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Published: April 13th 2008
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The following day we left Granada, first by bus for a very squished and hot ride to Rivas, followed by a further short bus to the ferry port at San Juan on Lake Nicaragua. We hid away in the airconditioned deck of the ferry for most of the journey across but the views are wonderful with the island of Ometepe, dominated by two volcanoes, stretching out ahead. Another hour on a very bumpy minibus across the island took us to our rooms just above the beach with views of both volcanoes from the beach. By the time we'd finished a late lunch there was only really time for a bit of a swim in the very shallow, warm water which began to cool quite rapidly as the wind picked up turning into quite a wild night.
After a very windy night (which luckily outblew the hot air from one of our fellow travellers who loves the sound of his own voice late into the night!) we got up early to a quieter morning and did a short walk through the nearby forest with a wildlife guide. Our first sighting was a family of howler monkeys having their breakfast - rather
small animals considering the noises they make. There were also lots of parrots and a tree full of fruit bats that we could see really well, including the zig zag stripes on their backs.
Back to the hotel for breakfast and then we went to meet our horses for a morning ride along the beach. My horse was called Adonis but all three of them (we went with another girl, Juliette) were rather slow and steady unless really persuaded to go. It was a beautiful ride though past local people washing their clothes in the lake and watching the clouds swirl around Volcano Madera ahead. At the end of the beach we turned inland and climbed a little to a private lodge where there are a collection of large stones showing weird and wonderful carvings or petroglyphs. Nobody is really sure how old they are, who made them or what they signify but there are definitely monkey and crab pictures though most are rather abstract, possibly meant to be calendars.
After a rest at the lodge watching hummingbirds and butterflies in the gardens we got back on the horses for our very hot return. We managed to get
a little speed up along the beach but after nearly 3 hours this was quite painful for me and I was quite glad to get back to the hotel.
After all that activity we had a great lunch and a lazy afternoon with a brief swim (for me very brief due to a plague of tiny flies) and a relatively early night, sadly punctured by the voice the above mentioned inconsiderate travelling companion - he prefered drinking rum to any of the other activities available wherever we went.
The following morning was our earliest start of the trip so far - 4.45am - ugh! And a horrible long day of travelling starting with a bus across the island and ferry to the mainland. To our relief the bus that we had booked did turn up and still had our seats (sometimes they double sell them to people getting on in Managua so people getting on at the island don{t have their reserved seats).
It was only just over an hour to the Costa Rica border but getting through the border was a long and hot process involving lots of queues and lack of information totalling around 3
hours. From there the bus down to San Jose, the capital, just seemed to go on for ever. We dropped some passengers at the airport which is around 16km north of the capital but then as soon as we were back onto the main highway we hit Friday night rush hour traffic and took around an hour to do the last stretch. By the time we had got cabs to the hotel we were all thoroughly fed up and starving!
Still, this was the start of Costa Rica, one of the parts of the trip that I had been most looking forward to so I was pretty excited.
I hope you all get as excited about your Friday nights.....?
Am still trying to catch up with this and we´re just about to head off into the wilderness again tomorrow so you may have to wait to hear about how exciting it really is.
Hope all well?
Lots of love
S + H xxx
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jon peacock
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birdies
This is great - bird identification without the hassle of travel! The "bird at hotel (and everywhere else)" is a white throated magpie-jay (I'm not making this up). I am listening to the Gin Blossoms (remember them?) and planning the next Netherlands trip (Harlingen in Friesland for fish and ferries to the islands). Enjoy the wilderness, Jon.