At Nayara Resorts, a collection of eco-friendly sanctuaries across Costa Rica, Chile, and Panama, we see luxury differently. Forget thread counts and gold-plated faucets—we believe true luxury is measured in connection: how a place moves you, how a stay transforms both guest and host.
And the greatest luxury of all? Time.
Unlike material comforts, time is finite. How we spend it is what makes life, and travel, meaningful. Whether you’re Elon Musk or a farmer in a Costa Rican cloud forest, the clock doesn’t play favorites. We all get the same twenty-four hours. What defines us is how we use them.
Our philosophy has four guiding pillars: immersive experiences rooted in place, regenerative travel that goes beyond sustainability, holistic wellness, and food as a reflection of its environment.
Nature is the thread that binds them all. And sometimes, that thread moves slowly—very slowly.
From Deadly Sin to Rainforest Royalty
Enter the sloth. Biblically branded a deadly sin, this remarkable animal has staged one of the greatest PR comebacks in history. They've been reborn as rainforest royalty—and, oddly enough, a kind of modern influencer. They’ve starred in movies, inspired yoga poses, and even earned their own hashtag holiday.
But beyond the memes lies something deeper. Contrary to reputation, sloths aren’t lazy at all. They’re the ultimate rainforest strategists—the Machiavalis of the mangroves.
At Nayara Tented Camp, our reforestation program created natural corridors where sloths and other wildlife returned to thrive. You might not expect them on a Caribbean island, but Nayara Bocas del Toro is home to a mangrove-dwelling variety of their own.
And in Chile—where no sloth has ever lived—they still serve as a perfect metaphor. The Atacama Desert survives much like a sloth does: conserving energy and thriving in stillness. On Rapa Nui, the culture itself mirrors this strategy—enduring over centuries, resilient through constant adversity.
Nature and its survivor par excellence, the sloth, are not another pillar. Rather, they are what ties it all together, a reminder that true luxury lies not in speed or spectacle, but in the art of slowing down, and belonging fully to place.
Nayara runs on sloth time—luxury's new currency.
Pillar 1: Experiences Rooted in Place
In the summer of 1969, one small step for man changed the history of mankind. Yet long before Apollo 11—about four billion years before—the Moon had already been shaping our story, pulling the strings behind the curtain with its gravity. It slowed Earth’s spin to give us 24-hour days, formed the tides that created the conditions for life, and then shielded the planet from cosmic debris so that life had time to evolve.
On Earth, the Atacama Desert is the closest thing we have to another planet. Its barren valleys and salt flats make it so Mars-like that NASA trains astronauts there for future missions to the red planet. By day, it’s barren. By night, it’s the best stargazing spot on the planet. Dry air, high altitude, and zero light pollution make the heavens blaze with impossible clarity.
At Nayara Alto Atacama, guests trace Saturn’s rings and the craters of the Moon through telescopes at our own observatory, guided by expert astronomical guides.
From sloth-gazing to star-gazing, that same Moon connects every Nayara. On Rapa Nui, it once guided voyagers across the Pacific. In Panama, it glimmers above bioluminescent bays. In Costa Rica, it lights the rainforest, where frogs and countless nocturnal creatures emerge on guided night walks with our on-staff naturalists.
These are not diversions. They are experiences rooted in place, shaped by the rhythms of nature itself—and they can only happen in these settings.
Read the full blog to follow the Moon’s path across desert, rainforest, and glowing oceans in Nayara by Night: of Moon & Stars
Pillar 2: Beyond Sustainability
If the Moon governs reflection, the Sun commands action. And on October 2 of 2024, the island of Rapa Nui became one of the best vantage points for a total solar eclipse: a phenomenon that is only possible because of a cosmic coincidence—the Sun is 400 times larger than the Moon, but also exactly 400 times farther away.
At Nayara Hangaroa, the opportunity was literal. Our recently completed solar panel project harnessed the same power that lit the eclipse. Nayara Alto Atacama led the way two years earlier, transforming relentless desert light into clean energy.
The story was different in Costa Rica, a nation that was green before green started trending. Here, solar panels weren't needed because the national grid already ran on clean energy—hydro, geothermal, and wind.
Instead, we turned to the land itself, replanting 20,000 native trees on former barren cattle pasture. Cecropias grew, sloths returned, wildlife corridors were created, and with them, balance restored. This was just one of myriad factors that our led our three Arenal resorts, Nayara Gardens, Nayara Tented Camp, and Nayara Springs achieving coveted green globe status and full carbon neutrality.
At Nayara, we believe sustainability is not an endpoint but a beginning. For us, the question is not just how to avoid harm, but how to leave each ecosystem and stronger than we found it. And the environment is just one part of the puzzle.
Read the full story, including how we built an electrical grid from scratch in Bocas del Toro, in Sunlit Sustainability: Nature-Powered
Rooted in Community
On July 29, 1968, the Arenal Volcano erupted with catastrophic force, wiping whole villages off the map. Yet from destruction came rebirth. La Fortuna—literally, “the fortune”—grew like a phoenix from the ashes into a hub of conservation and ecotourism. What looked like ruin became opportunity.
