Departamento de León

The neighbour's rooster wakes me up this morning. It's about 6am so it's not that bad. It took me 2 minutes to fall asleep last night, I guess our trek in the heat was a pretty good workout after all.

This morning another adventure awaits; we will go boarding down a volcano called Cerro Negro. It is the youngest Volcano in Nicaragua and it is still active. David our guide picks us up at 8am. He tells us that they estimate that Cerro Negro erupts every 20 years. The last eruption was in 1999. We first think he is kidding but he is serious 😳. If there is any sign of activity they would warn us and not allow any tours to get nearby. We should be okay.

The ride in the Jeep is thankfully not as bumpy as yesterday. There are three other tourists with us going to the activity. Two are American and the other is Columbian.

Once we get at the base of the volcano, David gives us a backpack and a board. We have 45 minute climb to get to the top. As we ascend we feel the wind becoming stronger and stronger. Our boards catch in the wind and try to pull us like a sail. We have to adjust the way we hold it or else get pulled somewhere we might not want to go. As we get near the top we drop our stuff and head to the other side of the top to see the lovely view and feel the heat of the volcano. You simply dig 20 centimetres and you can feel it being very hot. You also se the steam rising from the hole. You could easily cook an egg.

After a couple cool photos we head back to our boards. We put on our gear comprised of coveralls, face mask, goggles and gloves. We kind of look like a bunch of minions. We head to the start of the descent after getting the instructions from David. I am a little nervous as the incline from up here can be intimidating. We do no see the bottom as the second half has an even stronger incline. I go first while the others watch. It is pretty fun and I start picking up some speed. Halfway down I feel the incline difference and pick up more speed, I feel rocks flying around me hitting my goggles. I'm glad I have them. Near the bottom my board gets full of rocks and sand and slows down my board to a stop. I have to empty my board before slowing descending the last part of the descent. This was fun. Too bad it's another 45 minutes to get back up.

We put all our gear away, have a snack and head back to town. We stop for a beer to celebrate surving another adventure 🍻. We exchange contact information with David as he took photos of us and will share them.

We head back to the hostel to pack our stuff and get ready. We are going to San Jorge for the night. We will sleep there before heading to an island the next day.

Today is a really windy day. When we arrive at San Jorge we see the trees go sideways and the waves on the lake nearby are about 5 feet high. We try to find a restaurant after checking in our Hostel and find nothing of interest as ther is way too much wind by the water. We decide to dine at the Hostel restaurant. We have pizza and beer 🍕🍻. Tonight we go to bed early watching the Grammy's for a little while.Read more