We have made it to the top of the world or at least a volcano!

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The last 10 days we have spent in Nicaragua and it is a great country to visit. The people are reallly friendly and funny and this coupled with great nature and lovely old towns...We headed straight from Costa Rica to Nicaragua with one overnight stop in La Cruz on the Pacific coast. We saw a stunning sunset there and then crossed the border to Nicaragua.
We love Nicaragua but travel is very slow here and the meaning of 'chickenbus' becomes clearer everyday, yes there are real chickens on the bus! The other interesting thing is that you never know where you will end up as the bus just chucks your bags out at the highway and there you are! Our first bus ride was to take us to Granada but we ended up 10 km from Granada and had to take another bus. However, it is all good fun and Granada is a lovely city! There is not a lot to do there except exploring the streets and take advantage of the cheap food and drink. In Granada we met a couple from South London and we were well excited to pay under 1 Sterling for a litre of beer... All fours of us wanted to visit Isla Ometepe and we decided to do this trip together. The lago de Nicaragua is huge and the water doesn't look very nice as it is brown and a bit dirty, but it is the only fresh water lake with salt waterfish or something like this. The island is beautiful and 2 volcanoes are dominating the shape of it. We were staying in Merida, which is a tiny village and has a very remote feel to it. On our fisrt day we hiked to the waterfall Santo Ramon to test our fitness for the big volcano hike. It was boiling hot and a really tough hike for us and we were never soo happy to see a waterfall. After this, Regan and Lou decided not to climb the volcano and the other Geramn couple we met called it a day too. We were not defeated that easy and still decided to give it a go as we really came to climb a volcano. On the next day we started very early with our guide who was really only a kid. The climb is normally 8 hours round trip and after 1 hour we were soaked in sweat and already tired! Our guide kept telling us when other people gave up and returned was announcing that we are very slow...I have to say that the hike is rather steep and we are not very fit! The lack of fitness we made up with sheer determination and after 3.5 hours we arrived at the top. The top was covered in clouds and we were not able to see the createrlake but we still were very proud to have made it. During the next few days, movement was restriceted as ourlegs werereally sore.

From Isla Ometepe we continued up north to Leon - another lovely colonial town- and from there to the Pacific coast, wherewe stayed in a little place called Las Penitas.

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Comments

[isi & prisca]

top of the world
to the mountain climbers: congratulations! this must have been a real adventure but let us ask some question: therewas no stadium around?? did you climb through the crater??? you look like coal workers who were hiking to the waterfall to wash. in austria it is awfully cold again and prisca is struggling a cold. i am very fine and plan to finish my novel before summer. prisca and me are both very much looking forward to having you bakc again but of course do wish you sopme great last months on the road.. take care

[Nicki]

Congratulations!
You two seem to have changed a lot on your travel! Climbing up volcanos, a new side I have never noticed about you, and I`ve been missing shower pics for a long time now. Saw a sunrise on the highway in Carinthia yesterday, was very proud, but after your sunset pics I feel a little ashamed... When are you coming back? Love, Nicki