San Jose, Costa Rica

July 9-10

Possibly the worst place I've been all trip, so I'll keep it brief. 

We arrived late morning and had a little explore. We found the main square (which was filled with decorative high heels?!) and had Argentinian food for lunch. We went into a museum...which has to rate as one of the most boring museums I've ever been to. A little bit about Costa Rican history, but nothing very interesting. 

After a nap we attempted to find dinner, but when asking locals where to go they would all say "nothing's really open at night"...what the! So we had local fast food, empañadas & nachos. It was our last night as a group (Dave and Sahil were off to the Carribean Coast the net day and Aaron and I were heading towards the pacific coast) so we decided we should celebrate! We met up with Aaron's friend who lives in San Jose and he showed us a bunch of local bars. Bit of fun!

Last night out with these boys!

And that's it. We escaped San Jose the next morning!! Short and sweet. Or just short...

Monteverde, Costa Rica

July 6-9

Getting from San Juan to Monteverde in one day was difficult, so we stopped via Liberia overnight... Which was nothing interesting.

As soon as we arrived in Monteverde we booked ourselves onto a zipline tour. The tour included 12 regular ziplines (some which you did with a partner)

Plus a Tarzan swing...which was incredibly scary! And two 'superman' ziplines where you go face first! Also stupidly scary. I had a momentary freak out just before the first superman zipline, but it was actually super fun.

The whole way through this tour we got incredible views of the area, including a waterfall! 

The next day we did a short steep uphill trek to find a massive ficus tree. Ficus trees are hollow inside, therefore perfect for climbing! We each climbed all the way to the top (or until it gets too narrow to go any further, at least) and explored the forest trails.

 

 

In the evening we went on a 'night walk' to spy on the local animals! Our main aim was to spot a sloth... (Aaron & I may be a little obsessed with sloths...)

We saw lots of spiders and other crazy insects.

 

We saw a couple of little snakes and a kinkajou - however only from a distance. We saw a toucan and some other sleeping birds. We saw frogs... 

And eventually we saw a sloth!! Two sloths even. The first one was sleeping and we could only see his bum. The second one was moving about way up in the tree tops, sadly too dark and too far away for a good photo. But this is only the beginning...the sloth hunt continues!!!

San Juan del Sur...take two!

July 3-6

We had so much fun in San Juan we decided to do another weekend there before heading into Costa Rica. 

The first afternoon back in San Juan, Seth and I walked up to a viewpoint. It was sunshine and blue skies when we started walking, but of course just as we reached the top it started to pour with rain. Intense horizontal rain with fierce wind. Picturesque!

 

Just as we left the viewpoint it stopped raining and the clear skies reappeared. Loco tiempo!!

In the evening we played some drinking games by the pool before heading to the Pacha Mamas bar for a repeat of the previous Friday night. Fun night!

Saturday was spent at Playa Hermosa, known to be one of the nicest beaches in the area. It was also where many seasons of Survivor were filmed! Beautiful beach, accompanied by many hammocks and a nice bar to chill out at.

Seth, Nick and Jake went out for a surf while the rest of us entertained ourselves with various spontaneous ball games and walks along the beach.

 

Naturally, we chilled out on Saturday night in preparation for Sunday....

SUNDAY FUNDAY #2!!!!

Equally as fun, memories equally as hazy.

Much like the last week, we began the morning by the pool at Casa de Olas. There were games, bets and many people being pushed in the pool.

   

Then into town for another pool party.. At some point Seth cut his foot on the pavement and there was a fair amount of blood. A friendly backpacker told us he had a first aid kit and took us back to his hostel, where he bandaged it up well enough to last the rest of the day & night! What a champ!

After Naked Tiger, we ended up back in town at a bar on the beach... Lots of fun and a little bit of craziness ensued...!

Ometepe Island, Nicaragua

June 29-July 3

Ometepe is a little island made up of two volcanoes, situated right in the middle of Lake Nicaragua - the biggest lake in Central America. 

