Isla de Ometepe, Nicaragua

An unsuccessful attempt to spend a few nights in a National Park (the bus dropped us off in the middle of no-where and randomly pointed in a vague direction. We couldn’t even see the volcano the national park was on!),  led us straight to the docks where we met up again with our mate Michael. We can’t seem to get enough of him. Ometepe is the indigenous Nahuatl word for ‘Omete’ (two) ‘Tepe’ (mountain). The island was picture-perfect beautiful with the iconic volcano cone shape! The two very distinct volcanoes forming an island in the middle of Lago de Nicaragua. So excited to get there…

Lago de Nicaragua with Ometepe in the middle. I stole this pic from the internet because I forgot to take one myself!

 As we arrived to the docks on a lovely ferry we caught the most fun bus taxi ride to Balgue, a small town at the base of the lesser Volcan Maderas (1394m). We stopped for beers, listened to the worst quality Celine Dion while driving on bumpy roads, it was great fun!  We arrived at Finca Magdalena with horses everywhere! Can’t get away from them…a little racoon on a leash was playing around, and it was sundowner time. Cheers, we watched the sun sink slowly behind the bigger Volcan Concepcion and mingled with the other backpackers. Salud!

Sundowners on the roof of Finca Magdalena with our new mate Alistar.

 Finca Magdalena – what a fantastic hostel! $3.50 for a private room, comfortable and simple. The staff are friendly and the food is cheap and great! That morning we hired a guide to take us up Volcan Maderas for $5 each. He said it will take ‘mas o menos’ 5 hours…oh man, we miscalculated, it’s 5 hours up…and 4.5 hours down. We didn’t bring enough water. The Volcano is overgrown with structurally diverse vegetation that is distinctly separated in 4 ecological stages according to altitude. (Volcan Concepcion only has primary growth because it erupted and killed all the trees, so it’s barren but beautiful). We loved the walk, it was hot and humid in the beginning, but as we reached higher altitude the air was fresh and clean. We saw Wild turkeys, white-faced monkeys, howler-monkeys and of course the amazing view of the other Volcano. The only shitty thing was our group thinking it’s a race and were practically running up the volcano not watching the nature. I didn’t pay 5 bucks to see my feet  and the mud trail!

'Mirador' of Volcan Concepcion, a pleasant view.

 At the top the view was fantastic. Nicaragua is really an under-rated country, the people are friendly, the food is…well chicken & rice, but it’s good! At the view point we finished 90% of our water and still had over 1.5 hours left…to the top! Bad planning…Got to the top and had a great view!

No water, but we saw a Nicaraguan Wild Turkey!

On top of the World in Nicaragua!

 Then we arrived at the Crater Lake. I’ve never seen a Crater Lake before, it’s gorgeous. The vegetation is so lush and everything thrives here due to the incredible fertile soil. A great swim in the lake cooled us down, and got us dirty. It was so peaceful there, I wish we camped up here.

A tiny section of the Crater Lake on Volcan Madera.

 The ‘walk’ back was a breeze. We all unanimously decided cold beer awaited us at the bottom of this Volcano and literally ran down it! It felt like we were in Predator, running through the jungle, we could smell the beer…An almost 5 hour walk turned into about 40min! The guide laughed his ass off. What a great day!  And it was about to get better….

Rob and his machete are in a tight relationship now.  He bought it a few days before and has become disturbingly attached. We asked the Ladies at Finca Magdalena if we can get some coconuts from the plam trees that grew nearby. “Sure, if you can climb them!”. Little did the poor lady know that we had four ‘alpha’-males ready to show one-another what they’ve got! So Rob went up, got some coconuts. Michael followed, then Alistair and Nick…They were all successful and we managed to get at least 15 coconuts. It’s good to exercise to earn a cold drink.

Super Monkey!

And a cold drink it was! After all having a go chopping up the coconuts with the great new method shown to us on Tobacco Caye (Belize) we managed to collect a jug full of all-natural, fresh coconut water; perfect for the rum we had bought! The sweet ladies laughed and were very impressed (and maybe a little regretful?) to see how much coconut juice we got, and got us glasses and ice for a truly enjoyable sundowner. A good job well done!!

Rob's special technique!

