Round the World with Ann and Katie

From San Juan del Sur I travelled up to Granada.  Although it seemed like a very nice colonial city I ended up spending only 1 day there.  I enjoyed exploring the city but within the city itself there isn´t really that much to see and do.  I was there at the weekend and it seemed very quiet, so as I´m getting short of time I decided to move on to Leon.
Leon is another colonial city with some impressive buildings and a very interesting political history.  I spent a day looking round the city and went to the museum of the revolution where I had a good guide who explained all the recent political history of Nicaragua.  I found it really interesting to listen to the stories of someone who had lived through a lot of it and seen the changes happening. 
I also visited Leon Viejo, the original city that was founded by the Spanish but destroyed less than 100 years later by an earthquake, and had been covered with volcanic ash so it was only rediscovered about 50 years ago.  It was an interesting place to visit and the site itself was just a really nice place to wander around, by the lake beneath the volcano.
The following day I went on a 2 day hike with a charity called Quetzaltrekkers.  They organise hiking trips for tourists and use the money for that to fund various projects working with the local communities to help street kids, improve education etc.  I really enjoyed the couple of days I was with them, the volunteer walk leaders were really good, the hike itself took us to some very nice places and the other people in the group were all really nice.  It was an early start the first day, we had to meet at the office at 4am, to get organised and get the bus to the start of the walk.  First we climbed Cerro Negro, an active volcano that first erupted in the 1800s so is very new.  One of the most amazing parts of the walk was when we walked down into the crater, there wasn´t actually any lava, but some amazing rock formations and a lot of steam vents, a very strange landscape.  From the top of the crater we literally ran down the side of the volcano, so although it took about 45 minutes to climb up, it took about a minute to get down again.  We then climbed another volcano, El Hoyo which also had some impressive features that were really interesting to see.  We camped on the side of the volcano and enjoyed a nice night here.  Cooking on the steam fumaroles was good fun.
THe following day we got up to see sunrise over Volcan Momotombo and Lago Managua.  It was a hot and steep walk down from the volcano to another lake where we spent a couple of hours cooling off and having lunch, before getting the bus to Leon.
In the evening there was a big parade through the city and fireworks to celebrate the religious festival of the Virgin de la Mercad.  This was good to see, then I had a much needed early night to recover from the last few early mornings.

I decided to spend a few days in San Juan del Sur to try surfing again, as I had really enjoyed the afternoon when I first tried it in Chile, but haven´t done it again since.  The following day I had my first lesson at Remanse beach, a little way down the coast from where we were staying.  There was a group of 5 of us having the lesson with our instructor Fred from Peru.  Within about 10 minutes everyone else had managed to stand up a few times. Hours later I was still struggling to make much progress.    But despite swallowing several litres of salt water and ending up very bruised I still enjoyed the day.  In the evening I went out with a few people from the lesson and from the hostel and I discovered the common drink in central America, rum.  After we lost count of how many bottles of rum we had, we ended up back at the hostel sometime early in the morning.  So the nextdaywas spent at the beach recovering from both surfing injuries and a hangover.
After a days rest we were ready to try surfing again.  After I had been so bad the first day I decided to have the beginners lesson again.  I have no idea why, but for some reason I found it a lot easier this time and it didn´t take me to long until I was able to stand up fairly regularly.  So we had another really good day surfing.  And despite planning on having an early night to get an early bus the following day, we also ended up repeating the evening before and drinking too much rum again.

