Our first stop in Nicaragua was Leon; we chose this destination with one thought in mind, to conquer another volcano. With no time to lose we joined a group of 10 other eager pioneers and set off at the delightful hour of 5am. Although El Hoyo peeks at a much more reasonable altitude of around 1200 meters compared to Tajumulco (the volcano we climbed previously in Guatemala), it provided its own adversities, the main encumbrance being the temperature. Despite setting off early, by midday we were climbing in 40-degree heat, soaked through to the skin in sweat and a good three hours from the summit, needless to say this was no walk in the park. The main reward for our toil came early on in the hike when we clambered up a neighbouring volcano and then proceeded to run down the side of it, a totally exhilarating experience which left us with more than a few cuts and grazes which I later proudly showed off as battle scars. This slope is so steep people even snowboard down it, so accumulating speed was effortless! The second gratification to this long hard slog came when we reached the summit and where provided with the most amazing panoramic views of what felt like, the entire country. We were incredibly fortunate to be accompanied by a really great bunch of people and that night we stuffed our faces with tacos and marshmallows around a campfire before sleeping under the stars. The following day we made our way down with a brief stop at a lake to cool our aching feet before making our way back to Leon, all fatigued but drunk with pride at our accomplishment.
From Leon we made our way to Granada, a pretty colonial town with an auspicious nature. We managed to accrue another two Brits along the way, Mark and Caroline, whom we'd met on the Volcano. Finding other like minded travelers is always a treat but naturally with a crew of 5 of us our Spanish suffered more than a little. Granada actually reminded me a lot of Mexico with an abundance of live music; bohemian teens roaming around and a selection of street performers, including crews of break-dancers who perform while you eat your dinner on cobbled streets. But amidst this vibrancy there was also clearly a huge amount of poverty in Granada I think I saw more beggars there than I have in any other town on this leg of the trip. It's scary how accustomed you become to seeing children as young as 6 working as street vendors, and the debate as to whether or not its right to give them handouts plagued my mind whilst exploring the town centre.
The US has been involved in Nicaragua throughout the 20th century, during the 40-year corrupt dictatorship of Somoza; starting in 1937 they launched attacks on Guatemala and the 1961 invasion of Cuba from Nicaragua. In 1978 the Sandanistas led a revolution against Somoza's dictatorship, the Guardia nacional responded ruthlessly and killed thousands. In June 1979 The Sandanista's took Managua (the capital) and Somoza resigned and fled the country. During the Sandanista's time in power they redistributed Somoza lands to small farming cooperatives, reduced illiteracy from 50% to 13%, eliminated polio through a massive immunization program and reduced the rate of infant mortality by a third. However during this time relations between the US and Nicaragua went downhill, the US didn't like the fact that there were increasing numbers of Soviet and Cuban advisors in Nicaragua and allegations that they had supplied arms to leftist rebels in El Salvador. So in 1981 Ronald Reagan suspended all aid to Nicaragua and after the Sandanista's won another election in 1984 the USA initiated a trade embargo of Nicaragua, which played a big part in devastating the Nicaraguan economy. By the 1990 elections the Nicaraguan people were disillusioned with the Sandanista government, mainly because of the massive economic problems. A new party called UNO was established in 1989, they were supported by the US, Nicaragua was promised millions of dollars of financial aid and to lift the trade embargo if UNO won. With this bribe UNO of course made it into office. During the 1990's there were a few changes in government, the Sandanista's were still trying to come back into power and eventually in the 2007 election the old leader of the Sandanista's, Ortega, was voted back in despite being involved in several scandals.
Just to back track a little, whilst in Leon, Abi and I met up with her friends, Chris and Tanya. Unfortunately they recounted a rather nasty story that had happened to them a fortnight previously in Rivas, another Nicaraguan town further south. Basically they'd hopped in a taxi which turned out to be dodgy and the driver along with two others held them at knife point, and took them to all the different cash points in town, until their accounts were well and truly drained they then took all of their belongings and left them at the side of the road in the middle of nowhere. Amazingly Chris and Tanya told this story with a humorous undertone and explained that when they were finally let go the robbers left them with their passports and enough money to catch the local bus home. They even advised them not to keep their passports in their back pockets because, I quote 'it can be dangerous around here', how very considerate of them! It seems that Chris and Tanya's bad luck followed us, as soon after leaving them Caroline’s toe nails fell off (due to a reaction to the anti malarial she was taking), Mark slept in a bed infested with bed bugs and got covered head to toe in bites, and Charles' wallet got lifted within two minutes of arriving in Rivas with all his cards in it. Soon after that I fell off a horse and Abi's credit card got stolen and some cheeky buggers managed to check themselves into an 80 pound per night hotel before she had time to cancel it.
