Two international TV networks are highlighting Costa Rica’s natural attractions in full-production documentaries. National Geographic Channel and Italy’s RAI came to Costa Rica exclusively to tape shows about the country’s biodiversity.
Tropical forests, rivers and beautiful white-sand beaches were enough to convince National Geographic to call Costa Rica somewhere as close as it gets to an “earthly paradise.”
According to the prestigious TV network, Costa Rica is unique worldwide due to the immense diversity of living beings that call this tiny Central American nation home.
The documentary, which aired last July 25, was overflowing with shots of crocodiles, quetzals and the always-popular gangs of various species of monkeys.
The documentary featured Costa Rica s one of Latin America’s seven wonders, focusing on the region’s biodiversity to ground this claim.
Dubbed “Land of Life” by National Geographic Channel, Costa Rica was a favorite among Latin American countries because of its exuberant vegetation and its many types of forests.
National Geographic also billed Costa Rica as a country where people can enjoy the hatching of great numbers of sea turtles, which emerge out of the sand and run frantically toward the sea.
Guanacaste on Primo Italian Time
Meanwhile, the natural beauty of Guanacaste’s beaches — including Tamarindo, Avellanas, Roca Bruja and Playa Grande — will be enjoyed by 10 million Italian viewers next November thanks to a show produced by RAI Television.
Camera operators and four actors from the Italian network came to the province in June to tape an episode of the reality show “The Perfect Wave.”
The production was directed by Marco Mazzocchi, a well-known personality who for many years worked as anchor for the Sport Sunday show that airs in Italy right before the weekly soccer games.
Production of “The Perfect Wave” includes locations such as Biarritz, France and Lima, Peru, where the RAI team traveled to create an attractive setting for the surfing show. In similar programs, Mazzocchi and collaborators have brought to Italian homes shows taped in paradisiacal locale such as the Himalayas and Alaska.
Taping on the coastal region of Santa Cruz canton was complemented by shots of a class that world-class Costa Rican surfer Federico Pilurzu gave children who are part of a program sponsored by the Culture, Psychology and Education for Children and Adolescents Association (CEPIA).
