Charlie Soto -- Recommend very highly!!

[marshaatn]

This is a very late posting on my part, but I want to recommend Charlie Soto to everyone for a wonderful tour for your day in lovely Costa Rica. There were four of us that hired Charlie while on our Brilliance of the Seas sailing in February at a price that was very reasonable for the amount of time that was spent ($40 pp plus zipline fee). Charlie has a very nice, comfortable van and both he and his driver are very personable. Charlie is willing to tailor your tour to whatever you want to do.

 

We did the boat trip down the canal, toured the banana plantation, did the zipline at Las Brisas, and toured the Animal Shelter, which in my opinion was one of the highlights. The Animal Shelter is run by a very nice young man from Louisiana and you are able to interact with the sloths, the toucans and all of the other interesting animals.

 

Charlie is very responsive to emails, speaks very good English (he lived in California for a while) and just generally made our day very special. I liked the fact that he had a driver which enabled him to constantly interact with us and point out all of the sights along the way. We also stopped at a wonderful place along the beach for lunch, which was very reasonably priced.

 

Our tour with Charlie was our favorite day of our entire trip. No one will be disappointed if you book with Charlie! You can reach Charlie via email at okeydokeytours@hotmail.com.

 

If anyone would like more information about Charlie and his wonderful tour, please feel free to email me direct and I will be happy to respond.

[quimbydog]

I have posted here about Charlie before, but I had to add my two cents. We had Charlie when we were in Limon on Carnival Legend over New Year's. He was very professional, extremely nice and a great tour, even though we had a rainy day! I'm glad to see that others are "finding" him on this board - he really is a gem! If you have any questions about the tour, or anything else, feel free to email me at quimbydog@earthlink.net

 

Tiffany

[SeaGal]

Based on the good comments here on Cruise Critic we have booked with Charlie for this coming December. He promptly returned my email (within an hour) and confirmed our reservation. Then he suggested that he would send me some post cards of Costa Rica. Imagine my surprise when yesterday four beautiful post cards arrived in the mail. What a terriffic guy! We are really looking forward to spending our day in Costa Rica with him.

[saw1953]

Does Charlie have a website?

[marshaatn]

Charlie doesn't have a website yet, I believe he mentioned to me that he was working on one -- but if you email him at okeydokeytours@hotmail.com he will get back to you right away. As I mentioned before, it was the best day of our cruise -- Charlie goes out of his way to make sure you enjoy his country.

[sophiecruiser]

We did the boat trip down the canal, toured the banana plantation, did the zipline at Las Brisas, and toured the Animal Shelter[ /QUOTE]

How many hours did this take? We are in port Limon from 11am to 7pm. Will this be enough time to do all this?

 

Also, what's the difference between the zipline at Las Brisas vs Almonds & Corals?

[Arubalisa]

Does he have a minimum number of persons required for a tour? We will be 4 adults and 1 child. Also if we are skipping the zip line, would he be able to take us to the canal, banana plantation and Animal Shelter? Could this tour be done in 4 - 5 hours?

[beachlovergirl]

Arubalisa -

 

My husband, a friend and I just booked Charlie Soto for our day in Costa Rica at the end of October. I had sent him an e-mail asking him about a minimum needed and in my confirmation he said no minimum number of people needed. Just let him know what you want to do that day and he'll customize the tour for you. We're sailing on the Coral Princess and will be in port from 6:30 am to 6:30 pm so just let him know what time your ship is in port and how long of a tour you want. He's picking us up at the pier at 8:30 am (ship time) or 7:30 am (Costa Rica time). Here is an explanation of the tour he is doing for us....we didn't want to zipline either:

 

Hi Dee, thanks for email me , now i will take you to the tortuguero canal

boat ride , to see the most beautiful things there about animals and the

forest , animal rescue center , bananas plantation to see all the process,

the view point to take a look of the city from the top of the hill , bonita

beach to have a nice lunch and enjoy the beach after city tour to show you

the most nice places this tour is for 6 hrs , 6 differents places for only

$49 p.p. include boat ride on the tortuguero canal and include admission at

the animal rescue center all my tours are personalized tour and i will be

your tour guide , i provide you a full insurance van for 14 pass. air

conditioned, nature fruits, coke, beers and water not extra charge , boat

for the canal it have roof, confortables seats, i will be at the pier

holding a sign with the names of my customers, its a pleasure to serve

blessing charlie, you can bring all the people you have dont worry i got van

for 14 and 29 persons god bless you charlie

 

In doing my research I found that Charlie has consistently gotten excellent reviews.....we're looking forward to his tour. :)

 

Dee

[Arubalisa]

Thank you so much Dee. I am going to email him right now.

