Don’t hate me, but while the US is starting the long cold winter, I’m still wearing shorts and flip flops. The weather has been incredible lately, and we’ve taken advantage by traveling and seeing more of Nicaragua.

A few weeks ago, we traveled to the beautiful island of Ometepe, located in the middle of Lake Cocibolca. This lake is the largest lake in Central America and the 21st largest in the world. The island of Ometepe is large enough to take several hours to travel around via car or boat. It is made up of two volcanoes, one of which is still moderately active. I wish I had pictures of all the modes of transportation, but we were so rushed there and back that we couldn’t stop to breathe let alone take pictures. We took the bus from Granada to Rivas, a taxi from Rivas to San Jorge, and a ferry from San Jorge to Ometepe. From the ferry port, we took a taxi to the hotel. Two days later, we took the same trip in reverse. Travel time took about 5 hours in total. We left on Friday afternoon, and came back on Sunday afternoon. The ferry ride was my favorite part, as we were able to get a lot of pictures of the island from the distance. Mid way to port, a rainbow appeared in between the two volcanoes. It was so incredibly beautiful. As the hubby put it, “When in your life are you guaranteed to see this again?” I can’t describe how amazing it was to slowly chug through the water watching the rainbow shimmer and shift through the clouds.

The island was filled with wildlife. From cows to monkeys (on a string! or in trees), we were constantly surrounded by animals. Pigs are plentiful on the island, as are dogs. They are definitely well fed, even better than the dogs you find in the cities.

This is quite possibly the funniest sign I have ever seen in my life.

We had a series of mishaps during the weekend. From almost missing the bus and ferry (literally pulling up as both were leaving), to flat tires (less than 5 minutes after renting the bikes) to torrential rains with more than three kilometers to bike to the hotel, we had quite the adventure. We also ran out of money on the last day and had to stop at the ATM before running to the ferry.

We spent most of Sunday morning hiking to a coffee farm on the smaller of the two volcanoes. It took about an hour, and the last kilometer was very strenuous. If you don’t have a car, don’t go to the island if you aren’t willing to hike, walk, bike, kayak or otherwise exert yourself.

We stayed at two hotels, I can’t remember the first hotel and El Encanto. We enjoyed both, but Encanta had much better food, was in a slightly better location, had a good selection of vegetarian meals, and the owner spoke English. The rooms are very budget based, and other than eating there isn’t much to do. We all loved the fresh homemade bread, french toast and lemongrass tea. We also used the facilities at Hacienda Merida and Finca Magdalena.

The first was my favorite hotel by far, having a variety of activities and equipment. It was our first choice to stay, but all of the private rooms were taken. Magdalena was a coffee farm with slightly rundown facilities, favored by hippies, and fantastic coffee. It was well worth the hike up to see the view and flowers. My favorite moment by far was getting caught in the rain on the bike ride back to El Encanto. When I say downpour, I mean DOWNPOUR. The road is already hard to navigate when dry (because of the millions of large rocks). In the rain it was nearly impossible. Ditches became lakes and bike seats became our nightmare as we slogged through the road.

I can’t wait to go back and explore more, but other destinations call our names first!

{all images from author’s personal collection}