I got the bus from San Jose to Rivas in the south of Nicaragua.  Despite there being huge queues at the borders it was actually an OK journey.  I arrived in mid/afternoon, so just had time for a walk round the town, which was OK as there’s not really anything to see here.  But I enjoyed it, its very different from Costa Rica which is very westernized and developed.  The following day I got up early to get the ferry to Isla Ometepe.  I had planned to go to Balgue, a small village in the south of the island, 2 bus journeys away from the ferry.  The first one was no problem and the driver said I just had to wait half an hour for the next bus to Balgue.  But after waiting a while and asking a few more people, the only person who could give me any kind of answer just said I would be waiting a long time.  As the bus stop was in the main square it was a nice place to sit for a while anyway.  After I had waited about an hour and a half a parade started around the main square as it was a national holiday.  At that point I realised it was going to be impossible for any buses to go anywhere for a long time, so I enjoyed watching the parade then gave up and went and found a hostel for the night.  I spent the afternoon walking to a nearby beach and swimming in the lake to cool off.
The following day I decided to give up with the buses and did what the locals seemed to do and cycled round the island.  THis was a really nice day, the roads around the island are relatively flat so it wasn’t too hard going, except it did feel like I was cycling in a sauna as it was so hot and humid.  Luckily I cycled past several nice beaches so was never far away from somewhere to go for a swim to cool off.  I made it to Balgue and ended up getting there just in time to see some of their independence day celebrations.  Everyone from the village seemed to have gone to the main square for the day to listen to the various speeches.  I cycled back to Alta Gracia and managed to see some of their celebrations in the main square.  A parade with a lot of drumming and dancing, which everyone seemed to enjoy, including me. 

The following day I moved on to San Juan del Sur. 

I met up with Sarah and Gemma in Allajuela as its near the airport and they didn´t arrive until quite late.  We have spent the last 2 weeks travelling around northern Costa Rica and have managed to see a lot of the country in a short amount of time. As Costa Rica is quite small it has been a great place to see a lot of different things, but I think the main highlight for us has been the wildlife.
On our first day we visited one of the many active volcanoes in the country, Volcano Poas and enjoyed quite a relaxing day doing a little bit of walking near here while we adjusted to the heat and humidity.
Our first stop was La Fortuna.  The evening we arrived we were lucky with the weather.  After a storm early in the afternoon the weather cleared, so we went on a guided walk in the forest where we learnt a lot about the plants and wildlife.  Once it was dark we went to see Volcano Arenal, which is apparently the second most active volcano in the world.  At night it is possible to see glowing rocks and lava flowing down the side of the volcano, we were really lucky to get an amazing view of this.  Then we spent the rest of the evening enjoying more geo-thermal activity in the hot spring.
The next day we travelled to Tortugera on the Caribbean coast, an area known as a mini Amazon.  Its on a peninsula inaccessible by road so it was a long journey by bus and then boat.  I enjoyed seeing the Caribbean way of life here, very different from anywhere else I have been so far.  This evening was very different from the last as we went to watch turtles nesting on the beach.  It was a very strange thing to see, and be able to get so close to.  It did feel like we were disturbing the turtles, getting so close to them when they are actually laying their eggs, but we were assured that once they have actually built the nests it is fine to watch them. We watched 2 turtles laying there eggs, covering them then walking back to the sea. For me the most impressive thing was the size of the turtles, they were huge.  And almost as impressive as the turtles was the huge thunderstorm we watched out to sea. 
After a late night turtle watching we had an early start to go on a canoe trip to see more wildlife.  I really enjoyed this as it was a very relaxing way to see a lot more wildlife including caymen, iguanas, several species of monkeys, river turtles and many types of birds.  In the afternoon we headed back to La Fortuna and in the boat on the way back I think we saw even more wildlife than we had seen on the tour in the morning.
Our next stop was Monteverde, a small town in the hills that was originally founded by Quakersin the 1950s.  The afternoon we arrived we went on a tour of the cheese factory that the original Quakers set up and is still running now.  It was actually interesting to see and I enjoyed it because it was my first chance to try some real cheese in a very long time, they even had a reasonably good Chedder.
The following day we went on 2 tours, the first a guided wildlife walk through the forest on a series of hanging bridges.  The second part was a canopy tour where we went on a load of zip wires through the tree tops, very good fun.  We also had to do a tarzan swing, which in a way was like a bungee jump as the 1st few seconds you were just free falling before you actually started to swing. 
Our next stop was Liberia in the north west of the country.  Here we visited Rincon de Vieja national park to see some more geothermal activity, hot springs and boiling mud.  It was a nice walk through the park and we also saw some more wildlife, huge butterflies, iguanas and monkeys.  Liberia itself was a bit of a disappointment though.  the guide book describes it as a colonial town and one of the must see things in Costa Rica.  It had one street where there were a few old houses, but that was about it, definitely not one of the highlights of the country.
We decided to spend our last few days at the beach, so we went to PLaya Hermosa.  This was a very quiet little village, with virtually no one else there.  We spent a nice relaxing day there, enjoying the beach and swimming before heading further south, to the resort town of Montezumma.  Here was a lot more developed than Playa Hermosa and the closest beach was about half an hours walk along the coast.  But we stayed in a nice hostel with hammocks in the garden by the sea.   We spent a day here walking to a waterfall in the morning.  This was a good walk along the river and had a good pool for swimming under the waterfall.  In the afternoon we walked further along the coast to the beach, where we tried to swim, but it wasn’t really possible.  The following day we spent travelling back to Allajuella.  Then our last day we spent at Xandari spa resort just outside the town on a coffee plantation.  For me this was a bit of luxury, a very big change from staying in hostel dorms.  We spent the morning walking around the site which has 5 waterfalls.  on the way we came across a huge snake on the path, at least 1.5m long.  LAter we tried to find out what it was and the closest picture we could find is of a snake that is apparently has a deadly venom.  After lunch the weather wasn’t so good so we passed the time doing a jigsaw, before having a very nice dinner.
Unfortunately the following morning Sarah had to leave very early for her flight home and I wanted to get back to San Jose to try and get a bus to Nicaragua.  So I only had a short time enjoying a bit of luxury.  