We played several games with the other backpackers, Pass the Pigs, card games, 30 seconds and chatted the night away. This is such a beautiful place. The electricity kept tripping and the power failure sometimes lasted 30min at a time. It was a blessing, because out of the bush came hundreds of huge fireflies that lit up the veranda we sat on. What a perfect place…

Our sundowner spot, overlooking Volcan Concepcion.

 Next day we were absolutely determined to have a little braai on the ‘beach’. Rob’s machete is uber-popular and the boys just wanted to chop down trees and go wild! Of course, they did not, and we only chopped up wood we found on the ground…Alistair, Rob and Chrissie went to the beach and collected firewood, bought beers and were ready to make an epic fire! Well, easier said than done. We sucked! Everything was completely drenched from the torrential downpour we had last night, and the fire wouldn’t start. Epic Fail.

After trying & trying to light this damn thing it was a pleasant sight to see the sweet little howler monkeys play in the trees above us, watching us struggle with the fire. The alpha male was particularly interested in us and he kept moving position to make sure he had the best view. He positioned himself right above Rob trying to light the fire…and pissed all over him! Oh, I almost died of laughter! Rob jumped away like James Bond avoiding a death pit and escaped with only a minor Golden Shower by a monkey! (This may or may not be the reason why he got sick in Colombia).

A little more to the right...Rob's Howler Monkey!

Eventually the wood dried and the fire was ablaze. Next mission: get food! We anticipated the shopd selling chicken or something! Nope nothing…and after a third attempt we managed to get a huge (at least 2kg) of unidentified meat from some dodgy café for only $2, a bargain. I made some soasaties and we cooked the meat while watching the most spectacular sunset, chatting with some very friendly locals who gave us mangoes.

Using the wire from our braai grid we could make sosaties.

The food was alright, the sosaties were great. The meat was a bit iffy. Then Alistair found a cyst or something in the meat and we almost threw up, and tossed the rest of the meat to the stray dogs. Gross. Could’ve seen that coming!

Back at the camp we celebrated our last night on this fantastic island with more card games and chats with the great people. We cleared our bill - $55 each for 3 full days, of eating, drinking and hiking. Not bad!! We woke up at 4:30am to catch the local bus to the pier where we set off to Costa Rica. Good-bye Nicaragua, you are an amazing country.

Warning: you are on an active Volcano!

Volcano Surfing!

So we had heard that in Leon, Nicaragua you could do what is considered by some to be an extremely dangerous and manly sport, surf down the side of an active volcano! How could we possibly pass up a chance to be cooler than we already are (I know, I know most of you can’t believe we could get cooler, but keep reading). So we signed up and prepared to surf!

Volcan Cerro Negro when it erupts, spewing it's lava out it's base. Bad-ass!

 We woke up in the morning of the day in question and had a hearty breakfast.  Who knew, it could hve been our last! Then we played some pool and messed around the hostel. Finally the time came for our surfing trip. So we all loaded onto our huge orange truck slash tank (it had a hatch and everything!) and headed out to our adventure. The truck itself was simply the front car and a carriage at the back that was covered by an orange tarp on top and not covered on the sides at all.

We were all excited about what was to come, little did we know it was going to come sooner than expected, we had a massive torrential downpour on the way there! I don’t mean “oh no we got a little wet” I mean the roads were turned to rivers within minutes and all the staff clambered through the aforementioned hatch and left us to fend for ourselves on the back!

Ten bucks if you can see a guide.

Well the rain really came down! And everyone was soaked to the bone! Not only this but the weight of the water  really weighed  the surrounding tree branches down, which let them slap us around and deposit every sort of creepy crawly in the forest directly into the back with us, if not on us! But we soldiered on and eventually the rain slowed and stopped.

We arrived at the entrance to the national park and saw the volcano we had come to conquer ominously watching over the valley ahead of us. Volcán Cerro Negro is the youngest volcano in Central America, having first appeared in April 1850, and has had a record breaking number of eruptions  for the basaltic cinder cone type volcano which it is, these volcanoes usually erupt only a few times, mostly only once. But this one has erupted at least 23 times, and is very much still active. What makes this volcano unique is that the lava doesn’t flow from the cone, like typical volcanoes, it spews from the bottom…killing all life while ash is shot out from the top. Evidence of this was clearly seen, it looked like a fire had just gone through the área. Although on ‘orange alert’ the last eruption was in 1999.

