Nicaragua
We got dropped off in Rivas, now we just had to grab a taxi to San Juan, where we going to stay for the night. We were on our way to the twin volcano island 'Ometepe' but after a day travel we were due for a beer a feed and a sleep. Arriving in San Juan it all looked a bit seedy, every single person was hammered.. what the f.. is going on? We sat down at a beach shed and had a few beers and a great Spanish conversation.. Still don't know what it all was about. Is this a typical Saturday night or what.. it turned out it was a yearly festival. Every town in Nicaragua has this party but all at different dates.
Anyway it was a good laugh to watch drunken locals. We headed back to hotel for a night sleep in the hottest room we ever had..
The next morning we took the first ferry over to the island. When we arrived we needed a good brekkie.. And we got one at an American place. How good is bacon and eggs after a long time without.. Again it makes us appreciate what we've got at home!
We hired a motorbike in town, tied our big backpacks to the back of it and holding another one, and off we go.. It was great to have our own transport for once and don't have to rely on overcharging taxi drivers or chicken buses. We found a really nice quiet spot right on the beach/lake. “El Pirato” just what we needed chilling out. We explored the island by bike and it was lovely. Sometimes James had to dodge chooks,pigs and wandering cows, but everything went smooth.. Although, at some stage we parked the bike, came back and it didn't want to start..f*ck lucky a 'mechanic' came straight away.. yeah right! First brake it and then want to fix it. ah no.. after a good look we found the choke lever all the way open. So problem was fixed.
On the road again.. we ended up at a really nice swimming hole for a swim, some beers and a great lunch.
After two days it was time to head back to the main town to drop off the bike. We stayed one more night with a really characteristic pot smoker. And for tea we had the best burger and potato salad ever.
Back on the boat and the bus to head North to Granada. According to the travel bible this sounded like a really nice place... when we finally found the hostel it was really nice, finally a swimming pool woo hoo! We met some nice people and went to the Irish pub for the pub quiz (and a horrible feed) And then we discovered how ugly Granada was. About 20 beggars came along and harassed us...argghhh So we booked straight away flights to the Corn Islands in the Caribbean. One night at big Corn and now on little Corn where is no traffic, beautiful beaches, and great snorkelling and fishing. So we booked straight up 5 nights a private cabin on the beach, just $20,- a night. Life is Great!!
Seafood every day! And cheap, where else in the world can you eat a lobster for $10,-....
5 days of chilling out, we did a little bit of exercise, we rented a kayak for the day and explored the bay paddling and snorkelling around. And of course just this day a tropical storm came so we waited for a bit on a excluded beach sucking on mangos (they are everywhere here) when the storm passed we paddled back. On another day James went out fishing with a local and Karolien went for a scuba dive. One time we went out for lunch to try the typical local dish 'Ron Don' which we had to order a few hours in advance. It was an amazing seafood stew. After 5 days of relaxing we could not get enough of it.. we counted our money and we were able to stay another 3 days, (there is no atm on the island) if we eat 'street food', banana bread and some mixed rice,corn and chicken wrapped in banana leafs out of a bucket. we are just loving it. And then we had to leave on a Saturday..but still not ready so we squeezed our money. Caught our own lunch 'fish' and cooked it on a fire on the beach and shared our dinner so we could stay another night. We used our last coins to join happy hour, 2 rum cocktails for 3 bucks.
Sunday came along and it was time to do our favourite hobby...pack our shit (again and again) To take the boat to Big Corn Island. We changed our plans in the mean time. We are over-bussed and decided to fly to Cancun. For some reason flying in Central America is pricey so its cheaper to fly to Miami and then back to Cancun. (Mexico)
We stayed two nights on Big Corn and explored this island. We thought it wouldn't be as nice and beautiful as Little Corn, but the beaches and the Coral was an amazing. We walked around half the island and enjoyed for the last time a nice grilled fish for a while. We flew from Big Corn to Managua in the morning and had to find a way to entertain
ourselves the day, (we fly at midnight) we so did not want to go into Managua (because we heard it is a horrible city included kidnapping ect)
Lucky across the road was a Best West Hotel where we could use the facilities and a pool for the day. This was a good way to spend a day. We finally could hop on the plane at 1am and arrived in Fort Lauderdale (Miami) early in the morning totally buggered. We had a quick brekkie and rolled into bed for a few hours sleep.
After 3 nights in Fort Lauderdale we where happy to leave the noisy hostel. And fly to Mexico...
