We have just returned from a very successful trip to Costa Rica, arranged through Travel Local, with Ecole Travel as the in country agents. Soledad worked out a brilliant itinerary for us and we saw everything we had wanted to and in the process realised what an amazing country Costa Rica is. Ecole also proved themselves with a couple of minor issues we had. One was our late arrival in San Jose, with a 3 hour delay at Gatwick and another 3 hours getting through San Jose airport, but the driver was still there. Brilliant. Talking to travellers with other agencies that wasn't always the case, so a big well done there. The second issue was a missing pick up from a hotel, which turned out to be the hotel's mistake. Ecole sorted it with them and 20 mins later a taxi turned up and all was well. The lodges they chose were great. In the middle of nowhere so the roads were quite interesting but the standard of food and accommodation was outstanding and the variety of birds and wildlife that could be viewed was amazing. We would definitely use the Travel Local system again where we arrange the tour with a local agent but pay Travel Local in sterling and have the protections of Travel Local in the UK.