Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center
Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center is located a short 10 minutes from Hotel Villa San Ignacio. If you are just starting out a family vacation and spending two nights to shake off some jet lag, we recommend a visit to Rescate Wildlife to view an abundance of Costa Rica’s treasured wildlife. As well, if you have a little time before you depart, you may get to see a few animals you missed…as well as get some great photographs.
There are over 800 wild animals (125 species), living in the Lifetime Care Sanctuary including, sloths, jaguars, tapirs, pumas, coyotes, and monkeys as well as a wide variety of birds, small mammals, reptiles. Also within the wildlife sanctuary is an exotic animal sanctuary where you can see ostriches, emus, peacocks, colorful pheasants, and many species of exotic birds. Your visit to Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center not only helps support all of the sanctuary animals but also the wild animals that they rescue and return to their rightful place in the wild.
Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center is also a great place in Costa Rica to bring children. There is a two- hectare Mini-Farm especially designed for kids, complete with miniature green pastures—a great way to spend time with the family. In the Mini-farm there is a variety of domestic animals, including; three miniature horses, a miniature donkey, a miniature pig, sheep, chickens, rabbits, guinea pigs and more.
Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center also features a souvenir shop with local crafts, an ice cream shop with fresh fruit smoothies and home-made juice pops from local fruits as well as a full service restaurant. Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center is fully accessible and complimentary wheel-chairs are available on request.
About Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center
Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center is situated on 36 acres of natural forest in La Garita de Alajuela, just 15 minutes from Juan Santamaría International Airport and 40 minutes from San José. Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center rescues over 3,000 wild animals every year. Roughly 2% of the animals they receive cannot be released back into the wild because they have been too badly injured, or they have been kept as pets and are too used to humans. These animals are provided with lifetime care in Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center’s Lifetime Care Sanctuary. Here the sanctuary residents live in highly naturalized habitats nestled amongst thirteen acres of lush, tropical botanical gardens.
There are over 800 wild animals (125 species), living in the Lifetime Care Sanctuary including, sloths, jaguars, tapirs, pumas, coyotes, and monkeys as well as a wide variety of birds, small mammals, reptiles. Also within the wildlife sanctuary is an exotic animal sanctuary where you can see ostriches, emus, peacocks, colorful pheasants, and many species of exotic birds. Your visit to Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center not only helps support all of the sanctuary animals but also the wild animals that they rescue and return to their rightful place in the wild.
Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center is also a great place in Costa Rica to bring children. There is a two- hectare Mini-Farm especially designed for kids, complete with miniature green pastures—a great way to spend time with the family. In the Mini-farm there is a variety of domestic animals, including; three miniature horses, a miniature donkey, a miniature pig, sheep, chickens, rabbits, guinea pigs and more.
Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center also features a souvenir shop with local crafts, an ice cream shop with fresh fruit smoothies and home-made juice pops from local fruits as well as a full service restaurant. Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center is fully accessible and complimentary wheel-chairs are available on request.
Sanctuary Tour
There are hundreds of fascinating animals living in the Lifetime Care Sanctuary at Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center. Each one of them has a unique rescue story to tell, such as Gracia, the first toucan in the world to receive a prosthetic beak, or Guapo, the jaguar who was found floating on a log in a hurricane or Coco, the 6-foot crocodile who was kept as a pet in someone’s backyard! Take a guided tour of the Lifetime Care Sanctuary and learn all about the various residents who call Rescate their home. Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center’s experienced guides will not only share the stories about the various animal residents living in the sanctuary, but also help you locate and identify all amazing free-living wildlife within in the surrounding botanical gardens from tiny hummingbirds to massive iguanas. Bird lovers be sure to bring your binoculars for an opportunity to spot species such as Great Curassows, fiery billed aracari, and green king fishers. Additionally, within the botanical gardens surrounding the animal habitats there are hundreds of varieties of trees, shrubs and flowering plants, many of them native to Costa Rica. Find out about the Costa Rican guava fruit that the locals use to make a drink similar to lemonade, how banana peel is used to relieve itching from bug bites or what flowers the hummingbirds like best. Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center’s guided tour is one of the best ways to become familiar with Costa Rica’s amazing and diverse wildlife.
Freedom Tour
Over 3,000 wild animals are rescued by Rescate Wildlife Rescue Center every year. For an exclusive peek into the lives of the rehabilitated animals, take the Freedom Tour and learn about how they take the step-by-step process of recovery and eventual release back into the wild. Rescate’s Wildlife Rehabilitation Center is unique in that it has separate care units for various species, including primates, parrots, raptors, small mammals, and reptiles. Each care unit is equipped with an intensive care clinic, incubators, a fly-proof enclosure, and a series of acclimation enclosures. Find out how baby monkeys make their way back into a wild troop, what type of milk sloths prefer or how individual parrots are trained to recognize natural foods in the wild.