Lazing on the Corn Islands

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Corn Islands

We're rapidly coming to the end of our trip, and we needed another little holiday from our holiday. We came to Managua in Nicaragua and spent a few days investigating how to get to the islands. Websites were giving us mixed information on the exact day of departure for the ferry from Bluefields and not one site seemed to agree with another whether it was Tuesday or Thursday! As we didn't want to get stuck in Bluefields, we ended up deciding to splash out on the $106 airfare.

Casa Sunrise

We flew to Big Corn really early in the morning, landed about 8:00 am and then waited around for the 10:00 am speedboat to Little Corn. Elliott had done lots of research and had found a place away from the village where he wanted us to stay. ( see here for his inspiration ). We were after a bit of paradisiacal relaxation in our own little hut, with our own kitchen and a view of the beach and great snorkelling nearby. This was Casa Sunrise.

After an exhaustingly hot walk through the ‘jungle’ to the north tip of the island we had to wait around for a while for the German owner Heiko to get back from a trip into town. He turned out to be an enigmatic Buddhist man of some sixty years, who was (to say it mildly) very talkative! Before even seeing the cabin from the inside, he had told us about several injuries he’d had which had led him to the conclusion that although he loves his land (where he’s lived for more than 20 years) it is time to turn the leaf (as Buddha says), so he is now in negotiations with an Australian investor who wants to turn the land into a luxury resort. Not sure I would be happy about that if I’d run a “Wellness Centre” in close rapport with nature for 20 years… But hey, it’s not my land - unfortunately!

We stayed in the basic cabin that didn’t have any electricity, just a gas stove, and where we had to get water from the well in a bucket, even for showers, and use the outhouse with a long-drop. Aside from Heiko’s own cabin and the cabin we lived in, he had also recently helped build a little hut for the caretakers of the land Dona Rosalba and her husband, and their 6 children: 2 boys of 12 and 13 Juan and David; and the four girls: Yasira, Yarisca, Yanira and Yanisca of 9, 8, 4 and 1 years of age. And yes, I had to write down those names to try to differentiate them and remember them! They were very sweet and Yarisca, the 8-year-old was very curious and came to talk to me almost every day, wanting to know all about my family, how many siblings I had, how old I was, where did I come from, how many aunts did I have, etc, etc. They collected young coconuts along the beach every day, and always came with one for me and Elliott as well.

I was dismayed to find out that the children don’t go to school because they have to help take care of the little one. The boys said that they used to go to school and know how to read and write, but the girls don’t.

Hotel Sunshine

After 5 days we began yearning for just a hint of civilisation; we had run out of batteries and were quite bitten despite our fine mosquito net and tired from sweating all night with nothing but the occasional gust of sea breeze to cool us down. So we moved into the village, to Hotel Sunshine where we also had the use of a kitchen and had the added luxury of air condition in the hours that the island has electricity: 2pm - 5am. From here we became a bit more active exploring the island by foot (rather than just dazing on the beach and reading books and snorkelling); and one day we rented a kayak and sailed around the island. It’s not very big - actual paddling time was maybe just over 2 hours, but we took breaks on various beaches and snorkelling sites and really enjoyed ourselves.

The snorkelling is amazing on the island. We saw loads of fish: lots of variations of parrot fish, trigger fish, butterfly fish, angel fish, rays and these amazing little sea slugs that I’ve forgotten the name of now; most amazingly we even saw sharks almost every time (one almost as big as Elliott that swam straight towards me and didn’t care one bit about us being in the water), and a couple of times we saw the shadow of a turtle quickly swimming away from us.

And that basically sums up our time on the island: beach lazing, book reading, sun bathing, snorkelling and one dive for me (Ell had an ear infection, the poor thing). The dive shop (Dolphin Dive) were really nice and it was a very relaxed and leisurely dive, but I didn’t really see much I hadn’t seen before. Maybe apart from an abundance of lobsters. It IS coming up to lobster season after all 😊

Big Corn Island

After two and a half weeks, we decided we really did have to make a move and finally took the boat to Big Corn where we spent one night in Beach View Hotel. We just wanted to go snorkelling and have a little look around, and we enjoyed our view of the beach very much. We tried to find the Spanish Galleon which you should be able to snorkel, but when we swam out to what we thought was a ship wreck, it turned out to be a stranded tree. The snorkelling was great, even though visibility was down and the current was quite strong - mostly because I managed to spot a Lion Fish! Which I’ve never seen outside an aquarium before. It was soooo beautiful in black and white with its long feathery fins in a big fan around himself. See here for pictures and info on just how venomous they are…

Unfortunately, my excitement was spoilt a little by some people we had dinner with as they told me that Lion Fish are not indigenous and that they are quite a problem for the rest of the fish in the area and that you should kill them on sight! I’m glad I didn’t know this when I saw it.

We then took the ferry back to Bluefields, leaving at 11pm on Sunday night. This was quite the ordeal as you have to arrive early to secure one of the few sleeping cots, so we spent the night on some very narrow and hard plastic benches outside with people walking past non-stop and talking loudly. When we arrived in Bluefields, we took the next speedboat we could up the river to Rama. Now, normally this journey might be bearable if you catch the ‘fancy’ bus in the morning to Managua - but as it was my brother, Benjamin’s birthday, we took a detour into Rama itself in search of an internet café with skype. As you know I take birthdays quite seriously, and although I whine about the terrible run of chicken buses we had to take instead, it was obviously more important to sing happy birthday to my little bro on his 18th birthday!!

Finally at 8pm on Monday night, after several buses and standing up on a minibus for an hour and a half and more or less 24 hours of travelling, we finally arrived in Granada. Back on the mainland!

OK, laters...
Kristine

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Photos

Our one and only picture from Managua
Planning our trip!

The view we had been waiting for
From our hut at Casa Sunrise