The computer has died and I´ve been either away from internet, hungover or too lazy in the last few days to write any posts. Will be back up and running ASAP.
In Costa Rica at the moment and not loving it, so not a lot to report anyway. Its like the Gold Coast here and we´ve all got massive culture shock. Making our way to Panama early in the New Year.
Happy new year to everybody from us! Much love.
Huge love to Marie and Julia- two very, very awesome German ladies that we’ve become great friends with over the past two weeks.
You make a lot of close friends on a journey like this, but only a handful of them are as special as the two of you. I know we’ll be friends for a long time to come.
Can’t wait to see you both in Germany next year.
xxx
Very chilled beach day on Playa Hermosa yesterday – a lot of laying around and a little bit of surfing. There must have been a school of fish close to the shore because there were hundreds of seagulls and pelicans flying around and bombing into the water to catch them. A very cool sight to see.
Last night was Open Mic night at a hostel called Pacha Mamas, so we headed there to catch up with everyone. Big night, much pain this morning… actual physical pain because Josh squirted chilli sauce in my face and I fell on my ass. It’s bruised and I cant sit down. Josh and I aren’t friends any more.
We spent three days in Popoyo, a tiny beach town on the west coast of Nicaragua, doing a whole lot of nothing but having a lot of fun in the process. There were 11 of us staying in a very basic hostel right on the beach and the days consisted of swimming, walking on the beach, frisbee, eating and cards (a whole lot of cards).
One night we had a very cool bonfire out on the beach – the stars were amazing and Mark played guitar. Liam got an amazing long exposure shot with all of the stars which I will have to put up when I get my hands on it.
We’re now back in San Juan Del Sur at Casa De Olas for a few nights until we move into our place on Thursday. Christmas is going to be a lot of fun, though we’re all a little concerned for our health…
We spent our first two days in León on an amazing beach called Playa Los Brasiles, a beautiful beach about 30 minutes east of León. The hostel organises transport for $1 each way, which includes a shuttle and a boat ride over the river.
You hang out at a little hostel / hotel at the beach called Surfing Turtle Lodge which has little cabanas to sit under, a beach volleyball court, food, bar and lovely staff- all travelers who are “volunteering” there to stay for free. Not a bad place to spend a few months while not spending any money.
The beach is really similar to an Australian beach, though the sand is a little darker. The water was amazing and the surf was perfect – not too big but still enough waves to be fun.
We were only intending to go to the beach for one day, but it was so nice – and we were so hungover the next day – that we decided to go back for another day. We spent a lot of time playing frisbee, volleyball, eating, playing cards, swimming and relaxing. Yesterday it rained a bit, so Kel and Mark (yet another Aussie with an amazing voice and skills on the guitar) had a jam. We even released some just hatched baby turtles into the ocean… we’ll we put them in the sand, they didnt really move.
It was a pretty perfect way to spend two days, but yesterday we put on our adventure pants again and hike up a volcano to toboggan down it. A group of 7 of us headed out to Cerro Negro, a volcano about an hours (very bumpy) drive out of León. The hike up was relatively easy, though the big volcano boards made it a little harder. The volcano is actually the youngest in Central America and the last time it erupted was in 1996 (circa). If you dig your foot into the rocks a little you can feel the intense heat coming out of it.
We donned our very attractive, bright orange jump suits and googles and watched sunset over other volcanos and the ocean while we waited for our go. We had a bet going between the seven of us – whoever clocked the fastest speed would be bought a drink by everyone else. Surprisingly – to no one more than myself – I clocked the fastest speed from our group at 56km per hour with everyone falling dismally behind me at about 35km an hour. There were a few bail outs and a some minor injuries, but nothing too serious.
Last night we all celebrated a little too hard and are not looking forward to the 5/6/7 hour journey we need to make on chicken buses today from León to Popoyo, a surf town further south on the Nicaraguan coast.
A fairly uneventful day yesterday. We rose early to check out Ojo De Agua on Ometepe but it turns out we were a little too early – the gate was closed and, although we made it through, there was a bunch of cows seemingly protecting the entrance to the springs. Kel tried to make it around, but one of the cows almost charged him so we decided to bail instead of being trampled by a heard of deadly cows.
We said goodbye to Marie and Julia for the next few days and spent the rest of the day traveling – we took the very slow ferry from Ometepe to Rivas and then were convinced by a taxi driver doing the hard sell that there were no buses on a Sunday, so we taxi-d it all the way to León, getting lost only once along the way when he convinced us that there was in fact two different Leóns (we have a strong suspicion he was fleecing us – no matter).
Had a few drinks last night and are setting out today to see the sights of León (of which I don’t think there are many). Tomorrow we go volcano boarding and then – most likely – make our way aback to San Juan Del Sur.
Today we rented bikes on across the road from our hotel in Ometepe and set out for a lovely relaxing bike ride and hike to a waterfall on the other side of the island. Turns out it was not so much relaxing as it was hard, with the road quickly turning from pavement to very, very rough rocks. On top of that it seems that we underestimated the distance and just how long it would take us to get there- with the bke ride being 2 hours and the hike close to 4 hours we wouldn’t have made it back to our hotel before dark, so we decided to grab a drink before heading back.
We found a cool little (tiny) restaurant on the water that had locals doing their washing and bathing in the lake out the front, a bunch of guys playing the guitar and singing The Beatles, and a very cool view of the volcano just around the corner.
We made it back unscathed, but very happy to see the paved road again. Tomorrow we head to some springs called Ojo de Agua and then leg it to Leon to do some volcano boarding. We’re missing the beach already, so after that we head back to San Juan Del Sur for an extra week in paradise.
We left the beautiful San Juan Del Sur today, bound for Ometepe. Omatepe is an island on Lake Nicaragua dominated by two volcanos.
The ride over took about an hour and was very rough on a very old boat, so all of us were more than happy to get off when we arrived. The island is extremely beautiful, quite undeveloped still with amazing views of at least one volcano wherever you are.
Tomorrow we’re thinking of renting some scooters and checking out the island for a day. We could potentially climb a volcano but the memory of Acatenango is still pretty fresh, so not sure if that will happen!
Beach day today with the gang from the hostel as well as Kelvin and ML. Sun, swim and volleyball – not a bad day at all.
Tomorrow we leave San Juan Del Sur for Ometepe, an island with two volcanos we will (read: may) climb and apparently a lot more stuff to do. After that we’ll head up to the north of Nicaragua for a few weeks and then back here to San Juan for Chrissie. Bloody bueno.
We spent this morning fishing with a bunch of awesome people that we met at the hostel here. For once we weren’t all Australians- we had a 50% contingent of representatives from around the world: Germans (Julia and Marie), an American (Andy), a Canadian (Jessica), Englishman (Ben) plus the 50% Aussies Glen, Josh, Vanessa, Kel and I.
Managed to catch 2 tuna and 2 giant trevallies, though the family didn’t represent today as we were letting the amatuers have a go (HA!). Tonight we’re cooking them up into fish tacos and ceviche for everybody at the hostel. Muy rico!
Making the most of what comes & least of what goes 