Nicaragua

Another interesting border crossing.  Very hard to find out where to go but luckily the car hire company was on hand to help. Lines of trucks several kilometre’s long would take days for them to go through border. 

But such long walks with bags between places.  Of course the usual pay money to exit and enter but a new one was the $1 for the lady on the Nicaraguan side to open the door (obligatory payment).

Off to San Juan Del Sur – supposedly a good surfing town – actually not so it was another beach a taxi ride away.  I think we knew this town would not suit us when still in the taxi a man tried to sell us sunglasses and w… and another a few minutes later the same.

Prettyish beach, an odd colour sand –  I guess a mix of volcanic black and white.  Lots of small local huts one end with large bars and restaurants the other. Walking around though it all feels a bit seedy and does not have (for us) a particularly good vibe. It is colourful though and I like the style of buildings.

It is also the first time I have ever seen a line of power poles down the middle of a beach  – wonder if there used to be a road before climate change took back land.

Food though is another matter, we have found some nice food – more variety and cheaper than over in Costa Rica.

At the top of a hill near the beach is a huge Jesus statue, we did think about walking up there but it was a very long steep walk and as we are not really interested in the subject decided against it – plus it was raining.

Not being enamoured with this town we left earlier than planned and headed to Managua to sort out a trip to the Corn Islands.

We stopped on the way to take a picture of Ometepe island and the 2 volcanoes, it turned out that Concepcion the bigger had erupted the day before, first time since 2010.  Pity we did not know as it was only 20 mins from where we were staying, would have been great to see.

One of our main reasons in coming to Nicaragua – apart from cheaper going overland was to go up Masaya Volcano, a very active volcano that is great for photography.  Again lady luck is not with us as at the end of April there was a landslide and the volcano is currently closed.

The airline website for the Corn Islands in the end was very misleading about baggage but lucky we did have time here in a hotel right opposite the airport as we went back and forth over the road 5 times trying to solve the baggage issue. (you were only allowed a small check in bag and all ours were too big, we thought they might let us take one bigger one between 3 but no.)  In the end a purchase of a cheap? bag (35 USD) between us in the airport was the only option, leaving our other bags in the hotel till our return.

Crossing the road you took your life in your hands each time.  Although there are pedestrian lights it is a busy road and most cars and almost all buses do not stop on the red lights when pedestrian lights green.  Definitely need your wits about you.

Once sorted we got a taxi to take us to a reserve run by locals, no government funding. 

Amazing place but hard to get to and a very rough road.  Great reserve, amazing vegetation and watching 800 Parakeets coming into nest in the cliffs was great. 

On our way out an even more amazing sight with 2 male and a female long tailed manakin doing a mating dance. Didn’t manage any good photographs though as very branchy.

https://www.google.com/search?q=long+tailed+manakin+dance&rlz=1C1RXQR_enAU1069AU1069&oq=long+tailed+manakin+dance&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyBggAEEUYOdIBCDUyODZqMGo3qAIAsAIA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:a24a1958,vid:dysuZHnwv3Y,st:0

Getting up early for our flight to the corn islands we found thousands of flying ants outside our door. Steve coming behind us saw a Northern Tamandua on the path – really surprising in a big city hotel grounds. Big Corn Island, looks great from the air a very typical tropical island.  Nice Caribbean feel to the place and gorgeous blue water.

Unfortunately for us the weather is very windy and the sea far too rough for the snorkelling we planned.  We hired a car (had planned a golf cart but it was in use) and instead a quick jaunt around the island.  Our hire car was a taxi so we kept getting waved at to pick people up – should have made
some money on route…
Viewpoint just before steep decent.

This was the sign right after the viewpoint, interesting , love the drawing.

Our last full day we had planned a boat for snorkelling at 10am, taxi to the shop – no still too rough and bad visibility, try 12.  Rang at 12 – no but come at 2.  Finally we go out, pretty big waves so not the best for taking photos but the steamship wreck was interesting.  Apart from a couple of sharks though and some common fish, there was not a huge amount of life (all fished and eaten and they eat Green Turtles).  The coral was better than expected though with lots of beautiful fan and other corals.

Must admit food was a lot better than other places we had been.

So many places on the island are shut, accommodation and restaurants.  One place advertised (Aussie owned) it was reopening in Nov 23 after Covid but obviously did not survive even then as gone now. There are very few tourists here but a lot of work going on so I think they are expecting it to pick up.

The island has been lovely and we have enjoyed our time here, but like many places not what was expected.

Going we had a smallish plane, coming back we had an even smaller plane but the oddest things is the attire some people wore for a flight – bikini’s….

The good part was once everyone was checked in the plane left – half an hour early, bonus.

 We had planned to go overland by bus to Honduras but the three bus companies that did this route are still not running since Covid although one did start and was running in 2023 when I did the research but closed again since, so back to Managua for one night before flying to Honduras.

Oddly this big international plane (we go via El Salvador) also took off half an hour early.  Hope it happens on second flight so we don’t get into to accommodation at midnight.  Doubt we will be that lucky though.