On Costa Rica’s Nicoya Peninsula, a roughly 80-mile-long finger of land south of the Nicaraguan border on the Pacific Coast, researchers identified a group of villages with a significantly higher rate of longevity than the rest of the country. Dan Buettner traveled there to explore what makes a Blue Zone in a developing country.

Centenarian Don Faustino and five generations of his family are pictured on the Nicoya Peninsula in 2007. Nicoyan centenarians tend to live with their families, and children or grandchildren provide support and a sense of purpose and belonging. —Text adapted from the National Geographic book Blue Zones: Lessons for Living Longer From the People Who've Lived the Longest