Hi,

I highly recommend that you stay away from using travel by jen (aka jet set vacations); as they do not disclose the appropriate information about travel times, car upgrades, hotel security ect; which in the end costs you more money, time, and a huge amount of stress!
Afterwards, they want to put the full blame on you for not getting the correct forms or doing appropriate research on the places and car agency rentals.
Sorry to say I thought that is what a travel agent was supposed to do by making things easier, safer and simple.
It seems they just want your money, and then they listen to your complaints only to use that information towards future clients to make themselves sound more legit.
They DO NOT offer compensation only excuses! They have a guy named Robert that writes to you for days on end getting detailed information on the issues and all the while disputing everything you say and trying to justify his own experience (which apparently supersedes our experience.For example, Robert states"Driving to Arenal takes me 2 and a half hours...I have been there 12 times in the past 19 months" (like right we knew we would be driving up a winding narrow mountain in complete darkness with fog, and it would take almost 4hours??).
As i said before, it seems they want to utilize the information to add to their repertoire of flowery sounding salesmanship on their ads to make more sales. Not once have we been offered an apology or compensation of any sort "I will try to get you compensation".
As for one of the upgraded hotels, we purchased, it was not far from safe. I misplaced my key card, yet I was able to take out a window and put my hand through the ground level balcony door and enter!! Thank goodness we did not get anything stolen on this trip, but I proved that it could easily be done!
When you see their Ads it seems like they are very reasonable, but if you choose to use them in the end you will be sorry and more in debt!
See my link posting on tripadvisor for a more detailed report!
http://www.tripadvisor.ca/ShowTopic-g291982-i813-k5822313-Must_DO_and_Don_t_Tips_For_A_Fantastic_Costa_Rica_Trip-Costa_Rica.html
I do hope this information can save you the troubles that we encountered!!
Ollie