Día del Boyero

The painted oxcart is Costa Rica's national symbol, developed in the nineteenth century to carry coffee from the central valley down to the Pacific coast, and decorated from the early twentieth in geometric patterns whose designs varied by region so a cart could be identified from a distance. UNESCO inscribed the tradition in 2005. On the second Sunday in March, San Antonio de Escazú in the hills above San José holds the boyeros' day: hundreds of carts with their ox teams and drivers parade through the village, there is a blessing, and the craft that survives mainly as ceremony gets its annual outing.

What you actually see

• The parade - hundreds of painted carts with their ox teams.
• The painted wheels - the geometric designs that identified a cart's origin.
• The blessing - of the carts and teams at the church.
• The boyeros - the drivers, and the calls they use to work the oxen.

When to go

The second Sunday in March, in San Antonio de Escazú. Other towns hold their own boyero days at various points in the year, and Sarchí, where most carts are made, has workshops open year-round.

Honest expectations

It is one day a year and the village is small, so parking and crowds are difficult; go early or take a taxi. Outside the festival there is nothing to see in Escazú related to it. Sarchí's workshops are the year-round option and are frankly a shop rather than a working craft village now. The oxen work hard on the day and welfare views vary.

Nearby

Sarchí and its oxcart workshops are an hour northwest; San José is twenty minutes below.