The menacing Volcan Cerro Negro.

At the entrance to the park we found a little shop and bought four beers (one for having survived the trip there and one for after the surf).  Having got this vital bit of work out of the way we were kitted out in our prison orange overalls and safety goggles to help stop the ash and pebbles from blinding you. Then came the crème de la crème, the super advanced high tech volcano surfing boards, guaranteed to protect you from gasses, extreme heat and extreme awesome for the surf down…No, not actually; the boards are in fact pieces of plywood which have a rectangular piece of tin nailed beneath it so it can slide smoothly and a piece of plastic rope connected to the front which you pull up to allow the stones to slide under your board.

Team eXtreme ready to go...

 Sorted! Now for the walk up the volcano… Well it is dead everywhere and you walk along this path made of small rocks from the volcano, they are all black, hence the volcanoes name. So we walked along this path for a while as our guide explained about the volcano’s history. After walking for about half an hour we came to a ridge and as we got to the top of it we were met with a site out-of-this-world. The volcano crater beneath us was steaming and spewing out sulphur all over the place and fine layers of yellow crystals adorned the rocks alongside pure white crystals (obviously crystalized sulphur and calcium deposits). This also heralded the summit of our walk, we just had to follow alongside the ridge to the designated surfing area.

*Just out of frame tons of lava and dragons

Having arrived we saw there was a group ahead of us so we wandered around the volcano taking photos and chatting, we even stumbled across a toad living near the top of the volcano ridge, I wonder how he lives with such sensitive skin with such harsh gasses around. I mean I could feel the burn in my throat, lungs and eyes.

So now having explored the area the moment of truth arrived. Our instructor took her board and showed us how to sit on it and how to steer (this entirely involved of sticking your feet into the ground until you swung in the desired direction). We were also told the speed records for the run and the prizes for breaking one of the records, for the men it was to hit 80 km/h and you would win five free mojitos, for the girls it was an astonishing 87 km/h which was claimed by an Israeli girl who didn’t understand the safety instructions before and just sat on her board and flew down the hill! 

Hypno-toad does not need air! All Hail the Hypno-toad!

With an air of cockiness our grouped moved to the surfing area, a few people volunteered to go first so we watched as they slid down, both of them wiped out several times and neither seemed to get any significant speed. After a few more people Chrissie and I decided that it was our time to go, so we volunteered and walked up to the edge side by side. We sat down on our boards and pushed off, I (Rob) shot ahead initially and thought to myself the mojitos are in the bag. That is until I hit a speed wobble which resulted in me eating dirt and rolling down the side of the volcano with my board trailing behind.

I just realised we get free beer & cookies at the bottom :)

"Watch how fast I'm gonna go!"

 As I came to a stop I shook myself off and looked up only to see Chrissie barrelling down on me at a rate of knots! I leapt out of her way as she sailed by me at about a hundred and fifty miles an hour, only to wipe out herself! We clambered back onto our boards and tried to get our speed up again before the spot where they measure your speed but alas due to a few more falls and the ground being stickier due to the moisture neither of us won the coveted mojitos! This may have been a blessing however, as we learnt the previous week or so ago a person was trying to break the record for the guys, he managed to equal it before coming short just after they had clocked him at 80 km/h and breaking a wrist, collar bone and several ribs, but apparently he had his mojitos before they took him to the hospital…

This is exactly how Rob dodged Chrissie.

Our times were not that impressive (25 km/h more or less) but we still had celebratory beers on the way home and the hostel even gave us two free mojitos each for effort! 

One more thing...

Village People called, they want their member back!

Extreme Nicaragua, land of Volcanoes

Nicaragua is gorgeous! It's lush and the skies are rich with clouds and storms. The first thing we noticed is the abundance of horses, still a predominant means of transport. The second thing we noticed is the abundance of Volcanoes!!! We got so excited to see all the volcanoes, scattered sporadically across the land. Their shape is so iconic and really lets my imagination run wild!

One of the many Volcanoes seen in the distance in Nicaragua.

We arrived in the dark to Leon, and thankfully Michael remembered the name to a hostel: BigFoot. It was very clean and comfortable, but lights out after 11pm and no outside alcohol allowed in made it feel like a school trip. nevertheless we had a very enjoyable time there playing pool, swimming, chatting and much more!

