Travelling Nica

San Juan del Sur, 20.1.-21.1.2012

This was our first weekend trip! There were a lot of volunteers with us and we all stayed in the same hostel, actually in the same room and the hostel had the same name as our organisation, La Esperanza! So funny.
The best thing around this quite touristic place is the beach we went to. It is called La Maderas and you have to take one of these shuttles provided by the hostels. We had a cool, exciting ride on a pick up and then enjoyed this great beach with only one hostel and one bar and one beachvolleyballcourt! Yeah, the most important thing for me, and I really did not care that the net was only about 2m high...haha. We had a great time there playing, relaxing and jumping into the waves!

The nightlife is good in SJDS and you can also have great food, but it is really a touristic place, full of australian surfers... who likes this, is really welcome here. 

Corn Islands: Or in other words: Paradise on earth! ( 7.2.-12.2.12 )

 
As magdalena had some problems with her leg and knee, we decided not to take the long trip by bus to the caribean coast and then take a ferry to the corn islands, but we just booked a flight from managua directly to Great Corn Islands. In the end, this was a great idea as everything was quite easy and comfortable. The 1h flight in a small turboprop (my university friends now will for sure think of our prof mundt...hah) was not that bad and the airport was just sooo small. Actually only one little room where they check again the passports.
We arrived at our Paraiso hotel and got a quite nice cabana, which is like a bungalow. The main sights and most interesting things were:
To climb, well actually only walk up, the Mount Pleasant. Our taxidriver took us to a place where we started the tour, after about 20 min we passed some houses and did not know which way to go now. We met a nice woman and she asked her son to guide us up to the mount pleasant. So did he and we followed this 9 year old boy and his dog through the forest. Up there we had a great view around the island and the boy took some nice pix while waiting for us to go back.
The rest of the day we had amazing walks along lonely beaches... just look at the fotos.
Both nights we stayed at Great Corn Island, we had dinner at "Comedor Maris". It is not a restaurant, but we had dinner right on the terrasse of Maris, which cooks for her guests in her own house, well, kitchen. She is so nice and cooks the best fish, lobster and shrimp we ever had! It was amazing and we really felt a bit at home at her house as she was so friendly and nice with us. 

 
The 3rd day we took the boat to Little Corn Island. It is only a small boot for around 20 people and the ride takes about 30 to 45 min, depending how the weather is alike. The funny thing is, that the boat men charge the doble amount if it is bad weather, kind of a risk surcharge... But we were lucky and had quite good weather so that we got only a bit wet during the ride ( besides of the aches in our ases as the boat is jumping up and down due to the waves... )
Arriving on Little Corn Island was like entering paradise ! This little island is only about 2km long and not even 1km wide. There are no cars but only bikes and well, the whole island with its people is so damn relaxed! Everything and everyone is soooo slow, the walking, the serving, the thinking... everything! At first, we were wondering why it take them so long to serve a fresh juice but then after only some hours we were already used to the sllooooowness and got relaxed like them.

We met there our volunteer friends from Germany and had a nice snorkeling trip together with them in Davids boat. This guy is so crazy! He is laughing, talking and saying "my friend, my friend" all the time and besides the snorkeling tours he also invites his clients to dinner at his house, where his wife does some nice "pasta rasta" with a fresh fish. We had this dinner with him at this very simple house and then he looked for some coconuts in his garden, opened them quickly, put some ron in it and so we all had a great "coco loco" cocktail after the dinner. It is hard to explain but the whole situation was so weird, 5 german foreigners arriving at his house, then his daughter had to put the table and the chairs while his wife was preparing the dishes... and after the dinner seeing him doing the cocoloco. Great. Authentic...
The snorkeling tour was also very cool, we saw sharks, baracudas and some rays!

Having fun in the sea

Having fun in the sea

 

 

Another strange but in the end quite cool thing happened when we had a walk to the north of the island. We were not really sure about the way back as we didnt want to take the same we arrived, and then arrived at a resort which seemed totally empty, well, only 4 yelling dogs... fortunately we found a woman sitting in one of the cabanas and she explained us the way to our hotel. After having talked to her, the dogs changed her behaviour completely and did show us almost the whole way back to our hotel ! The really led us and waited again and again, taking care that we follow them. Incredible!
Well, summarzing Corn Islands we have to say that these 2 islands are really paradise ! Amazing beaches with almost nobody, great seafood, relaxed and friendly people speaking either spanish and or englisch, we really had great vacations there and we didnt want to leave there.

Our Breakfast Restaurant from Casa Iguana

We found, opened and ate a coco!! 

 
Some recommendations for sleeping and eating:

Great Corn Island:
El Paraiso Club, 60 Dollars a cabana for 1 night, not cheap, but we loved it.
Eating: Comedor Maris, for us a definitiv MUST GO there. Take a cab.

Little Corn Island:
Casa Iguana: Great, relaxed resort with many trees, flowers etc. 35 Dollars a cabana, with shared bathroom and seaview. Great breakfast on the terrasse with amazing view, supposed to have the best view from a restaurant there.
Eating: Restaurant Colores best view? Mangos Pizza. And try the famous rondon, or how they write it on Little Corn: Run Down! It is like a seafood stew ! Delicious!
Restaurant Turtle at the hotel Little Corn Beach Bungalows. Great atmosphere and delicious food, esp. lobster!
Do not forget to take a pocket lamp!

