seen in Europe, like Old World spiders and New World spiders. This work was later expanded by Darwin. I mean, he wasn't the only one working on it, but he's the most renowned, which is why almost any animal has 'Darwin' in its name, like the Darwin beetle in Chile (Chiasognathus grantii), the Darwin frog, the Darwin bird, etc.

But something to note is that New World animals were more colorful, faster, deadlier, and had little secrets in them, while Old World animals were just boring and bigger.

So, I'd like to do in Costa Rica is get lost in all it has to offer, biodiversity-wise.

I mean, look this.

If this did not do it for you, you my friend, are hopeless.