Street food is the best! I can't express how amazing it is, the flvours, the richness, y es muy economico! We endulged in some great street food, the typical rice & beans, grilled chicken and tortillas. A huge plate all for  less than $1. Heaven! We ate at some place, and my zero Spanish had no idea what I was eating. Eventually immitated a cow, nope, not a cow, then I baaed like a sheep and they said something and giggled, so we think it's goat or something. I don't really care it was delicious! Feel like a complete retard not being able to communicate with the locals though. No Espanol no es bueno!

The amazing street food 'stall', packed with pollo (chicken) and carne (meat).

 

La Ceiba to Leon, Nicaragua

This is more for people who want to travel between the two cities, which is quite common. Honduras isn't the safest of places, and Capital cities are generally great places to avoid. We got a taxi to the La Ceiba bus terminal at 3:00am. Took a long bus (Christina) to Tegus (Honduras Capital), another bus to Choluteca (to the west) and then another collectivo to la frontera (the boarder). We were completely bombarded by people, and it was luxurious to have so much room for haggling, got a A/C bus for cheap, great day.

As the collectivo stopped at the boarder I noticed a plathora of horses! Oh no- I'm allergic, and they were everywhere! Michael, Rob and I jumped into the first Central American style Rickshaw and drove off. The boarder is so chilled, Rob waited with our bags while I got the passports stamped. As we crossed over the bridge the man who was cycling us across told us to say we are in transit from El Salvador and paid $6. There was no time to ask why, and I pulled the stupid "I don't speak any Spanish" told them what I was ordered to and had no worries going across. Don't know what that was on about, but it was all relaxed.

We continuously asked the guy how much he is charging us for this trip. "Just give me what you feel like"...ja, whatever. We almost arrived and he wanted 200 cordobas each ($9). Hahahaha, funny joke. There's no way he got that, gae him 50, and that was 20 more than I wanted to give him. It was a hard bargain but he could see we weren't going to budge. Plus I thought it was really amusing that he actually asked for that much, I was laughing and it was a losing battle for him.

The same bugger tried to get us to get in a collectivo to Leon over over 1000 cordobas. Oh my sack, what is he on?! We got a chicken bus for 40. Never trust those guys, and always take the breesy chicken buses! Please don't be a stupid tourist and give locals that much money, it's robbery and if it happens once, they will get naggy and annoying!

Pico Bonito & Carnival in La Ceiba, Honduras

La Ceiba is hosting its annual Carnival this week, and Michael, Rob and I were lucky to have a couchsurfing host to show us around this pretty city. We arrived at the port, got a taxi to an internet café and waited to meet our host.  While we waited in there, a man knocked on the window and pointed to a lady across the road looking for directions. We thought it was Andrea, our host, but as we turned around, Michaels small bag was gone! They tricked us, and were bloody quick. Damn! Luckily there was nothing  too important in there, as Mike had just taken his camera, passport, diary etc out 5 min beforehand. Lucky...

Met  Andrea! An amazing girl!! She took us to her lovely house and we chatted the night away. Late in the night 2 more couchsurfers arrived from the US, who have made an amazing journey from Patagonia to Honduras. The next moring we walked to the closest road leading towards Parque National Pico Bonito. The city was crazy with traffic and large floats being prepared for the carnival. Being paranoid, I didn't bring my camera, so I have no pics. We hitchiked up the road to the entrance of the National Park. where we hiked all morning.

Robbie in the National Park getting fresh water from the waterfall.

 This place is really picturesque. There is a mountain range here in La Ceiba, which has a beautiful river that flows along it that is great for rafting. We walked across a suspension bridge, while the boys slid over in a rickety cage. Very funny watching them expecting the cage to slide fast across the cables, when it just stop mid way!

Over the bridge we go! Rob, Mike and Michael slowly paddling across the river at Pico Bonito.

 The hike was great - very humid. The jungle is so awesome, it's just like every David Attenborough documentary. We saw very distinct tracks running through the forest flood, looked like someone had scrapped all the vegetation away, but it's very clear that it was all due to Leaf Cutter Ants! Beautiful, and highly efficient. Some trees were completely stripped by these ants, and there didn't seem to be any sign of them stopping.  We also saw a little lizard, completely camouflaged with it's head shaped like a leaf.

