Makanda by the Sea
Hotel · Manuel Antonio, Costa Rica
9.3
Superb
133 reviews
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2026-08-11 · 6 min read
The adults-only hotel built into the canopy above Manuel Antonio
You hear the ocean before you can see much of it. It is about a hundred and fifty metres down the slope, through a wall of rainforest that starts at the terrace rail, and at night it is the only thing making a sound. Makanda by the Sea is an adults-only hotel above Manuel Antonio on Costa Rica's Pacific coast, built into the canopy rather than cleared onto it — thirty-three suites and villas stepped down a hillside, kept deliberately apart from the larger resorts along the Quepos road.
A hotel that goes down the hill, not across it
The whole property is tiered. Rooms are stacked down the slope on separate levels, linked by paths and light wells, with honeycomb screens and dark lattice wood doing the work that walls would do somewhere flatter. Nothing sits in front of anything else.
That geometry is the entire design argument. Each suite gets its own stretch of forest and its own piece of Pacific, and no terrace looks into a neighbour's. Privacy here is a consequence of the ground, which is more reliable than privacy as a promise.
Thirty-three rooms, none of them repeated
The suites and villas are one-of-a-kind rather than a floor plan run thirty-three times: dark hardwood and woven walls, floor-to-ceiling glass, a sculpted terracotta wall behind one bed and a painted banana-leaf wall behind another. Some have a private balcony, some a plunge pool cut into the terrace.
The palette is warm and deliberately dark — velvet, terracotta, driftwood — and the lighting comes on like fireflies once the sun drops behind the trees. Bathrooms open straight onto the treetops, which is a strange luxury to get used to and an easy one to miss afterwards.
Two pools, and whatever passes overhead
There are two pools and they do different jobs. The mosaic infinity pool is set against the ocean view and is the one people swim in at seven in the morning. The main pool is ringed by rainforest, with a swim-up bar and hanging chairs at the edge, and it is where the afternoon goes.
The wildlife is not an excursion here, it is the ceiling. Monkeys work along the branches over the water, iguanas hold position on the warm stone, toucans and hummingbirds come and go. Nobody has to organise any of it, which is the difference between a hotel in the rainforest and a hotel with a rainforest theme.
The wildlife is not an excursion. It is the ceiling.
The park begins five minutes from the gate
Manuel Antonio National Park starts minutes down the road — Costa Rica's most-visited park, with marked trails running through rainforest to Playa Manuel Antonio, and sloths, capuchins and coatis along the way. Go early; the trails are quietest before the coaches arrive.
From the air the shape of the place is obvious: Punta Catedral sitting between its two beaches, rainforest running to the sand on both sides. The hillside itself is steep enough that the hotel runs golf carts down to Makanda's own wild beach below the property — the detail that turns the ocean from a view into somewhere you actually swim.
Treatment rooms that open to birdsong
Shanti Spa is built on several levels into the rainforest, with treatment salas that open to the trees — massages, couples' treatments and facials, taken with the forest doing the soundtrack rather than a speaker in the ceiling. At its centre is a mosaic pool under a timber pergola, with hammock chairs hung at the edge.
It fits the rest of the house, where the good rooms are the ones with the fewest walls. The same logic runs through the suites: a marble vanity with round mirrors opening straight onto the canopy is not a spa feature, strictly speaking, but it has the same effect at seven in the morning.
Dinner in the branches
Árbol is the house restaurant and it is genuinely in the trees: hanging bulbs, a wine tower, the pool glowing beyond the tables, candlelight doing the rest. Breakfast is à la carte on the pool terrace above the ocean, and the Ocean Club handles the raw bar and the cocktails at the end of the day.
The cooking is more precise than the setting obliges it to be — a seared fillet under microgreens and chimichurri is not what a restaurant with this view would have to serve to fill its tables. The evenings have a shape without a schedule imposing one: the light goes fast this close to the equator, the firefly lamps come on, and dinner starts when it starts.
Why it works
Makanda takes no guests under eighteen — HUSH read the property's own house rules, and the house calls itself adults-only throughout its own site. On a hillside of stepped terraces, open bathrooms and unfenced plunge pools, that boundary is structural as much as it is editorial.
What it leaves is a hotel with no noise floor: a pool you can swim lengths in at dawn, a spa that hears birds, dinner by candlelight in a tree, and a turndown that leaves a silk sleep mask on the bed with an instruction printed on the box. It suits couples, and it suits anyone who wants the rainforest without the family resort attached to it.
Questions
Is Makanda by the Sea adults only?
Yes. It takes no guests under eighteen — HUSH read the property's own house rules — and the hotel describes itself as adults-only throughout its own website.
How close is Manuel Antonio National Park?
The park entrance is about five minutes from the gate. Marked trails run through the rainforest down to Playa Manuel Antonio, with sloths, capuchins and coatis commonly seen along the way.
Can you get down to the beach?
Yes. The hillside is steep, so the hotel runs golf carts down to its own wild beach below the property rather than leaving the ocean as a view from the terrace.
Do the rooms have private pools?
Some do. The suites and villas are individually designed, and several have a plunge pool cut into the terrace; others have a private balcony instead. There are also two shared pools, one of them an infinity pool facing the ocean.
Where does the food happen?
Árbol, the house restaurant, sits among the branches and serves by candlelight; breakfast is à la carte on the pool terrace above the ocean, and the Ocean Club runs a raw bar and cocktails.
The places in this story
Makanda by the Sea
Hotel · Manuel Antonio, Costa Rica