Ometepe
Trip Start
Jan 23, 2007
1
67
120
Trip End
Dec 24, 2007
Isla de Ometepe,
Nicaragua
Sunday, June 3, 2007
Had another fantastic weekend (all the more so because we took Friday off too) when we took ourselves off to the staggeringly beautiful Isla de Ometepe, in the middle of Lago Cocibolca.
Only really definitively decided to leave on the Friday morning we left, as we had just endured another marathon thunderstorm that effectively lasted 9 hours from 10am - 7pm the night before, and have expected the weather to be too miserable to bother.
Thankfully it was fine, although on the bus to Rivas, the nearest large town to the ferry to the island, we fretted that we had put our foot in it with our housemates as our abrupt departure meant we missed the party going on in our house that night, which we were going to be lumped with some of the cost for, despite us not really wanting it to be held there in the first place.
Added to this, there was a Sean Paul concert being held in Managua on Saturday night, that, after a series of mis-communcations with the girl he works with at school, Sam had inadvertantly bought 2 tickets for. Sorry Jojo - we should have really put booty shaking before natural beauty (tried hard to make that a cheesy pun - booty/beauty - but just wasn't happening today), especially as the tickets were only $15 NZ, but.......inexcusable really...
Thankfully, no one was overtly peeved upon on return, so good-oh.
Our trip to the island involved a painfully slow trip on a vehicular ferry - we could probably have swum faster.
01. Punta de Jesus Maria
We kept on dozing off in the warm sun - the dull throb and vibrations of the diesel engines didn't help either - and waking up and feeling like we hadn't moved at all. When we finally did dock, we found our hostel, and went for a walk to Punta Jesus Maria, a sandspit just over an hours walk from town, where we turned done the offer of a swim, as, gauging from the little kids cavorting miles out, we would have to walk for an age to get our knees wet.
Added to this, was the knowledge that Lago Cocibolca (maybe Lago de Nicaragua on your maps) is the only lake in the world to have freshwater sharks - yikes. Although their numbers in the lake are severely depleted due to overfishing, if you were unlucky enough to happen across one, it wouldn't be pleasant, as bull sharks are well known to attack humans (up there with Great Whites for fatalities). Also, Bull Sharks mate in the shallows, and some fatal attacks in Florida have been contributed to the unfortunate victim bumbling into a couple of amorous sharks.
In fact, they sound pretty scary for anyone thinking of taking a dip in the tropics - check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bull_shark. If you can't be bothered, in summary, they are big, aggressively territorial, even to humans, usually swim along slowly but then at light speed just before they bite your leg off, and swim up rivers like the Ganges where they attack bathers and eat the dead bodies floating downstream.....
Just to put the icing on that nightmarish fish cake, it was thought until very recently that the sharks of Cocibolca where a completely seperate species of bull shark - it was known that bull sharks aren't fazed by fresh water, but the river that leads up the lake was thought to be impassable to such a big animal (they are up to 4m long and very hefty).
02. Punta de Jesus Maria
It was then discovered, they were leaping the rapids much like Salmon. ******Gulp!****** Well, enough of that stupid scaremongering and wimpish behaviour!! Upon our return to Moyogalpa, the village we were staying, we had a pleasant dinner, even if we foolishly plonked ourselves down on some wet plastic chairs at the start of the meal, and looked and felt like we had wet our pants for the rest of the evening!
Next day we caught a bus around to the other side of the island, to the village of Altagracia - enjoying stunning views of the lake and volcano towering above us. At Atlagracia we had a nice stroll out to the local beach, on a road that wound through banana planations. Day-O, we say Daaaaayyyy-oh, daylight come........
At the beach, wading for eternity looked like a distinct possibility looking at the local swimmers were in the water, so we found ourselves some shade and Francie enjoyed perving at the rippling muscles of some local guys playing baseball.