Honduran lead-cutter ants on their mission to clean up the jungle!

Beautifully camouflaged lizard, note the shape of its head.

 We walked to our goal: the waterfall. As we arrived a bright green snake was slowly slimbing the leaves up the waterfall! Yay, I love snakes. As I was about to let the cold water splash all over me I looked up to see where the snake was, and right then it's went, BAAM, splat right next to me! The silly snake slipped. Got a great view of it though, so smooth and pretty.  We had a lovely day walking around. The area is beautiful and the scenery is really calming. We natuarlly had our after-hike beer at a beautiful lodge, where a red Macaw had been tamed and screeched !Hola!.

Pretending it meant to fall out of the bushes and onto the rocks!

All of us, with Andrea in the middle next to me, enjoying the cold, refreshing water!

!Hola! Buenos dias...

After that hike it was time for an epic meal, and we did not skimp on the meal at all. We went to a  local vendor on the street, and ordered the grande..the biggest roti with everything on it! It was so large I had to video tape the awesomeness. Delicious and cheap!!

The most amazing tortilla...mmmmmm!

That night we went out to see the Carnival. Too bad we missed the parades, it took us all a while to get ready with over  8 people needing to shower and get ready. But it was nothing short of amazing! Andrea is a fantastic host, she took us to the main road where everyone was covered in beads, sombreros, with beers and glow sticks. The men liked the beads more than the ladies :) We saw some amazing bands, and all danced the night away. It's hilarious, the men where on stage dancing and inviting all the ladies to come shake their asses. And Boy, can those ladies move! The decendants from West Africa have a unique culture here and are called the Garifuna. Their traditional dance is called the Punta, which basically entails gyrating your butt to quickly I couldn't even try to try it! Brilliant!

Yo no quiero agua, Yo quiero bebidas!! (I don't want water, I want to drink) came blearing out of the speakers and we all joined in singing & dancing. Was a fantastic night, and Andrea and I stayed up chatting long after everyone had gone to sleep back at home. A truely amazing day was followed by a delicious meal - veggie green curry with amazing vietnamese rolls. Our feast was a great way to say thanks to the lovely people we met here in Honduras.

Andrea and I cooking the delicious curry!

Home-made Vietnamese rolls...

Utila Diving

Utila is a major diving hotspot and is world renowned for it’s cheap diving courses. We decided to spend a week here doing our Advanced Divers license ($260). The boat trip there was the worst possible design for a speedboat - you can't get fresh air or see the horizon and is aptly named off the 'vomit comet'. Go onto the docks just in time to avoid seeing some people chundering. Were completely bombarded by dive schools trying to get you to see their place. I love it, being African has completely prepared me for hoards of people begging and hassling you. It’s a great way to get good deals if there’s so much competition! Unfortunately Utila has pretty much standardized diving prices, so we went to Parrots as the girl spoke Dutch and we were talking Afrikaans to her. Lovely place, great atmosphere!

Parrots in Utila...

Signed up for our Advanced, but needed a stupid medical certificate to get my asthma checked out, I hate that – R200 wasted! Stayed at the nicest place on the island: Ruby’s Inn ($20/room) with an incredibly kind owner, Tony Ruby. Met two beautiful Canadians – Haley and Niki, whom we immediately befriended and celebrated being on a beautiful island together having sundowners watching the huge red sun in the distance. Yes, life was great…

Haley and Nikki, our lovely Kenuks!

That night we had a great party – everyone was in a great mood. Haley & Niki were starting their divers and were so excited. We partied with them, drinking at a few pubs – one in particular is worth mentioning; The Treehouse/ Jade’s Seahorse Garden. It was beautifully decorated with bottles and had a fantastic psychedelic feel to it. Afterwards we went to a few other bars where Niki, Haley, Rob and I danced like freaks , good memories were made.

Hundreds of colourful bottles decorating this lovely Guest House.

