5: Nicaragua

This week I went to Nicaragua so that I could renew my visa (UK nationals - and many others - are only allowed to stay in Costa Rica for 3 months at a time). Joanna, Johnny and I set off last Sunday at 6am and started on the 9 hour bus ride to Granada, which is on the Western side of Nicaragua. The capital of Nicaragua is Managua but we were told to avoid it and stick to the more interesting and picturesque Granada. On arrival in Granada we checked in at a hostel called The Bearded Monkey which turned out to be pretty cool, despite the grumpy receptionist. We also met a girl called Annefleur, from Holland, who ended up sharing our dormitory and joining us for the following couple of days.

We spent out first evening and full day exploring Granada, which looked something like this:

Granada from above

The town has a lovely feeling about it, it was full of tourists but it didn't really matter - the colourful buildings and the atmosphere of the place made it worthwhile. Horse and carts were trundling around the town carrying tourists and, seemingly, some locals too. Granada was originally founded by Spaniards and architecture is famously colonial, very different from anything I have seen in Costa Rica.

On our way to breakfast at "Kathy's Waffle House" - which was excellent, by the way - we realised that something interesting was going on... there seemed to be a film being made, with lots of people wearing red t-shirts and bearing flags running enthusiastically up the street. It turned out that an advert was being made for a presidential campaign for "El Gordo Presidente" (The Fat President). It seemed very fun and the latino music was blasting out of the speakers. I'm not sure a campaign like this would go down well in Britain!

Making of a TV ad for El Gordo Presidente

On our second day we made a day visit to Masaya, a town which is about 45 minutes away from Granada and famed for its craft market. We spent the day walking round and discovering the town, and made a few (cheap) purchases in the market. The town and surrounds were a lot "rougher" than Granada, perhaps more indicative of the "real" Nicaragua (unseen by tourists)... but we still had good day.

In the evening we went to a local Irish Pub (run by a genuine Irishman) and had the best fish & chips I've tasted for a while! It was a real taste of home, although slightly odd knowing that home was such a long way away.

We decided to leave Granada on day three (Wednesday) to head to Laguna de Apoyo, where we spent the night. The lake was lovely, and we spent a lot of time lounging around reading and using the facilities provided by the hostel (such as kayaks). Here's our view from the hostel:

Laguna de Apoyo

We went back to Granada on Thursday and then made an afternoon trip to a place called Coyotepe. This is an old fort that was used as a prison up until the 1980s. A volunteer from the Nicaraguan boy scouts took us round on a tour of the place, and told us about the gruesome history of the place. Some pretty chilling stories! It was principally used for prisoners of war during the Nicaraguan Civil War, and we were shown pitch black cells and torture cells where prisoners had had to endure some pretty horrific things. All in all an interesting but slightly chilling experience (and there were plenty of bats flying around above our heads too).

Sadly we headed back to San José on Friday, but having had a taste of Nicaragua I want to go back and see more! I just hope I have the time and the money to do so...

Check out the photos here: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=280593&id=614663552&fbid=10150128491258553

4: About time for some news!

Well, it has again been a while since I posted anything, but for some more good reasons... I have been travelling around and was lucky enough for Mum to come and visit for a short while!

The first two weeks of February were more or less work as usual, and then for Valentine's weekend Johnny and I went and had a lovely time in Manuel Antonio (which is rapidly becoming one of my favourite places in Costa Rica). Then, later that week, Mum arrived (on the 18th) - very exciting! After collecting her from the airport on Friday night, I had to go to work on Saturday morning, but we made our escape on Saturday afternoon and jumped on a bus to Playa Brasilito in Guanacaste, close to where Johnny is staying.

I had booked a room in the Brasilito Lodge, a hotel I had found on the internet, and it turned out that there was a reason the hotel was not listed in my Lonely Planet guide... as we approached we realised that it wasn't exactly a nice and cheap hotel, more of a "big house" that was still under construction. The room was an interesting lurid green colour, similar to a hotel that James, Sarah, Johnny and I experienced in Agra in India, and it brought back a few memories! The German (and rather fat/lazy) hotel owner seemed quite apologetic over the room and said that we could have an alternative room the following day, so we stayed there for three nights in the end.

The next couple of days were spent on the beach, first at Playa Conchal and then at Playa Prieta. Both were beautiful beaches, with amazing clear blue water. Conchal is famous because instead of sand there are crushed seashells, which means that the water looks amazing. Here's a photo:

Playa Conchal

Once we left Johnny and the beaches behind, Mum and I headed on to Liberia, which is the central town/city in Guanacaste. The idea was to go to and visit the famous Arenal Volcano, however when we arrived at Liberia it transpired that it was too hard to get there so we decided to change our plans and after a lot of discussion we ended up spending the next day hiking around the Rincón de la Vieja National Park. The centre of the park is the Rincón de la Vieja volcano. So, in the morning, we checked out some of the volcanic activity: 

We didn't go to the crater of the volcano because it was too far, but it was still incredible to see bubbling mud and steam and other things coming out of the earth! In the afternoon we went for a trek in the opposite direction, to a waterfall called La Cangreja. The walk was very long and quite hard work, but it was worth it since this is what we found:

Catarata La Cangreja

The blue water is due to dissolved copper salts, according to Lonely Planet. We had an awesome swim there but then unfortunately had to head back before the park closed at 4pm. 

We spent the next couple of days back in San José recovering from the long day hiking in the national park, and then on Saturday I was back at work all day. After work, however, we caught the bus to Manuel Antonio (yes, again) and arrived at the hotel by about 9.30pm. Sunday was spent walking round the park and lying on the beach, a perfect combination really! Excitingly, we saw a sloth - although I did (and still do) feel incredibly guilty since Johnny has been wanting to spot one since he arrived in Costa Rica. Here it is looking down at us:

On Monday we spent the morning lounging around the hotel pool, had lunch at an great aeroplane bar/restaurant and then went to buy a few souvenirs before heading back to San José. Mum left yesterday morning and I gather that she has safely arrived in the UK now! All in all it was a great week and I was very happy to be able to show my Mum some of Costa Rica.

The rest of the photos can be found here:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?id=614663552&aid=274115
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?id=614663552&aid=271501