Nicaragua

SURPRISING NICARAGUA

Nicaragua never made the list of places I wanted to see. Having gone, however, I really can't imagine why not. It has all the right elements - an abundant variety of wildlife and fauna, strings of volcanoes, old colonial cities, good food and some truly beautiful beaches. So when a trip to Tasmania did not pan out for various reasons (aka astronomical vet bills) we chose somewhere closer to home and less expensive.

We flew into Managua towards the end of February last year and, although the Maracuya Hostal was very nice, it was not love at first sight. I may have expected too much - colonial cities tend to have charming old sections - and Managua did not have that, the reason of course being that a 6.3 earthquake leveled the city back in 1972 and most structures had to be rebuilt from scratch with what little money was available. Not wanting to spend our days in town we took a tour in a minivan with a couple of girls from the hostel to Volcan Masaya and the little museum, where there was lots of good information in English about the area. The volcano is still active and we got up to the rim where lava could be seen flowing far below. Pretty cool. I like volcanoes. The trip then continued to Masaya town where we visited the Mercado de Artesanias and had delicious lunch, which was beef with yucca and platanos. Our driver for the day also stopped at the Mirador de Catalina, a pretty overlook over Laguna de Apoyo, followed by a drive down to the beach for a quick swim. So far, so good.

Wall art at the Masaya information center

Volcano Masaya

Dancer at the viewpoint

A hearty, artery-clogging heap of beef, yucca and platanos.

The next day we took a bus to Granada, a beautiful colonial town that sits on the edge of Lago Nicaragua. Since it was an "express" bus, it took longer than usual and being an old American school bus, the seats made us feel like giants. Did I mention I love chicken busses? I do. They're fabulous and a great chance to get up-and-close (at times extremely close) to local life. Public transport abroad should always be experienced and has the advantage of being incredibly cheap - we paid about $1 to travel for several hours in an overstuffed metal box full of people and chickens and with Nicaraguan rap blaring through the ancient speakers. Priceless!

The colorful architecture of old town Grenada

Granada was lovely, pretty and full of foreigners. We did a boat tour from our hostel to Monkey Island, where the spider monkeys jump from the island and into the boat and more or less hustle any available food away from you. Great experience. The tour included a sail around the small islands in Lake Nicaragua - lots of birds to photograph and totally worth it. The rest of the time in Granada we spent photographing the old colonial buildings, perusing the local markets and eating delicious street food.

Costco's dried mango was a huge success with the capuchins

 

Great snowy egret

White-throated magpie jay

Fisherman on Lake Nicaragua

From Granada, we hired a fairly inexpensive taxi to take us up to Mombacho, an extinct volcano now steeped in jungle and cloud forest. We had made arrangements to stay in an eco-lodge in the middle of the forest. It was run by Cynthia from New Jersey and we happened to be the only visitors at the time, so we got lots of chatting in. What we did not not know was that the forests, and by association the lodgings, of Nicaragua are frequented by wolf spiders. They are the size of tarantulas but completely harmless. The size alone, however, is enough for an initial freak-out until you find out that they are impossible to get rid of - they ended up hanging out under the rafters as we slept. Needless to say, the mosquito net came in handy and was tucked thoroughly under the bed each night to prevent any surprises.

Mombacho is not only beautiful but also full of howler monkeys. There were a couple of troops that passed by the hut every day, babies and all, and I got quite a crick in the neck from shooting into the trees for hours on end. Totally worth it. 

We did a hike the following day, the Puma Trail, with an excellent and very entertaining guide that Cynthia knew. It started at the top of the mountain and ran along the ridge with some truly amazing views despite the intermittent fog. And here we saw our first sloth. It blended perfectly into the vegetation, a thin layer of moss covering its grey coat. We watched for a while, it moved a little, and we moved on since it was a four hour circuit trek and slots are, well, really really slow. Back at the start was a little museum with information on the flora and fauna of the forest. We took the shuttle bus back to the entrance gate and had lunch at Las Floras restaurant, which also has a little shop where they sell shade grown coffee from the small surrounding plantations.

Three-toed sloth unwilling to show his face

After several days in Mombacho, we took the ferry to Isla de Ometepe, crowded with locals and farangs alike. 

The main town and ferry terminal, Moyogalpa, is essentially the main backpacker hub where you can arrange tours and rent scooters, and there are some good and fairly inexpensive eateries including, for some reason, a lot of pizzarias. It's a nice little place that has all the essentials but don't expect too many quiet evenings as there are hordes of stray dogs barking through the night. 

The multi-lingual skills on Ometepe

One of the days we took a kayaking tour on Rio Istián which sits in the thin sliver of land between the two volcanoes - Volcan Conception and Volcan Maderas - that make up the island. It was a nice trip with lots of birds, turtles and  monkeys, at least until our kayak sprung a leak and we had to put ashore a bit before the beach we had started from.  The guide was fresh out of duct tape so nothing to do but paddle faster. We obviously made it, albeit somewhat soaked.