Still despite our misfortunes we thoroughly enjoyed our last few days in Nicaragua. Hardly surprisingly, we didn't stay in Rivas, and instead caught the ferry straight to Isla Ometepe, which is situated in the middle of Nicaragua’s largest lake, we stayed at three different locations on the Island, Merida, Balgue and finally Altagracia. Isla Ometepe hosts two volcano's, Conception and Maderas, many moons ago molten lava flows created an isthmus between them and thus the island was formed. It is perfectly picturesque, and unlike Utila it hosts a very real community of local residents going about their daily lives, in fact we came across very few other gringos which was surprising considering it's one of the top destinations to visit in the country. Keen to explore our surroundings, the first activity we booked ourselves onto was horse riding. Now I'm not exactly a horse whisperer but I like to think I have a natural bond with animals (despite managing to accidentally kill several pets throughout my childhood) and therefore felt at great ease when the others suggested such an outing. Unfortunately on this occasion it seemed my love for animals was quite irrelevant, the more pertinent fact being that the animal didn't like me. From the moment I ascended his back my horse was out to get me. He was a male with an ego of epic proportions with a serious dislike for Charles' stallion, or perhaps Charles himself, either way he was a nasty piece of work. So after several attempts at biting or kicking Charles horse my counter part decided to start a full on brawl and bucked with such force he left me lying face first on the ground. It's debatable as to whether he actually threw me off or if in fact I threw myself off as at that moment I decided the ground was a safer option than his back and made little attempt at staying on, much like a drunk on a bucking bronco ride who decides they feel a little queasy and is happy to accept defeat if it means they save face by not throwing up. Either way the bruise that arose from the incident still rendered me a hero to most people I met over the following couple of weeks, which naturally I showed off at any opportunity for dramatic effect!
So after I'd been thrown to my near death Charles very kindly offered to walk me back to the hostel (which I'm pretty sure was just an excuse to escape the same fate as he didn't exactly take to riding with dexterity either). Regardless, I was glad of the company and we used this time wisely by deciding to swim to Monkey Island. It has been said that I am not a great at judging time, which I can't deny is probably an accurate observation. So when I said to Charles 'ah it'll be easy, its got to be no more than 20 minutes away' it will come as no surprise that an hour passed before we made it to our little haven. Our struggle must have been quite apparent as a fisherman and his son even offered us a lift in their little wooden canoe for part of the way, which naturally we accepted with eager nods of appreciation. Sitting in my bikini amidst a pile of flapping fish wasn't the best environment for me to test out my Spanish but we managed to have a very broken conversation that went something along the lines of 'fish healthy' ¿your dinner, no? And 'gracias, gracias, gracias, muchas gracias' on my behalf. So with a little help from our new found friends we made it, only to find that surprisingly Monkey Island is indeed inhabited by monkeys, and not the type that will dance on demand. Just as I began to scale the nearest rock, panting and overjoyed to have finally made it to our intended destination, Charles exclaimed rather enthusiastically 'oh look a monkey'. Given my previous encounter with monkeys in China I didn't share his unsuspecting excitement and thankfully jumped straight back to the safety of the water just in time to see the primate leap to where I had been stood moments before, gnarling his teeth and demonstrating in no uncertain terms that we were not welcome. Despite the initial terror that ran through my body at this encounter, as soon as we'd established that monkeys couldn't swim, I'm ashamed to say that we spent the next half hour taking great pleasure in taunting the poor creature by taking turns to bang on the rock and then swim for dear life when he'd return with the same savage disposition.
Soon after Monkey Island we bid farewell to Charles, Caroline and Mark and headed for one of the main towns on the island, Altagracia. I say 'main town' but really this hamlet was little more than a few cobbled streets set around a small square, where various four legged beasts were still a common method of transporting goods and pigs and chickens roamed freely. The heat on the island, and in fact throughout the whole of Nicaragua was stifling and therefore we did little more here than meander down to the beach along a dirt track lined with mud huts, and lay ideally in the shade of a tree. Our journey from the island the following day was a little disconcerting as Abi discovered the captain of our ferry drinking beer with a few of his pals at 5am. It soon became apparent when we reached the other side that this wasn't considered common practise, and that his rather lax attitude towards his responsibility of the lives of his passengers was due to the fact it was the first day of Semana Santa (Easter). It appears that bank holidays mean anything goes. In addition to our inebriated captain this proved to be the worst day to decide to travel to Costa Rica, as there wasn't a single bus running and the border was swarming with local holidaymakers. Still we managed to make it to our destination, and unknowingly waved goodbye to the real Central America we'd spent 3 months getting to know.
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