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Carlos Alcaraz has withdrawn from the 2026 Cincinnati Open as he continues to recover from the wrist injury that has kept him away from competition since April. The ATP Tour confirmed the decision Tuesday, ending hopes that the defending champion would make his long-awaited return at the Masters 1000 tournament in Ohio. Alcaraz had entered Cincinnati as part of a planned comeback ahead of the US Open. Tournament organizers initially included him among a field led by Jannik Sinner, Alexander Zverev, Novak Djokovic, Taylor Fritz and Ben Shelton. However, the 23-year-old Spaniard has not recovered sufficiently to compete in the Cincinnati main draw, which begins August 13. “We know Carlos is doing everything he can to get back to playing tournaments as soon as possible,” tournament director Bob Moran said in a statement. The withdrawal extends an absence that began at the Barcelona Open in April. Alcaraz has since missed several of the biggest tournaments on the calendar, inclu...

A powerful eruption of Guatemala’s Fuego Volcano has forced authorities to evacuate at least 1,700 residents from areas near the crater and declare the highest alert level Tuesday in zones exposed to falling ash. Fuego, considered the most active volcano in Central America and located near the capital, entered an eruptive phase Monday morning. Its activity intensified overnight into Tuesday, with streams of lava flowing down its slopes and enormous columns of gas and ash rising into the sky. “The volcano is going through one of its most critical explosive phases,” producing mudflows, incandescent rocks, gases and ash, said Edwin Rojas, director of the Institute of Volcanology, known as Insivumeh. Guatemala’s National Coordinator for Disaster Reduction, Conred, began evacuating communities near the volcano Monday evening and declared an orange danger alert nationwide. On Tuesday, the agency raised the alert to red in the departments of Sacatepéquez, Chimaltenango and Escuintla,...

One longtime foreign resident of Costa Rica could buy a house or a condominium outright tomorrow. He has the cash, he has been here for decades, and he still rents the same apartment he has rented for years and he has no plans to change that. His reasoning is worth hearing before you sign anything, because the instinct most newcomers arrive with — buy early, buy fast, get it settled — is the expensive instinct if you turn out to be wrong about where you want to live. He gives three reasons. The first is that Costa Rica is not one place. The dry heat of Guanacaste, the green wall of the South Pacific around Uvita and Ojochal, the Caribbean side, the Central Valley — these are different countries as far as your daily life is concerned, and the region that suits you in year one may not suit you in year five. He spends the low season at the beach, when the crowds are gone and prices drop, and returns to the Central Valley for the high season, when the weather is better and the air...

Costa Rica’s Comptroller General has ordered the country’s national water utility and its public services regulator to identify customers who were billed more than they should have been for water, sewer and hydrant service, and to build a mechanism to pay them back. An audit released today put the improper charges at roughly ₡65.4 billion, about $144 million at the rate of ₡453.59 to the dollar. The report concluded that our Instituto Costarricense de Acueductos y Alcantarillados ( AyA ) and the Autoridad Reguladora de los Servicios Públicos ( Aresep ) failed broadly to comply with the legal, technical and control framework that governs how rates are set. The findings reach into how tariffs are updated, how the money they raise is supervised, how the value of infrastructure is calculated, and whether the five services AyA bills for — drinking water, sewerage, hydrants, protection of water resources and related services — can be sustained. Aresep is the same regulator that sets fue...

Serena and Venus Williams will play doubles together for the first time since 2022 after the Cincinnati Open handed the sisters a wildcard into its women’s doubles draw. Venus also received a singles wildcard, alongside Sloane Stephens, Taylor Townsend, Darja Vidmanova, Elvina Kalieva, Caroline Dolehide and Lois Boisson, for the tournament running Aug. 8 to 23 in Mason, Ohio. The pairing marks the first time the sisters will compete as a team in Cincinnati. Together they have won 14 major doubles titles and three Olympic gold medals, and their last doubles appearance came at the 2022 US Open, a defeat to Czech pair Lucie Hradecka and Linda Noskova in the tournament Serena described at the time as her step away from the sport. Serena, 44, ended that absence this summer. She played doubles at Queen’s Club and at the Berlin Open, without Venus on either occasion, before returning to singles at Wimbledon. Her first-round loss there to 20-year-old Australian Maya Joint...

