Day 10 - Nicaragua (San Juan Del Sur)

I've got almost nothing to say about today. The only thing of any note at all is the surprise package left by a previous occupant that I found when inspecting my room a little closer. 

You have to admit, that is a spectacular miss by somebody. 

Day 9 - Nicaragua (San Juan Del Sur)

Got a bus South this morning. Sat next to a nice backpacker guy from Canada and whiled away the journey swapping travelling stories. I've been travelling in company, more or less, since I arrived in Central America and feel like a bit of space and peace and quiet. So when he said he was going to the same place as me, I winced inside and claimed I already had a posh hotel booked just to avoid any awkwardness around sharing time and accomodation late in the journey. As it turns out, peace and quiet is the last thing I've found at my destination. 

Today I find myself in the beach resort town, San Juan Del Sur. It's on the backpacker trail and I kinda got suckered into it on that basis. It's a bit of a cross between Newquay in mid-August and Falaraki. It's a surf town with hostels and bars and young surfer dudes. If I'm being really honest, I'm not sure why I'm here. It's not really my thing. First impressions are that the American/Canadian/Nicaraguan beach crowd are determined to have a good time and I've already had to step over unconscious drunks on half a dozen occasions and I'm writing this bit at three in the afternoon. When I asked the bargirl for a fruit juice while I sat down to write this, I think she thought me mental. They're just young people doing what young people do of course. Getting drunk, getting sunburnt and getting laid. Which is all fair enough. 

It's fine though. I've found a beachfront hotel, the sea is about 10m from the front door, the beach is nice (I've been spoiled recently so this one only gets 'nice') the weather is warm and the beers are cold. So it's hardly a disaster. I've only allowed a couple of nights here anyway and then I'm off up North again, so this place will be perfectly fine for a day or two. 

Shouldn't complain really...

Day 8 - Nicaragua (Granada)

I was taking a lovely stroll through a brilliant packed market this morning when I got stopped by a guy wanting to sell me some drugs. What did he want to flog me? A line of cocaine? A bag of weed? No. Bloody Viagra that's what! For christs sake! What kind of signals am I giving off? Gave me the right raging hump I can tell you. I've gone right off Granada. 

I also started some due diligence around property purchase, wanting to make sure any investment made would be a sound one. All was going well until I discovered an active volcano on the outskirts of town. That did put a rather large crimp on an otherwise damn fine idea. 

Volcano Masaya and National Park is a volcano (derived from Vulcan, the Greek god of war). It produces igneous rock (derived from the Norse God of fire, Ignus) in large quantities. We got to walk through one of the pyroclastic vents of now cooled lava. It is active but plugged and covered in trees but the magma chamber below is in full flood and could erupt at any time. Rather confusingly, it was the smaller sister cone that was farting sulphurous gas and lava (I saw lava but it unfortunately didn't come out great on camera). So it was the smaller cone that provided most of the entertainment rather than the cone that gave its name to the national park.  

...Actually, before anyone calls me on it, I've made up most of the posh words above, or at very best dug them out of my hazy memory from Geology lessons some, ahem, well some years ago. So what I've just described is 95% bollocks. Well I've had to make it up because our guide was a man of limited ability and knowledge. I seriously doubt he could pour piss out of a boot if the instructions were written on the heel, let alone educate tourists on vulcanology. 

Anyway, it was a completely and totally excellent trip. It's one of the few places on planet earth you can get up so close to a vigorous volcano in a 4x4 with shorts and T-shirt and it only cost $25 for that plus a trip to a tat market. 

I've also been trying to work out my route into Belize from Honduras. The two most cost efficient options both take me through a city called San Pedro Sula. San Pedro Sula has no claim to fame really, oh, aside from being the most dangerous city in the world. I'm still working on a way of avoiding the place if I can. Going belly-up so late on in my travels would really annoy me. 

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/may/15/san-pedro-sula-honduras-most-violent

Very smelly volcano

Volcano hole (technical term)

At sunset

Pyroclastythingy ....maybe? Plus bonus sweaty back.

No comments on the Viagra required thank you. 

Day 7 - Nicaragua (Granada)

So today was a bit of travelling and a bit of unwinding. I decided the 30hr bus ride through Costa Rica was too much of a faff so I booked a not inexpensive flight into Nicaragua. So today I was up at 4am and I've done Panama City - San Salvador - Managua - Granada. If Managua airport and road to Granada is anything to go by, the nations capital and country as a whole isn't terribly affluent. Not that that matters. It actually reminds me of Bulgaria as much as anywhere else I've been. Hmm. That might sound a bit odd. It's more of a feel thing that anything solid I can point to. 

After a minor bidding war between the local cab firms at the airport, I managed to get a ride from Managua to Granada for $25. Which if the guide books are anything to go by wasn't a bad deal at all. 

Granada is absolutely awesome. Genuinely a place where I feel comfortable and my kind of town. I've been in or around big cities for a bit now and something more manageable with a community feel is a real tonic. It's kinda like a Nicaraguan Reading but with some personality. And culture. And interesting things to do. Alright, it's nothing like Reading. 

I have for once, found myself in the right part of town in decent lodgings. I just wandered into a small place in the heart of town and they had a room for a couple of nights for $40p.n. There are at least 25 bars/restaurants within 30m of my super-king bed and the plaza centrale is a mere 50m away. 

Within an hour of me arriving, I'd had some splendid fish tacos washed down with the best mojito over ice that I've ever had, sat in the scorchio heat of a Nicaraguan afternoon. In fact, I've been a bit of a pig all told. The ice cream proved irresistible and then I found some things on sticks which I've found equally compelling wherever I go. And then I had some chilli beef nachos for dinner which made me groan with joy.

