Tamarindo first population was the Chorotegas indigenas. Later by the colonization time this region was discovered by the Spaniards a year before Nicoya in 1522 by Gil Gonzalez Davila. By 1760 the first Spaniards settled near what is today known as Lagunilla. When the daughter of one of the first settlers, Bernabela Ramos, married, she placed a wooden cross on her house in Delicias, west of the river Diriá. In honor of that cross every year, a rosary prayer was offered. Soon it became a tradition and eventually, the name of the town was changed from Delicias to Santa Cruz (Holy Cross). Eventually the population spreaded through the whole area, including Tamarindo Beach.

Tamarindo's first house ever built