Costa Rica

Has anyone every been to Costa Rica with UC?  One of my best friends is having his bachelor party in Costa Rica this July.  I'm terrified of going to Latin America because of the whole water situation.  I went to Cabo last year and I was extremely ill the whole time I was there.

We are staying in an American Resort but I did the same thing in Cabo and it was hell on my Colon.

Costa Rica is supposed to be much better when it comes to water but I would prefer to hear some real life experiences than some published information on a website.

I need to put a call into my GI.

--Keith

I've been to Cost Rica. Its beautiful your gonna love it there. I didn't want to come back, but then again that always happens when I go on vaca. Anyways I didnt have any problems while I was there, just stick to the bottled water and try to avoid the ice cubes as well. Have fun

I live in Costa Rica, and I agree that you would want to stick to bottled water. But, the main problems here are the level of care in restaurants, bars and cafes, that's where you need to watch out, it is tricky, many people can and do get sick from eating bar food, my husband and daughter only recently were ill. Personally, I won't eat at bars or cafes anymore as I suspect hand washing isn't high on their list of priorities. I think if you pay more and go to 'good' restaurants you may be okay. That being said, its all a bit random and so you just need to be careful, like checking out the toilets before ordering food as if that area is not well maintained if gives you an idea of what the kitchen might be like.

You will have a great time as Costa Rica is an amazing place to visit for a vacation.

I went to Costa Rica earlier this year. It was so much fun and beautiful. I drank bottled water most of the time but did have mixed drinks at restaurants. We went to fairly nice places that my friends had been to several times- they live there. I also swam in the ocean and a fresh water waterfall/pool. No issues. We also made sure to wear bug spray whenever outside in the evening or when hiking. The travel clinic told me to avoid getting close to monkeys which have rabies- so we did not do the monkey tour. I also went to Cabo San Lucas. Was the only one out of 13 people who got sick. I think I just had a UC flare and not an infection then. Have a great trip!

suresh if you go to the top of this page you will see 'Search' if you type in the box next to it food and Ulcerative colitis, it should give you some interesting and valuable threads on what people tend to eat when flaring or not flaring. Sometimes it is easy to blame food on your UC symptoms but for many people they can eat pretty much what they want and their UC is not affected, obviously for some it is a different story, but I do think you need to eat a varied diet with this disease and your diet sounds awfully restricted, and if you are going to try going gluten or lactose free its best to try one out at a time before moving onto another otherwise you wont really know if you are having a reaction to one of them. I have food allergies too and it does complicate matters, I had to keep a food diary for a year before I realised what was causing me problems, so maybe a food diary might help you, but in the meantime why not try things like salmon, white fish,chicken, rice, potatoes,bread, bananas, vegetables without the skin on.