President Laura Fernández attended Sunday’s solemn Mass for the Virgen de los Ángeles in Cartago, the first Costa Rican head of state to take part in the ceremony since 2023, and sat through a homily in which the officiating bishop named violence, crime, drug trafficking, corruption and poverty as problems the country could no longer afford to look past. The Eucharist began at 9 a.m. on the plaza in front of the shrine and was presided over by Monsignor Mario Enrique Quirós Quirós, bishop of Cartago, with the homily delivered by Monsignor José Manuel Garita Herrera, bishop of Ciudad Quesada. Fernández arrived with her husband, Jeffry Umaña, and was seated to one side of the altar alongside representatives of the country’s supreme powers. Her attendance had been confirmed in advance by Luis Esteban Fernández, vicar and spokesman for the Basílica de Nuestra Señora de los Ángeles. Garita told the congregation that the nation was living through a moment demanding respo...

Drivers in Costa Rica will soon pay substantially less for super gasoline and diesel after regulators approved fuel-price reductions of up to ₡79 per liter. The Public Services Regulatory Authority ( Aresep ), approved the changes on Friday, July 31. The new prices will take effect the day after the resolution is published in the official government newspaper, La Gaceta. Super gasoline will fall by ₡55, from ₡756 to ₡701 per liter. Diesel will receive the largest reduction, dropping by ₡79 from ₡683 to ₡604 per liter. Regular gasoline will remain unchanged at ₡755 per liter. The unusual price structure means super gasoline will cost ₡54 less per liter than regular once the adjustment takes effect. Drivers should still follow the octane recommendation in their vehicle’s owner manual rather than choosing fuel based only on price. The reductions will produce noticeable savings for motorists and businesses that rely on diesel vehicles. Filling a 50-liter tank, equivalent to about ...

If you are flying out of San José today, leave for the airport far earlier than you normally would. A failure in the judicial branch computer systems that immigration officers depend on has forced the San Jose Airport into manual passport processing, and the backlog has already cost travelers their flights. The Dirección General de Migración y Extranjería confirmed on Saturday afternoon that the disruption forced the outright cancellation of one flight. A further 36 passengers missed a JetBlue departure. The problem was first reported around midday and worsened as the afternoon went on, with long lines forming inside the terminal while officers fell back on the physical entry and exit card protocol. In case you are wondering, here is why that slows everything down. When you pass through immigration on your way in or out of Costa Rica, the officer does not simply stamp your passport. Your details are run against databases held by the Poder Judicial, which flag court-ordered tra...

Chris Hemsworth has shared frightening footage from a small-plane flight during his family vacation in Costa Rica, showing lightning flashing outside the aircraft as heavy turbulence shakes the cabin. The sequence appears in a five-minute video posted on the Australian actor’s YouTube channel. Hemsworth films the cockpit and dark storm clouds before several large flashes illuminate the sky around the aircraft. He then turns the camera toward himself with a visibly alarmed expression. Text added to the video describes the experience as a “life-threatening plane ride,” while Hemsworth called it a “crazy plane ride through the lightning” in the video description. The aircraft landed safely, and no injuries were reported. Hemsworth did not identify the airline, flight operator, route or type of aircraft involved. The footage also does not make clear whether his wife, Spanish actress Elsa Pataky, or their three children were aboard during the stormy flight. They appear throughout ...

When people think about buying or selling property in Costa Rica today, they often picture property portals, real estate agents, Realtors and international buyers searching online for their dream home. But that isn’t how Costa Rica built its property market. For generations, Costa Ricans sold property through their communities. A simple “Se Vende” sign outside the gate. A conversation with a neighbour. A recommendation from a friend. Trusted lawyers handling the legal side of the sale. It wasn’t unusual. It was simply the Costa Rican way. As Costa Rica became one of the world’s most desirable places to live, retire and invest, the property market naturally evolved. International buyers needed guidance through an unfamiliar legal process, language and culture, and real estate agents and Realtors became an important part of helping people buy property in Costa Rica with confidence. For many homeowners, that remains exactly the right choice. But somewhere along the wa...