 As we had another day on Ometepe and I love climbing mountains, I booked a hike up Maderas with one of the small tour agencies along the main road in Moyogalpa. Conception is the more active and quite a bit higher but as the weather was pretty cloudy, Maderas seemed the better option. It ended up being me, the very good guide and a couple of nice Canadians. The clouds did not disappoint. By the time we had hiked through fields of cows, coffee plantations, jungle and then cloud forest, it was misty and wet and we were ankle deep in mud - good times. The visibility at the top was about ten feet, so unfortunately we did not get to the amazing views promised but the weather is one thing you can't debate with and it was a great climb with some truly nice people.

The somewhat foggy view atop Maderas

Those shoes go in the bin, I think

Volcan Conception

Orchid of unknown name

We were supposed to take a boat to Rio Juan the following day but as it turned out the water level in the lake was extremely low and made the crossing impossible so we instead headed back to Granada and took a local bus to the coast near San Juan del Sur. We stayed in a little eco-hostel several miles away from the center of town, which is all surfers and coffee bars, and had some of the best ceviche ever. It was a few minutes walk to the beach and along a river that spilled into the ocean - bathing in the river, however, was not really an option as it was carefully guarded by a ten foot long caiman. We saw anteaters climbing the trees near the river, being careful not to fall in, and there were bands of howler monkeys along the road. 

Guardian of the river mouth

  
The beach was pretty and had lots of rocks to climb on and rock pools to explore, some even had nudibranchs. Scores of brown pelican nose-dived into the sea in search of food - hours of entertainment for nature lovers... 

There are few things cooler than these wee beasts

One evening we walked to the next bay, where there was a restaurant and a surf school. I'm not a surfer but it was fun to watch them play in the waves as the sun went down.

From the ocean and on to the cool highlands of Central Nicaragua. We overnighted in a nice little hostel in the center of Matagalpa and gathered a few supplies before heading into the highlands and our eco-lodge the following morning. Bastilla is not really a town but an area encompassing a number of small, organic coffee farms set into the lush green highlands of central Nicaragua. It has an abundance of birds that include toucans, hummingbirds and parrots, and most famously the turquoise-browed Mot Mot that also happens to be the national bird.

Turquoise-browed Mot Mot

The cottage had 2 rooms and included bathrooms - and a great balcony with view of the valley

I'd recommend the Bastilla Ecolodge to anyone traveling to Nicaragua. The setting is gorgeous, the food is good, and the people running it are really nice. They have a working coffee farm on the hillside as you drive up 8 km of fairly rough road - we got a pickup in Jinotega, the closest main bus hub, for about $15. The restaurant has huge glass windows with views off the opposite valley - good place to sit and watch all the birds. The resident kitten was a bonus.

Keel-billed toucan

Emerald toucanet

Three-wattled bellbird

Yellow-backed oriole

Montezuma Oropendola

View from the cottage at twilight

We spent 3 nights at the lodge, using the days for hikes into the surrounding forest and photographing birds. One of the days we hired a great bird guide, who took us on a long hike into the hills. As most people outside the cities, he did not speak much English and my Spanish is pretty limited but since he was working on getting more business, I taught him some more words for things you would encounter in the forest, which he meticulously wrote down in a little book. He told me that for the past 5 years he had been working on saving up for a moped, so he could go further to meet more travelers. 5 years. That sort of brings things into perspective.

It was admittedly hard to leave the cool clime of Bastilla for the dry heat of Leon but go we must. The bus ride was long and fairly uneventful. As always on those long rides, it is interesting to see the landscape change. Here, small coffee plantations gave way to roasteries, which in turn gave way to dry fields of wheat and corn. Getting further south - Leon sits on the western coast - the perfect peaks of Cerro Negro, San Cristobal and Telica came into view. Leon itself is a typical Spanish colonial town, very charming and full of beautiful architecture. We had 3 night planned at Hostal Sonati and spent the days wandering the street, eating really good chancho con yucca and enjoying the sweltering heat instead some very good ice cream shops. 

Beautiful, colorful Leon

Not sure why they gave us the raccoon room...

Since I'm a unashamed nut for climbing high things, I hiked to the top of Cerro Negro. It was actually a tour for volcano boarding, but I opted out and instead went to photograph the 8 other people as they hurled themselves down the sides of the volcano. It was awesome. I slid all the way down, still have black lava sand in my Keens months later, and got some absolutely fun photos. Well worth it.

I opted for lugging up my camera equipment instead of the heavy wooden boards

View from the top

Leon was our last stop and a nice finish to a wonderful trip. Nicaragua was as beautiful as it was surprising, easy enough to traverse and not yet jaded from the hordes of tourist that inadvertently tend to change a place. I would go back.

As always, if you're considering a trip to Nicaragua, I'd be happy to provide recommendations! Just shoot me an email at anneharaiphotography@gmail.com.

Itinerary and hostels:
Managua - Hostal Maracuya Managua 
Granada - Hostal el Momento 
Mombacho - Mombacho Lodge
Ometepe - The Landing Hostel
Matagalpa - Hostal La Buena Onde
Bastilla - Bastilla Eco Lodge
Leon - Sonati Hostal Leon