Every forest has one tree that stands above all the others, and here it is the ceiba. The crown rides high over the canopy on a trunk like a grey column, and the base flares into buttresses taller than a person.
Where you’ll see it
Dry forest and river gallery forest across Guanacaste, with the giants mostly in the protected areas. Young ones have green trunks studded with spines.
What to know
The kapok is the pale silky fibre packed around the seeds in the pods, once a major export for stuffing pillows and life vests. The tree flowers on bare branches in the dry season and the pods burst and drift. To the Maya it was the world tree, roots in the underworld and crown in the heavens. Standing at the base of a big one, that seems reasonable.
