Blogs from Isla de Ometepe, Southern Pacific Coast, Nicaragua, Central America Caribbean

Nicaragua economy has been severely effected over the last 5 years. In April of 2018 there were violent protests and riots. It followed a move by the government of Daniel Ortega to reform social security. Following the deaths of protesters, demonstrations intensified and grew into a large anti-Ortega movement seeking his removal from office. Prior to this, their economy was growing at ~4.5% per year. The riots and violence brought the tourism industry to an almost complete halt. Foreign investment declined 90% in the second half of 2018. The World Bank estimated that the Nicaraguan economy shrunk by 6% in just 6 months. As they were attempting to climb out of this hole COVID hit. They are just now trying to repair their economy and tourism business. Currently tourism is only 14% of what it was ... read more

We got up and ready to head out. We're just taking overnight bags, and leaving the rest of the stuff at the beach house. Sylvia was a little delayed in getting ready, but we still had an hour and a half to do a drive that should just be an hour, so we figured that was plenty of padding. The drive out from the beach house wasn't nearly as bad as the drive in. It was much easier to see the bumps in the road in the light of day, and navigation wasn't nearly as difficult when we'd already been on the road once. In about 25 minutes, we were already getting off the dirt road that had held us captive for probably an hour and a half when we had initially arrived. Phew! The rest ... read more

Ometepe island was one of my top 2 places to visit in Nicaragua, and I wasn't deceived!! First thing is to get there. Although there are a few flights a week to get there from Managua, it's more fun and exotic to take the boat to reach it. :-) One important thing about the ferry. If you don't have a car or other transportation, you can take the ferry or smaller boat at any time without any preparation. But if you have a car or a truck, it would be very wise to reserve in advance!!! Reason is that not only tourists go to the island, but also many delivery trucks, and ferries are not that big. To give you an idea, on one ferry you can put: one long 53 feet truck, another truck less ... read more

Mittwoch, den 18. April, nachdem wir vom Treehouse Hostel zurück waren, machten Rebecka und ich uns auf den Weg zur Isla de Ometepe, einer großen Insel im See Nicaragua. Wir wollten eigentlich nur ein Taxi zur Bushaltestelle nehmen, aber schlussendlich machte der Taxifahrer uns einen sehr guten Preis und wir sind mit ihm direkt nach San Jorge gefahren, der Ort von dem aus das Boot nach Ometepe fährt. Da ich total den Kater hatte und Rebecka müde war, störte es uns nicht, auch mal ein bisschen mehr für einen — für einmal — bequemen Transport auszugeben. ^_^ Wir nahmen das letzte Boot, um 17h, nach San José del Sur. Das Boot brauchte eine Ewigkeit, ungefähr 1 1/2 Stunden, und so verpassten wir den letzten Bus zu unserem Hostel nach Balgue und mussten uns ein Taxi nehmen. ... read more

Hola Chicos, It has been a few weeks since the last blog, so just a short one with some activities I have done past few weeks. Spent the last few weekends seeing more of the island. Sherri and I rented bicycles one Saturday to go and see the San Ramon Waterfall. We caught the bus for a few stops to a bike rental, $5 per day. The waterfall is 50 metres high and situated partway up the Volcan Maderas, on the opposite side of the volcano from the farm. The road was paved for approx. 25% of the journey, the rest being rocky and rough! It took just under 2 hours to get to the waterfall entrance, a Biological station, but with a stop so probably an hour and a half, 14km. Oddly if you google ... read more