Not only that, Granada has a couple of real estate places and I'm a sucker for an impossible dream  ....It's been a while since I bought an overseas property and Granada is drawing me in!!! 

My Spanish is now up to about 20-odd words. At this rate I'll be fluent by the end of the trip. I suspect though I'll top out around 30 words, as usual with my language skills, and leave it at that. 

Honestly, it was bloody good. Truth be told, I managed to squeeze in more than one for quality control purposes.

More bars/restaurants than you can shake a maraca at. 

Plaza centrale. 

Day 6 - Panama (San Blas)

Left San Blas in the morning to return to Panama City for one last night. The trip back is a three hour drive by 4x4 across Panamanian jungle/mountains. To offer a clue on how rough the ride was, the guy sitting in the front of the vehicle blew chunks out the window at least a dozen times and made the rest of us feel more than a touch queezy ourselves. I did manage to keep my spider crab down though. Got back to the hostel and had a much needed shower and shave and headed out for a final dinner and spontaneous salsa in Panama City. It's been super great so far and while not an automatic choice for a holiday, I'd throughly recommend Panama for a week or so any day of the week. 

Travellers Tip - if a taxi driver in Panama City asks you for a ridiculous fare back to your hostel late at night, pay the man and damn his impudence. 

I caught a $3 cab the other way into the old part of town today in broad daylight, and we were going through the bits I'd been walking home in, mostly a little the worse for wear and with all of my worldly goods on my person. He insisted that we roll up the windows, lock doors and got me to duck down through those parts where I'd been merrily strolling in darkness. It did give me some pause for thought. Caught a $7 cab home. 

Oh, and for the record, the $7 guy also rolled up the windows and locked the doors. 

Home for a couple of nights.

Travelling companions for the last couple of days; A very sweet German couple on the far right. On the other side, an equally sweet Canadian couple. 

Found at the end of the bed on the morning of departure.

Day 5 - Panama (San Blas)

There's not an awful lot to say about a day on the beach. There's nothing to do on the island except read, sleep, drink beer and swap stories. I did play a few games of beach volleyball (my level of fitness has improved - fact) and I may be so bold as to add, that volleyball is a sport that I can turn my hand to with a passable degree of competence. Ball games are my thing if anything is (just ask the Uzbekistani massage guy). I tried not to gloat too much at smashing to bits the other team who had a guy on it that I didn't care for a great deal. Actually, I did manage to get in a few barbed reminders later on when I'd had a few, which was entirely inappropriate and enjoyable. 

Saw the New Year in on the island and it was a very very VERY cool experience. Seeing the other islands launch fireworks, sitting around a fire, listening to the surf lapping a couple of feet away was pretty unforgettable. Utterly unforgettable. 

Travellers Tip - if you're a massive introvert, travelling alone, particularly around New Year, get as drunk as possible as early as possible, so any regessive extrovert tendencies surface as quickly as possible. It ain't easy being socially retarded but alcohol does provide an essential shot in the arm in extremis. 

Face paint was optional. Well it wasn't in actual fact but I insisted. I do draw the line somewhere. 

I became too er... 'tired' to bother with any more photos after this one but the fireworks across the islands in the night were spectacular, you'll just have to trust me. 

Day 4 - Panama (San Blas)

Change of plan for New Year. I had booked a hotel room on an island on the Pacific side of Panama. It looked like a great option and a nice place but in the end I took a chance, cancelled and followed my fellow travellers to THE place to go - apparently - the Atlantic island chain of San Blas. 350-odd small islands, of which less than 50 are inhabited. And I wasn't disappointed with my choice. 

I hope God cracked open a cold cerveza and congratulated himself on a decent days work when he came up with this. 

The photo is the beach at Ina's Place. I ate, slept and drank just a short spit away from where the photo was taken. 

San Blas is inhabited by the Kunas Indians. A protected and authentic culture, with a penchant for authentic fake Nike and tourist dollars. The island I found myself on was approx 25m by 100m, so really quite small. It took about five minutes to walk around. Maybe less. 

As soon as I jumped off the boat into the surf, I decided that whatever privations were in store, it would be worth it and it was. Facilities were basic and I say this just as a matter of fact rather than by way of complaint. It didn't bother me that that the loos were flushed with a bucket. It didn't bother me that the showers... well they weren't really showers. The sea was more than good enough to keep stay clean for a couple of days. The food was basic but provided you enjoy rice with whatever they've fished from the sea that morning, crab, lobster, urm.. fish, then it was uber-fresh and tasty. In my case, I rated just a hammock under a corrugated tin shelter with five other people. The cabanas were designed for two and to be honest, were basically the same as I had but with a few sticks of bamboo lashed together to denote them as private space. Board with three meals a day ran to fifteen bucks per night (Cabanas twice that). Not too shabby huh? The hammock was fine as it happens and I got a couple of snoozes in during the day to make up for a short nights sleep. 

If I were to pick any fault, it would be that they haven't got one single clue how to do tourism. Aside from not being able to add up (number of tourists compared to number of beds available for example) they ran out of food, beer, forgot when boats go to/from - the list goes on. If you could live with their general incompetence (and they've been doing this for a while now so there's no real excuse), everything was just about perfect. The setting and views were all I was there for and they in no way disappointed. 

The approach on an exciting ride in a small zippy motorised canoe thingy.

Just before landing the sea turned azure and calm. 

Beach from the other angle. The individual in shot was not a Kuna Indian. Chilean as I recall.