COCOS ISLAND ARTICLE

If you are a diver, this is Costa Rica adventure at its finest.

The renowned Jacques Cousteau called this Costa Rica island the most beautiful island he had ever seen.

Costa Ricans have declared this little national park one of its Seven Wonders.

National Geographic describes it as one of the purest, healthiest, and most biologically diverse marine eco systems on earth with the highest concentration of big marine predators in the Pacific and the enormous number and variety of small fish and invertebrates.

It is being considered as one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World. Costa Rica's Seven Wonders, click here

Indeed, its waters are filled with fish, porpoises, whales, and sea turtles, and there are sometimes so many sharks, it is often called Shark Island. Experienced scuba divers travel here from across the planet because it is renowned as the greatest place on earth to dive with large sea animals.

See more here at BBC's Shark Island Hammerheads

The island has been famous for pirates, real and imagined, for centuries. It is believed by many that it was the inspiration for Robert Lewis Stevenson's famous pirate novel Treasure Island but sometimes real pirates sailed to it to escape the English fleet and to bury their treasure. Two great treasures, the Devonshire Treasure and the Lima Treasure, worth hundreds of millions of dollars today, may still be buried there. They're great Costa Rica pirates tales !

Cocos Island is also the setting for Michael Crichton's world famous novel---and Steven Spielberg's blockbuster movies---Jurassic Park.

The island is uninhabited except for a few Costa Rica park rangers who are stationed there to protect its waters from poaching. For eons its isolation safeguarded the island's rainforest and undersea creatures from exploitation.

But, Are We Killing Cocos Island?

Despite determined efforts of the good guys, the bad guys are threatening disaster. National Geographic Video: Are We Killing Cocos?

Great news! In March 2011, Costa Rica took a dramatic step in preserving the Cocos Island ecosystem, creating the massive Cocos Island Marine Protected Area.

Cocos Island Shark Finning Disgrace

More great news! Costa Rica's highest court has just closed a huge loophole in the law that allowed foreign fishing vessels to dock at private docks, thereby evading authorities.

It's against Costa Rica law to cut off shark fins before docking (same as in the United States). That requirement makes it much more expensive for shark fin pirates but for years, these butchers have used private docks to surreptitiously unload their illicit cargo.

No more! said the Court.

Bravo, Costa Rica.

Coupled with the creation of the massive marine protection zone, this ruling may preserve sharks. Only a few lucky people get to visit Cocos and if you want to go ashore, you will need previous permission from the rangers. Overnight camping is forbidden.

But, no matter. As you walk the shores, looking out over the great Pacific, your imagination can soar. You'll be walking the very shores that famous pirates hid buried treasure and you will not be alone.

It is almost as if some of the stones themselves can talk for you are going to find rocks and boulders bearing the inscriptions of past sailors who left their moment of history behind, writing their names, the names of their ships and ports of call, even the dates.

Sailors, long gone, forgotten to men but remembered by the rocks.

Like Kilroy, they were here.



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