Today, over 90 percent of our team comes from the surrounding community. Housekeepers become supervisors, dishwaters become chefs, nature guides become sommeliers, and even our resort manager began as a front desk agent. Like the sloth, La Fortuna’s people endured, adapted, and thrived.
Far away, on Easter Island, the story was more complex. One of the most remote inhabited islands on Earth, set adrift in the middle of the Pacific Ocean 2,000 miles from the nearest continent, it's a place where culture, mystery, and landscape merge into something singular.
And nothing on Earth is more singular than the Moai. Nearly a thousand of these stone giants—some weighing more than 80 tons—were constructed without metal tools, wheels, or beasts of burden, and somehow moved miles across the island.
These ancient Moai builders went on to suffer centuries of colonization, disease, and near-extinction. Yet the culture persisted and today, it is being reclaimed. At Nayara Hangaroa, we are proud to be part of that reclamation, and we're even prouder to be partially owned by a local Rapa Nui family, the Hito, whose leadership continues to shape the islands cultural preservation.
Sloths are keystone indicators of rainforest health. When their habitat thrives, it means the ecosystem is balanced, diverse, and resilient. The same applies to community, signaling that travel is truly regenerative. Protecting culture and creating opportunity is as vital as planting trees or installing solar panels.
Taken together, these efforts show that sustainability is no longer enough. To us, it’s about going beyond sustainability: leaving every ecosystem and community stronger than we found it.
Learn the full Arenal story and how we preserve Rapa Nui culture in Rooted in Community: The Human Side of Hospitality
Pillar 3: Holistic Wellness
If community anchors us, wellness restores us. At Nayara, wellness isn’t a list of treatments on a spa menu—it flows directly from the environments that surround us. It is holistic by design, caring for body, mind, and spirit in equal measure.
A Caribbean archipelago of mangroves, reefs, and rainforest, Bocas is a place where the pace slows the moment your boat arrives. There are no roads, no cars, no background hum of modern life—only the sound of waves brushing the shore of the private island Nayara Bocas del Toro calls home. Here spa rituals happen on your overwater villa deck with the ocean stretching out below, or high in our new treehouse spa suspended 50 feet above the canopy, where wellness is elevated quite literally.
In Costa Rica, the rainforest and its most commanding resident, the Arenal Volcano, write the rituals. Mineral-rich hot springs heated deep underground soothe body and mind, while treatments use rainforest ingredients like volcanic mud and cacao. Open-air pavilions host sound healing and guided-yoga classes that flow with the rhythm of the forest unfurling below.
Science echoes what these landscapes have long taught. Time in nature measurably lowers cortisol, eases blood pressure, strengthens immunity, and improves sleep. Even 20 minutes outdoors can reset the body’s stress response, while natural soundscapes—birdsong, wind, water—lift mood and sharpen focus.
Across every destination, wellness at Nayara isn’t escape—it’s recalibration. Mind, body, and spirit are realigned by the very landscape itself.
Explore how hot springs, treetops, and desert redefine wellness at Nayara in Holistic Wellness, Naturally
Pillar 4: Culinary Tradition
Sloths only eat from the cecropia trees that sustain them. At Nayara, that instinct inspires our own zero-kilometer philosophy: food sourced locally, rooted in place, and tied to tradition.
At Nayara Springs, belonging to Relais & Châteaux signals more than prestige—it’s a promise. Every plate must tell a story of its origin, crafted with both technical mastery and authenticity. Here, rainforest gardens provide herbs and tropical fruits that move straight from soil to kitchen. Coffee beans are roasted in-house at Mi Cafecito, where guests learn the heritage of Costa Rica’s most iconic crop.
In Panama, the sea itself writes the menu. Lobster, snapper, and even invasive lionfish appear on the plate—transforming ecological threat into culinary delight. Meals are served at The Elephant House, a century-old Balinese structure perched over the Caribbean, where nurse sharks drift beneath the floorboards.
In Chile, Andean grains and herbs keep alive ancient flavors. On Rapa Nui, fish is still cooked in earth ovens heated by volcanic stone, carrying on a Polynesian legacy centuries old.
At Nayara, food here is never just food. It is story, heritage, and ecology on every plate.
To eat at each of our resorts is to taste the landscape itself.
Discover how rainforest, desert, and volcanic ovens tell the story of each Nayara destination in The Nayara Table: Root to Reef →
A New Vision of Luxury
Taken together, these pillars—and the sloth that embodies them—define a new vision of luxury. Nature is not an accessory to our hotels—it’s the foundation, partner, and constant presence.
Sloths teach us that It isn’t about speed. It isn’t excess. It isn’t things. Its presence, connection and the deliberate choice to spend your most finite, time, resource in ways that matter.
Now it's your turn.
Witness the clearest skies on Earth, soak in your luxury tent’s private hot springs plunge pool, enjoy a massage from your overwater villa's floating deck, and finally check off “see the Moai” from your bucket list.
Sloth time may move slowly, but the time to start living fully doesn't.
And the adventure of a lifetime begins the moment you decide.
Start Your Nayara Journey Today
