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Published: August 22nd 2008
Boeing 747 to Big Corn
At this stage Liesel was still excited about the short flight ahead.Hola Everyone! David here. Time is really flying but our travels remain full of fun, challenges and many amazing experiences, and despite some growing home sickness and missing our families and friends, we're both in good shape. In this instalment of our travel blog I'll provide a taste of our adventures to, and on, both the Corn and the Bay Islands.
I'll start with the Corn Islands ( Las Islas del Maíz) which are essentially two very small islands (Big Corn & Little Corn) 70km off the Caribbean coast of Nicaragua, originally used as a safe haven for pirates when they still plundered the Caribbean. The Corns as they are referred to have some what of a mystique amongst travellers and are certainly not as well known or travelled as most of the other Central American Caribbean islands. Although the Corns did not quite end up being the undiscovered island paradise we had anticipated, they still delivered a good dose of fun as well as an overall unique growth experience that looking back made our trip there worthwhile. Read on further to find out more.
There are two ways to get to the corns which are very much off
the beaten track. One option is to fly and the other is to take a series of buses and ferries for a 24 hour marathon journey. Following some gentle persuasion from myself, Liesel and I decided we would fly. We arrived at the airport in Managua (the capital of Nicaragua) for our late morning flight and after dispensing with the usual check-in formalities we were soon ready to board our aeroplane. Thanks to Liesel's punctuality, we were the first to check-in and our boarding passes read "1" and "2" which meant that we would board first and avoid the scrum for bag space seats. What we didn't realise though was that due to popular demand on the day there were two planes flying to the Corns, the usual twin-prop large 30 seater and a 'special' tiny single-prop 8 seater. Of course by now you would have worked out that our early arrival meant we would be travelling on the 'vomit-comet' which given my flight anxiety and the building thunder storm soon had Liesel and I toggling between bouts of nervous laughter and solemn moments of silent prayer!
We soon took off into clear blue sky, both enjoying the experience
Refugees
Arriving at Little Corn. of being in a small plane (you could scratch the pilot's head if you wanted to). After being lulled into a nice comfort zone, I noticed that the weather radar in the cockpit was starting to turn from clear with slight blotches of green to solid swirls and patches of orange and red. I knew this wasn't a good thing for nervous flyers. Soon the pilot announced something in Spanish which we thought meant "lunch will be served in ten minutes" but in reality meant "please ensure your seatbelts are tightly fastened because we are about to hit a big storm in our tiny aeroplane which will feel like you're in a rodeo". The rest of the flight can best be described as a white-knuckle experience with time slowing right down - torture would only be a slight exaggeration. At one stage I did manage to look down at the ocean and having seen how rough the sea was I was glad I wasn't in a ferry at that time (as it turns out Andy and Lisa had a hell ride on the five hour ferry - which was basically a large speedboat). An hour and a half later we
Sundowners at Iguana
Iguana provided the perfect deck overlooking the ocean for sundowners on Andy's birthday. landed safely on Big Corn (Liesel was convinced that we were about to miss the runway) and were soon in a taxi heading for the ferry that would take us to Little Corn (a 45 minute ride).
Not surprisingly the ferry was actually a long open boat, called a Panga, with an outboard motor. Liesel and I sat right in front, wondering why all the locals were squashed into the two back rows with a big tarpaulin covering their heads. We soon discovered why as we experienced our second heart-in-mouth journey of the day complete with an often airborne boat, pounded kidneys and constant waves crashing overboard into our faces (Liesel had no choice but to bury her head under my poncho and breathe through the ventilated armpit area). Needless to say we survived the trip and were soon disembarking at the jetty on Little Corn.