[sophiecruiser]

Just wanted to let everyone know that we booked Charlie Soto for our Feb 06 cruise. He is very prompt at returning emails and will answer as many questions as you can shoot at him!

 

We will visit Brisas de la jungla for the zip line (or other activities for the whimps in the group) then go to tortuguero canal for the boat ride and any other stops we can fit in - banana plantation, animal sanctuary etc... I was concerned because we have a very large group (close to 30 people). Most of us want to do the zip line, but some do not. Here is his reply:

 

Hi Sophie, yes i will take care of everything, boat ride reservation Zip line etc, dont worry about your sister , there at the same brisas de la jungla they have other options , horse back riding , sky walk, rain forest walking tour, flowers garden , so maybe she can be doing anyone of those tours during the zip line , and iwll be there to do my best, the zip line take 1:30 hrs, so we are going to be driving : mini bus for 29 persons, full air conditioned, and this is only for our group, we gota driver and i will be you your guide, i meet you at the pier holding a sign with your name on it

 

Plus he's supplying beer, soda and fruit. Sounds wonderful doesn't it?

[Arubalisa]

I just finalized plans for our day in CR with Charlie :) Thanks to all who have posted all this terrific information. Charlie has invited us to join him at his home following the tour to have birthday cake to for his daughter's birthday! Anyone know how old she is? I would love to bring a little gift for her special day.

[Longlegscruiser]

I am going to book Charlie for a tour of CR in November, I am very excited, thanks to everyone for their comments.

[beachlovergirl]

Arubalisa - I sent Charlie an e-mail to thank him for the two postcards he sent me with beautiful scenes of Costa Rica. I also asked him how old his daughter was going to be for her upcoming birthday. Here is his reply:

 

"Hi Dee, i hope you doing very well, Charlie Jr. is going to 3 years old, its

a wonderful boy , everything he want ice cream, thanks a lot and god bless

you charlie"

 

I didn't have the date of your tour so maybe he has more than one kid??? Oh well, I tried! ;)

 

Dee

[ronbetty2001]

Does Charlie operate out of Puntarenas?

[beachlovergirl]

No, just Limon.

[mmsoko]

How was payment to Charlie handled? Did you prepay? Does he take credit cards?

 

Thanks for info.

[beachlovergirl]

We've booked Charlie for the end of October. Charlie doesn't require pre-payment. I don't know if he accepts credit cards. We're just paying him in cash that day.

 

Dee

[Arubalisa]

Charlie does not even require a deposit...

[palmtre2]

We just booked with Charlie for our Spring Break cruise - Anybody booked with him before that please post reviews. Our itinerary Tour A-1 includes Las Brisas, the Sloth sanctuary & much more - it sounds very ambitious, but we're up for it. We'd like to hear how it went for others!

[prinny]

Anyone going on the Coral Princess Panama Canal trip from Fort Lauderdale on Nov. 14-24? Anyone else interested in taking the costa rica tour with Charlie Soto on that cruise?

[beachlovergirl]

prinny - Your best bet is to go to the Princess Roll Call section to find others on your cruise who may be interesting in booking a tour with Charlie. I'm sure there is already a roll call started.

 

Dee

[highworth]

Just a point to note...Charlie does work out of Punterenous. We are booked with him in November out of there..

[LUV2CRUIZE]

WE were looking for something to do in Limon, and since i read this we have sent an email to Charlie to join others he has booked from our cruise. How much is the Zip line?

 

Ok, we'll keep you posted when we get confirmed.

 

Luv

[mamahugs]

Prinny...funny that you ask, I've booked a tour with Charlie Soto..a party of 6, it'll be great if you can join us. We are also on the Coral Princess. There is a roll call for our sailing. Go check it out.

[LUV2CRUIZE]

Hi Everyone,

 

After reading lots, and I mean lots of reviews on Charlie, we have booked him for Dec 19,2005 on the Coral Princess.

 

Anyone else sailing 12-14-05 on the Coral and looking to go, lets talk.

 

Reina & Mike

Michigan

reinapye@aol.com