 Woke up the next day, went for a refreshing swim off the docks at Ruby’s and went back to sleep. Walked around the island and met a nice girl whom we had met the night before  – black eye, bloodshot eyeball looking shocked. Oh my god, what happened? Someone followed her home that night, waited until she was asleep, opened her door (she left it open for her friend to come home), took his shirt off and strangled her. Thankfully she is alright, shaken up, but she is one brave cookie: she fought him off and he made a run for it. That poor girl, she got a huge shock and was understandably frightened. We are so proud of her for fighting for her life and being so brave about it. All the best to her, we wish you a speedy recovery and you should be proud of yourself for turning a dangerous situation around – you are a trooper.

We were all shocked about this news, of course. Tony Ruby was amazing, he hired a guard to watch the premises and especially her door, changed the locks and was really supportive. Sunday was a crap day, just feel bad for letting our guard slip because we are on holiday. Shit happens, even in paradise.

Monday we started our divers! Yay! Walked into the office to have a pre-dive tutorial with our awesome Dive Master Javi from Spain. And guess who we saw? Our favourite Dane – Michael. I think he’s stalking us :P This was the beginning of the rest of his travels in Central America with us, and we have had tons of awesome stories. First dive Night Diving. It was full moon and really beautiful. I felt like there were too many people and we kept bumping into each other, otherwise it was fun and we saw bioluminescent plankton.

One of the many fish we saw during our dives on Utila island.

Had a lekker braai that night that turned into a bit of a party. Took half a bottle of terrible booze and a can of lighter fluid to start the coals! No wood on this island...Spatchcocked a chicken and had a fantastic dip with all of us joining in. The water is warm and beautiful.

Woke up late for our diving the next day - Deep Dive & Peak Performance Bouyancy Dive - very fun. Saw an egg float like the death star at 30m deep. Fun stuff. Enjoyed the coral here - it's a wall dive and we saw tons of types of coral, all colours and a span of fish. Really stunning. Relaxed all day and went for two more dives the next day - Wreck Diving & Navigation. Great fun the wreck diving was fantastic! As we jumped off the boat into the deep blue water, we couldn't see anything below us - just sheer blueness. Then the outline of the ship appeared and it was like discovering it for the first time. Amazing, wreck diving is probably my favourite after wall dives. We could swim through the Captain's bridge. They had cut the cargo ship's deck off so we could swim inside - wow! Can't believe how quickly the coral has grown over the ship, it's minimal now, but give it another 20 years and hopefully it'll create a wonderful ecosystem.

A stunning cowfish swimming amongst the coral.

 Spent a wonderful night with our mates, "watched" hockey. Rugby is better. Spent the last night with two extra fun dives which were the most enjoyable. Michael was on our little diving exhibit and we saw 3 beautiful turtles, one when we were snorkelling during our surface interval. On our last dive my weight belt fell off and I almost shot to the surface - not cool. Swam down and managed to get it back on with the help from my Buddy Rob!

We spotted this little guy during our SI, watched it swim, feed and come up to breathe. Stunning!

An interesting point to note of Utila was the awareness of the invasive Lion Fish that have colonised and completely taken over in the Atlantic/Caribbean. I knew about the lion fish, and how their population has exploded much to the detriment of the endemic fish species. Posters and flyers were everywhere raising awareness of these (and other) invasive species. Lion fish are endemic to the Pacific coast, but have been introduced (e.g. people flushing them down the toilet when they don't want them as pets anymore) into the Caribbean. They are predators, and the local fishes lack the natural 'fear' to evade them, so all local fishies get eaten by the fat invasive lion fish. They are decimating the indigenous population, and management efforts are trying to find an effective way to decrease their population. But sofar, the easiest and most efficient method is through manual removal. Die lion fish die!

Lion fish are invasive and must be removed to conserve the ecosystem, Headshot!

The last day we went snorkelling around the island, free diving down to check out what creatures live in the airconditioners, tyres etc that is rubbish at the bottom of the ocean. We found a whole population of Lobsters! We thought about catching one and eating it, but that was quickly forgotten as they are so beautiful and their population is being severely over-fished. We kept the location a secret and hope that no-one will find them and eat them! 

Met Michael the next day and we went to La Ceiba together to couchsurf at a girl named Andreas house for Carnival.

We saw a pub with the SA flag (upside down though!) and were super excited! Our mate Rick from Oz..

Rick, Chissie and Nikki with the delicious coconuts we opened to make a snack and juice for Rum!