What follows is a summary of the highlights and lowlights we experienced (Liesel likes to call them challenges and has asked that I not call the Corn Islands a shit hole, oops!). Little Corn has no roads at all which when it is dry makes it cute, laid back and hippyish but
Robinson Crusoe
Our hideout at Ensenos on Little Corn (no fan, no air con, minimal solar power, big insects, monster crabs). when it rains (as it was when we arrived) it's like walking in a swamp, which together with a heavy back pack, slippery flip-flops, squashed rotten mangoes, and a hundred mosquitoes tearing flesh from your ankles and elbows, is not an all together pleasant experience. We were originally meant to stay at a place called "Derek's" on Little Corn but having trekked through the jungle as mentioned, arriving, meeting the scary owner, and taking one look at the communal shower - which was a big blue barrel with a jug - I hauled us out of there. We soon, however, found sanctuary for the night at "Ensenos" and despite heat like we've never experienced before, a plethora of insects and pretty much zero creature comforts, we enjoyed our stay for the next couple of nights. We then met up with Andy and Lisa on Andy's birthday and Liesel and I checked into the Sunshine Hotel (in 'town') which we loved (air con, clean and great shower). The rest of the day and night was spent celebrating Andy's birthday involving ice cold Victoria's and Tona's, amazing grilled lobster (for $10), lot's of laughs and great chats, and even a visit to
Heading South on Little Corn
All of the beaches are very rustic (more survivor than paradise). the local disco. What a great time!
Two days after Andy's birthday Liesel and I left Little Corn for Big Corn and checked in at a lovely place called La Princessa de la Isla (our Italian Hosts Constanz and Alessandro making our stay there very special). Again, it was raining for most of the time we were on Big Corn and we therefore spent many great moments reading on the rustic verandah, eating amazing home cooked Italian food, sipping cappuccinos, and just chilling. Our only moment of excitement came at around 05h00 on our second last morning. Liesel and I were both awoken by the sound of loud voices coming form the beach literally just outside our room and when I peered through the window outside I could make out about ten men frantically shouting and running about (I was immediately nervous not aware of whether it was the start of a coup, a ploy to kidnap gringos, a fight, or someone being chased). Soon after, Alessandro came out and I saw him shouting something at the gathered mob at which point I decided that I couldn't leave him out there alone and so I went outside to see
Just Relaxing
We caught up on some good reading at La Princessa de la Isla (thanks to the rain). if I could help. As it turns out, everything was fine and Alessandro explained that the corns are on the drug run (shipped by high-speed power boats up and down central america) and that from time to time if a carrier is intercepted by the coast guard, the shipment is tossed overboard and often floats towards the corns and is referred to by the locals as a "gift from the sea". On that particular morning a gift from the sea was spotted in the ocean outside our hotel, hence all the excitement - if only I had I gotten up earlier!
Our flight back to Managua two days later was a lot smoother (on the bigger plane) and having spent the night at the fantastic Pyramid hotel, we embarked on a two day bus journey (with a night's stopover) to the Bay Islands (Islas de la Bahía) in Honduras. To help keep me settled, Liesel booked us on "Diamond Class" which made me a happy bus traveller!
Our bus from Managua took us to the port town of Le Ceiba on the Northern coast of Honduras from where we hopped on board a (proper) ferry to Roatan, the
Diamond Class
Now that's more like it (on a bus by the way). largest of the three Bay Islands. The one hour ferry ride was a pleasure, complete with air con, free water, and "Happy Feet" playing on the large plasma TV. We arrived in Roatan at around 5pm and as we drove from the port to our hotel, Liesel and I immediately formed a positive impression of the island (it's funny how we've just learned to get a quick feel for places on our travels). A little while later we had checked into our wonderful hotel (or inn as it was called in Spanish), the Pousada Las Orqueadas (our room was large, bright, spotless and airy, and best of all we had our own balcony overlooking the bay and a constant cooling breeze blowing in off the water).
Roatan (and the Bay Islands in general) is famous for its SCUBA diving both because it is inexpensive and there are many beautiful and exciting dive spots. Liesel and I therefore decided that we would take advantage of the opportunity and opted to do our Advanced Open Water qualification. In decisive mode, we set out on our first full day to choose a suitable dive school (there are many on the island) and
Our Dive Instructors
David with our dive instructors,Tim (Brit), Mark (American) and Andrea (German, and yes, very thorough). after a thorough interview and evaluation process, we chose "Native Sons" (they are one of the oldest and most experienced dive schools on the island, are owned by locals, and had a good attitude and equipment).
As it turns out, Liesel and I absolutely loved the course - as opposed to the Open Water programme the Advanced one is far less theoretical with the emphasis on practising various skills and applying knowledge whilst diving. There was some theory which was required but as it turns out Liesel and I were the class nerds learning all of the answers off by heart and rattling them off without having to look at our text book (this was basically thanks to Liesel who would do all of the required reading the day before the dive and then give me a crash course on the answers when I woke up the next morning or while walking to Native Sons).
