Five hundred and fifty kilometres off the Pacific coast of Costa Rica a forest rises over the waves. It’s Cocos Island and its legends, its magnificent rock walls loaded with trees. Depicted in Jurassic Park, this island entered the imagination of millions of people as the place where dinosaurs reappeared.
The only way to reach this unhabited and isolated island is by boat after two days crossing at high seas; for its remoteness, Cocos Island was used as hideout of choice by corsairs and pirates who ravaged the coasts of the American Pacific: among them John Cook, William Dampier and Captain Morgan. Legends has it that Bennett Graham hid the Devonshire Treasure in a cave of the island, and the Loot of Lima was supposedly buried here by William Thomson.
Above the sea level, there is a rectangular area that holds a tropical rain forest. The ground is steep, with high slopes, creeks and waterfalls nourished by persistent rains, by the dump winds and by the clouds that seem to settle down on the high peaks.
Underwater swim the giants of the ocean: sharks, mantas, dolphins and humpback whales. The tiger shark is the king of the island, notable for its vertical stripes and aggressive behaviour; the whitetip reef shark is a nocturnal hunter and its body is covered with placoid scales which protect it when hunting between cracks; the scalloped hammerhead is the most iconic species in Cocos Island, where they school near the seamounts and islets; the whale shark reaches a length of twelve meters and it’s the biggest fish in the ocean.
