These unforgettable night tours reveal the world’s creepiest wildlife after dark.
“Paren! Paren!” our lead guide shrieks as he leaps forward deeper into the Costa Rican darkness. He lands, sprints forward 10 feet, heaves a sigh, then implores us to remain still.
“Don’t move!” yells our back guide after their animated dialogue.
Giddy with a blend of anxiety and anticipation, a feeling one often experiences on tropical trails in the dark, we soon learn the source of our spontaneous game of statues, an adult fer-de-lance coiled at the base of the last step leading off the trail.
Sure, hiking under the Milky Way is wonderful, but what’s more fun than spying a goliath tarantula among the leaf litter, flying foxes in the night sky and, yes, Central and South America’s most venomous snake curled beneath your next step in Costa Rica? Here are 10 night hikes guaranteed to get a rise out of the hair on the back of your neck.