All five qualifying dives were fantastic! We started with a "Peak Performance Buoyancy" dive which was one of my favourites, especially the bit where we had to do a somersault through a hula hoop without our tanks or any part of our bodies
Night Dive Satisfaction
We were both feeling pretty chuffed after our first night dive. touching it (it felt like being in the movie "The Matrix). Our second dive was a night dive (a first for both of us) and even though Liesel was pretty nervous, once again she proved to be game and ended up doing brilliantly. The night dive was amazing with the highlight (for me any way - I've still got the scars from where Liesel dug her nails into my hands) coming towards the end of the dive. We all knelt in a circle on the sandy bottom and switched our lights off. After about a minute of complete darkness we witnessed an iridescent display of bio-luminescence unique to the Bay Island called "strings of pearls" which as the name applies are scores of long glowing strings of small orbs flashing on and off in the eerie water. Our third qualifying dive was both of our favourites and was a deep dive. What made it special though was that the dive centred around a large wreck and we were both in awe of firstly the feeling of 'free falling' to around 32m and then exploring the massive wreck looming menacingly below us. Our final two dives were a drift dive and
Sundowner Bar
Our favourite little watering hole right on the beach in West End. a navigation dive which also didn't fail to disappoint. Needless to say we were both completely satisfied and exhilarated when we received our qualification on the day before we left.
Roatan is a great island. We had heard previously that it was packed full of resorts and would be flooded with tourists from 'up north' thus making it a bit of a Cancun experience. The reality couldn't be further from that description. Firstly, the island itself is pretty rustic and even though there are some resorts on West Bay, none of them are the massive imposing kinds you get in other places of the world. The village where we stayed is called West End and is a small and vibrant spot comprising mainly one long sand road along the sea, strewn with a large number of rustic and chilled restaurants, bars and cafes. Even though it wasn't high season yet, the island was pretty packed with international tourists from many places, the most notable being Italian, Dutch, English, German, Canadian and Americans but at least half were locals enjoying the Honduran school holidays. Overall, Roatan rates as a big highlight for Liesel and I, and apart from the occasional
Water Taxi
Our mode of transport between West End and West Bay beach. nip from a tiny sand fly there is nothing to fault.
One of our specific highlights on Roatan was the beach at West Bay. Described in many travel publications as "one of the ten best beaches in the Caribbean" it certainly lived up to that accolade in our eyes. The beach is a ten minute hop in one of the many water taxis from West End and is one that we did often. The beach is approximately 600m of spotless white sand kissed by pristine clear water where you can literally see your feet as if you were on dry land. There are no waves at all and so the scene resembles about four or five natural Olympic size swimming pools side by side, which gave us the perfect play ground to cool off, laze about and swim to our hearts content.
On our penultimate night on the island, Liesel and I made our way to "Roatan Rick's" for a couple of prawn quesidillas, some "Port Royals" (my favourite beer in Honduras) and "Barenas" (Liesel's favourite), and some live music courtesy of Brion (yes with and "o") James and his band. Apart from some good music and a
great vibe, Liesel and I felt like we were watching a soap opera often sitting open mouthed or laughing hysterically at the crusty old pirate who kept dancing with one particular German's wife, the mature American man who brought in his twenty something local wife complete with baby (definitely not his) and brother in law (they all ignored him and he paid for everything), the guy with his portable (large) Ryobi fan (I have to get my mom one!) who was trying to pick up the middle aged brunette sitting at the bar, who in turn was trying to pick up one of the local reggae back up singers, and finally the blond mutton dressed up as lamb who fancied herself as a bit of a rock star and kept screeching out songs. What a priceless evening!
It was a sad day when we bid farewell to Roatan and caught the ferry back to La Ceiba. From there we would board the first of many buses to Guatemala. Our journey to Guatemala is a story all on its own and so I will leave it to the next instalment to tell you more!
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Abbe
non-member comment
I DON'T CARE ABOUT THE REST OF THEM...I AM JEALOUS!
Wow...what amazing adventures. I have been reading throughout the past couple of months and am just so excited to experience through your words and photos the fun and adventures you've had together...and with friends along the way. Thanks for continuing to share and enabling us to live through you! Make the most of these last few weeks and clearly we will look forward to having you back! Warm Wishes! -Abbe