Blogs from Isla de Ometepe, Southern Pacific Coast, Nicaragua, Central America Caribbean - page 8

From León we decided Ometepe would be a good bet. A pair of volcanic islands - a couple of volcanoes really – in the middle of Lake Nicaragua, the largest lake in Central America. It sounded like a good place to spend a few days just relaxing and...stuff. We'd been moving pretty quickly for a while, so we figured a short break was in order. To get to Ometepe we had to catch a ferry from San Jorge. There was a couple of options, but this seemed the easiest. From León there were a number of bus changes, but eventually we got to San Jorge. At the last change we had been scammed, but only slightly – the tout bloke had assured us that the bus would go directly to San Jorge – instead we were ... read more

The next morning on Ometepe was early for Darío. He had to meet his hiking group at 6.45am to catch the 7am bus to the next town to start the trail. I had a smallish sleep in until 8am. I had a very lazy morning, I spent almost 2 hours at breakfast so i could catch up on internet usage, so ate very slowly to use the wifi at the restaurant. Plus they have a laundry there so I caught up on that too. I went and did some essentials shopping including postcards and water before deciding it was maybe time to go and hire a bicyle and do some exploring of my own. Robinson, the guy who owns a motorcycle rental place and organised the tour for Dario was where I wanted to hire my ... read more

Después de dejar México, ver una combi fue más y más raro. No fue hasta que llegamos a Nicaragua, muy cerca de la frontera con Costa Rica donde la MVG encontró a su prima Ramona; una combi que ha viajado desde el Sur de México y hasta Argentina encontrará algo de descanso. Lo que más nos llamó la atención al principio fue, que La Ramona es orgullosamente Jalisciense ! Si, una combi con ojos tapatíos, y placas de Jalisco! La MVG y La Ramona viajaron juntas en el Ferri que nos llevó a la isla de Ometepe, hermosa isla situada al sur de Nicaragua, la cual la adornan dos grandes volcanes. Es animador el saber que no somos los únicos en este lado del planeta que viaja-vive en una de estas reliquias. Lo más sorprendente es ... read more

Ah, once one gets behind on a travel blog, it just snowballs. So, now I'm in Panama City, but I spent the better part of the last two weeks on the islands of Lake Nicaragua. Headed with the group from San Juan Del Sur to Isla de Ometepe, which required a pleasant one hour ferry ride on the lake. Third world ferries are always interesting. I remember laying on the roof in the sun, somewhere between the bananas and a motorcycle. The island itself is beautiful - two volcanic cones rising up with a land bridge connecting them. We decided to stay on the distant, more remote side of the island. The bus rides on the island are incredibly slow and bumpy, but one just gets used to this sort of thing. Stepping off the bus ... read more

Got up early, breakfasted at the market and caught at $10 cab to the port at San Jorge. Just in time for the ferry to Moyogalpa and from there we bit the bullet and got a $20 cab to the hotel in Playa Santo Domingo. Villa Paraiso is a cush place compared to Istiam where I stayed before. I had reserved a $29.00 double for us, but we soon realized that the room they put us in was much nicer than my reservation. When we asked them about it they said it was actually the $60/night room but that they would give it to us for $50. Umm, no, we´d rather just move. Soon it became $40/night. Still not cheap enough. She offered $35 to which we said we´d still like to see the other $29 ... read more