There are a few little towns on Ometepe but really not a lot. We stayed in Santa Cruz - which had a couple of hostels, about 2 general stores, and maybe 3 restaurants. Busy! It also had a nice beach.

Much time in Ometepe was spent relaxing and recovering after our big weekend in San Juan. One afternoon we went on a fishing trip out on the lake. Between six of us we caught just one fish! What a success. 

On the plus side, we had good tunes and a decent sunset over one of the volcanoes on the way back.

In the evenings our hostel was quite lively, which led to many games of mafia, spoons and other card games. Insane drink specials kept us happy too!

The most eventful day in Ometepe was spent roaming the island, by motorbike/moped/quad bike. This was my first ever ride on a motorbike...and despite a rocky start (!!) Seth managed to get us back alive!

We rode to Ojo de Agua, a natural spring. The water was refreshing and we were kept entertained by a rope swing and a tightrope over the water. 

 

We continued to ride around the island for a while, getting nice views of the volcanoes and the coast. We saw a huge array of animals on the road, including pigs, horses, cows, dogs and even a couple of monkeys!!

San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua

June 26-29

San Juan del Sur is a small beach town right down the south of Nicaragua, most famous for its 'Sunday Funday' party.

I arrived with Jake and Nick on Friday afternoon and met Dave, Sahil and Aaron at a beautiful hostel that overlooked the coast, up on a hill. Gorgeous spot.

After relaxing by the pool for most of the afternoon, we headed into town. We were a group of about 12, drinking a few rums on the beach. We were constantly harassed by locals and one was getting a little heated...so we quickly moved on. We danced the night away at Pachamamas!

The next day we ventured to Playa Maderas. It looked like an ideal beach for learning to surf, but we had other plans! We walked about ten minutes down the beach, away from the masses of tourists and found a more secluded little beach which we just about had to ourselves. We spent most of the afternoon swimming, playing cricket and soaking up the sun. 

 

That evening we played an epic game of mafia and had an early night in preparation for Sunday...

SUNDAY FUNDAY! This is basically a massive pub crawl across San Juan. We started the day nice and early at our hostel, playing games like flip cup and slap cup and spending a bit of time in the pool!

 

 

   

Then we were shuttled down to a bar right on the beach where we drank, danced and again spent a bit of time in the pool! 

 

Later in the afternoon Aaron, Sahil, Claudis and I wandered off to find food and stumbled across a horse parade! After that we went up to Naked Tiger, the hostel next door to ours up on the hill. The drinking, dancing and pool time continued into the night, until we retired to our hostel at 9pm. Yes, early, but that's what happens when you start at 9am!! 

Granada, Nicaragua

June 24-26

Granada is the oldest colonial city in Nicaragua, and similar to Leon in many ways. Again, there are colourful buildings and beautiful churches but also some dreary looking streets.

The afternoon that I arrived in Granada, with Jake and Nick, we were a wee bit hungover and therefore spent the day mostly by the pool.

In the morning I had a quick roam around and admired the brightly coloured cathedral. It sits right by Central Park which is also quite nice.

The three of us, along with two American girls that we met, headed to Lago de Apoyo for the day. This is yet another volcano crater lake! It is one of the cleanest ones because they don't allow motored boats on it. 

We swam out to a little platform and spent most of the morning jumping, flipping and diving into the water. When we were tired out, we had lunch and a little relax. 

Nick, Jake and I hopped on some kayaks and paddled around for about 15 minutes...until the weather turned bad and we quickly headed back in, retreating undercover for the short shower.

Then a bit more splashing around off the platform! Beautiful lake.

When we got back (and refuelled with a pupusa!) we went to explore the city. We wandered down towards Lake Nicaragua... But it turns out it's pretty dirty and disgusting! And we may have walked through the dodgiest part of town to get there...

However we also found a very old-looking church, the outside of which has obviously not been maintained. You'd never guess it from the outside, but the inside was bright and colourful. Interesting contrast!

All the restaurants in Granada seem to be quite fancy, it's difficult to just find some basic Nicaraguan food. So we had Italian for dinner and downed a few rums at an Irish pub.