Upon getting back to Altagracia, we caught the bus back to Charco Verde, a nature reserve on the southern side of the northern part of the island (sounds weird, but makes sense geographically speaking!). Walking the nature trail around the top of some cliffs, we were treated to a prolonged bout of the smell of guano by the hundreds of shags nesting above us in the trees. Every now and then a vulture would swoop low and leer at us menacing, as if they knew something about our time here on earth that we didn't - perhaps previous hikers had been overcome by the smell and they were evaluating whether we would too! They are very unnerving when they fly so close to you as they are pretty darn big!
Further along the trail we saw a troop of monkeys enjoying an afternoon meal, although we keep a safe distance after hearing that they are fond of throwing their faeces at you when you get too close! Also saw a number of beautiful white-throated magpie jays, although sadly they were too coy for us to get any photos of them and their deep blue colouring.
Caught a ride back to Moyogalpa on the back of a rickshaw/ute thingee and upon entering our hostel, were accosted by a good natured Canadian guy who said we should come along and get some food like we would get at home at his restaurant.
Tempted by the sound of mouth watering things he rattled off, we walked along too have a squiz at the menu.
03. Altagacia on route to the beach
Unfortunately, we ended up being railroaded into having a pretty unimaginative and expensive dinner. To even see the menu we had to go right inside the restaurant (which was completely empty apart from the owner), whereupon were greeted like old friends and asked if he could get as a beer. This was all very friendly but as he chatted away to us, we felt like we would be refusing a personal dinner invitation after already being inside his house if we left, despite the fact that the food he was offering he pretty similar to the western options on any restaurant menu here.
Afterwards we watched a good movie on his projector (which we paid for) 'Thank you for Smoking', which kind of made up for the dinner, and promptly took our leave after this.
That night, listening to the booming Discoteca right outside our room, we chuckled as there was a power cut and we could hear all the patrons booing and groaning as all the lights and music cut out! Talk about a couple of Grinchs!!
Our last day on the island, we rented a couple of bikes with dodgy brakes, and biked for a couple of hours to a museum we had seen the other day. On the way we managed to add to the tone set by the shags and monkeys yesterday afternoon, when Sam needed to stop for an emergency 'comfort-stop' in some roadside bushes (he is an old pro at this now!) and Frances ran over horse dung, dog turd and as a fitting finale, a gigantic toad that had been run over the night before. Sam went decidedly green when splatter of toad guts and blood squirted up into his face....*shudder*.
Having got the disgusting part of ride out of the way, we pedalled the last little bit to the museum and enjoyed a cold coke, before balking at the entry price and beginning the ride home.
04. The beach at Altagacia
A big iguana (about the size of a cat) crashed off the road when we disturbed it sunbathing; Sam's mind immediately turning to good ol' Steve Irwin (Eeeesn't she beoooodifull) but resisted the urge to dive into the bush after it.Back in Moyogalpa, we were told by the Canadian dude from the night before that the ferries here regularly sink/capsize (although to be fair, he did talk a fair load of crap in general) right before we stepped aboard one that looked a fitting candidate for foundering. Once again the trip was painfully slow and uncomfortable.
Back on Tierra Firma, we foolishly decided to catch a bus to Rivas rather than catch a taxi, and ended up on a bus which we couldn't get off. The frustrating thing about it was we tootling around for the best part of half an hour picking up various people from their doors in San Jorge (about 10 minutes from Rivas), but once we eventually got to Rivas, the charger wouldn't let us off the bus, as it was an Express - he even got all stroppy with us and angrily told us to 'sit down'. After we got at the next practical point, he accusingly asked us where we were going, as if we were stupid not to pay him money to go somewhere we didn't want to go. Idiot.
That aside, it was a very pleasant weekend all in all, and upon arriving home, we found an astronomical amount of rum had been consumed at the party of Friday (the equivalent of about twenty 40 ounce bottles for about 30 or so people) so were weren't sad to have missed it!
Comments
Mereceis mucho un descanso
Or something similar! Looks idyllic. How do you make such populated places look so quiet and people free? Hope it was as lovely as it looks.