Thanks to all who made the days there to an unforgettable experience !
MM

Isla de Ometepe, 8.3.2012 - 11.3.2012

Isla de Ometepe is a really relaxed island with two vulcanos, Volcan Maderas and Volcan Concepion. Before we went to Ometepe everyone said that the streets are quite bad, but I didnt believe it...We arrived at 6.30pm and it took us 1.5 hours to get to our hostel which wasn´t that far away...and you see the map above how small Ometepe is...

We were with my sister Katharina and her friend Arzu, really great company...first day we went to Ojo de Agua, a very quite laguna with crystal clear water, and after that we enjoyed some great fish! The rest of the afternoon we walked around the island, walked along the Playa and got back on the bus (which took us again about one hour to go back to the hostel)

at the waterfall

our pick up!!

sunset at Isla de Ometepe

  

Michael at the playa

the only bus operating on Ometepe

The second day we went to a waterfall which we thought is a nice and easy two hour hike...but in fact, it wasn´t. It was super hot and after 20 minutes we weren´t even close to the waterfall. But we were lucky because a big pick up stopped and gave us a lift...for the afternoon we rented kayaks which is always an adventure, especially with the wind there. But it was great fun and we got back safely!! Isla de Ometepe is definitely a must to see, if only for the special, relaxed atmosphere!

Leon - Playa, Vulcano Boarding and Culture 23.3.-25.3.12

Leon, a city in the north of Nicaragua and quite close to the beach was our last weekendtrip while volunteering. We had 3 great days, one at the beach, one at the vulcano Cerro Negro where we did a nice 1h hike, saw 3 craters and did the vulcanboarding and on the 3rd day we visited some museums and churches.

Look at THIS jump! hahaha

 

Playa Penitas - high waves and dark sand

on the top of vulcano Cerro Negro with her board!

one of the craters with gas coming out

vulcanobooarding !! Magdalena 

Leon City, chicos jugando futbol

mmhh...delicious cakes and icecream

On top of Revolucion Museum with view to the Cathedral and the vulcanos behind

Trip to the north, our last trip in Nicaragua, 30.3.-2.4.12
Matagalpa, Selva Negra, Esteli, Somoto, Miraflor

Matagalpa, Selva Negra

This is a Eco Tourism Resort in a huge forest and huge farm of coffee and animals. They produce almost everything by themselves and the best is, as the owners are germans, they produce delicous cheese! We had a big plate of cheese for dinner and for lunch the next day as we loved it !! As there is nothing to do in the evening, we went to bed around 8.30 pm and woke up quite early to do some hikes in the forests. One of these we did not finish because we heard a very strange, loud and frightening sound of any animal, that we definetly did not want to meet.. haha.

 

Esteli

This is another nice city in the north, where around 20 years ago the revolution in nicaragua had his base and main supporters. We stayed in a nice hostel, Luna,  which supports with all his revenue a eco community in the hills of Miraflor. The owner is a former volunteer from England and it was really nice there.

Canyon of Somoto

WOOOW! This was a funny trip with our volunteer friend Matthew from the UK who we met by accident in our hostel in Esteli. We took the bus to Somoto and were met by our guide Olvin, who took us to his house where his mother already waited for us to ask what we wanted to have for lunch after our trip. Then we went a nice hike to the canyon and then started to walk, swim trough the canyon. After a while we had to jump from some rocks in the water to go on and then we arrived a huuuge rock from where our guide jumped ! It was around 20m high and incredible that this crazy guy really jumped. I actually wanted to do the same, but he did not let me to do it, as it can really hurt if you fall in the water not in the correct way. So we kept on and looked for another rock for me and Magdalena to jump... we found one which was around 13m high. We both went up with the guide and jumped down! amazing! Ok, it took us a few minutes to do it, but in the end we both were proud of ourselves and overloaded with adrenalin....

 

 

Miraflor

We decided to stay the last night ouf our trip to the northern part of Nicaragua at a local family in Miraflor. This so called community tourism is a way for the people of Miraflor to earn some money. You pay a fixed price of 22$ and this includes your own room and three meals per day. Bear in mind, you live with a Nicaraguan famliy, so you are likely to have rice and beans three times a day. But dont worry, you get used to it!

We decided to stay in Coyolito with Nelson, his wife Lorena, his son Feli and his daughter Nelsie. They were really friendly and welcoming. When we arrived in Coyolito, we were picked up by Feli at the street. From there, it was a 25min uphill walk. Nelsons house has an amazing view over Miraflor. Right after our arrival, we were offered some nice coffee and some beans, eggs and tortillas. After that, Nelson showed us the nearby mirador, the waterfall and we stopped by his parents house to say hello. After lunch, we had a little nap in the hammock before we helped Nelson in the garden. This was tiring but it also made us feel we are part of the family. After a quick shower, we helped Lorena in the kitchen and then enjoyed a great dinner with the entire family.

People go to bed earlier there, so we were in bed at 8.30pm. I think I have not been in bed that early for ages, but this way we could also get up at 6am the next day without any problems. Our bus already left at 8am and we had to say goodbye. Even if we just stayed one night, it was a great and worthwhile experience! Thanks a lot to Nelson and his family!