My first impression of Costa Rica when I saw it from the plane was how green it looked.  Everywhere was green with just a few buildings.  Everywhere else I have been it has been the middle of the dry season so I have got used to brown and dusty places, here it is very different.  My second impression of the country was much it seemed like the states, but a bit poorer, but maybe thats just the capital.  I arrived in the evening so just found a hostel and something to eat then was too tired to do much else. 

I´m not used to being in such a small country where you can get anywhere within a few hours, so it was hard to decide what to do with the 4 days I had before having to be back in San Jose to meet my friends.  In the end I guess I went for the obvious choice and went to Chirripo national park in the south, where there is Costa Ricas highest mountain.
After spending a night in San Isidro I got an early morning bus to the village and park entrance as I wanted to get an early start to avoid the heavy rain that seems to happen every afternoon.  After arrivingh at 7am, I then took a wrong turn in the village so it wasn´t until 9am when I actually got to the start of the path.  The walk was a steep climb up thtough the cloud forest.  To start with I had good views, until the clouds came down, but it was still a nice walk.  I reached the half way point after about 3 hours and by then it had started raining heavily but I decieded I should carry on to the top anyway after getting that far.  What I thought was heavy rain then got even heavier and I was soon soaked through despite wearing waterproofs.  At least here it is still warm even though it is wet. The rain made it hard going, but I eventually made it to the refugio at the top where I was to spend the night.  Luckily I stillhad some relativly dry clothes in my rucksack so was able to get changed.  I met a very nice group of Costa Ricans who gave me a bowl of soup and a mug of hot chocolate to warm up as because I had climbed to over 3000m it was now pretty cold.  THe refugio only has electricity for a couple of hours in the evening so it was lights out at 8pm and an early night.
I got up early again the next morning and was relieved to see the rain had passed.  I spent a couple of hours exploring the area of lagunas around the refugio before starting to walk back down to the village.  The walk down was really nicer as the clouds were much higher than they had been the day before.  I also saw a lot of butterflys and tiny hummingbirds.  I made it back to the village in time for lunch and luckily I had just madeit into a cafe when the afternoon rain started again.
Having enjoyed my first few days in the south of Costa Rica, the following day I returned north to Allajuela to meet Sarah and Gemma that were arriving from home that evening.
And now almost a week later I am still trying to dry my boots out after that first days walking.