It's 1:30AM. I should be sleeping but a loud but adorable tractor, lying right next to me in the tent, woke me up with sporadic powerful engine sounds. This not unusual melody was then followed by a sound of something heavy, hitting the ground. And since we were in a crater and the ground is not super thick as it's technically a gigantic hole, it echoed pretty loudly. And it was followed by another one… Ok, am I crazy? Am I dreaming? Am I imagining things? Maybe it's the volcano! Or maybe the thin ground under us was collapsing!
I sat in the tent, looked outside and saw… what?! A horse?! I must be dreaming or my eyes are playing tricks on me. I went back to bed and heard the same thing again. I sat in the tent again and looked outside again… and this time, it was very clear. It was a gorgeous white horse and was grazing on the few blades of grass it found here and there, at a few meters from our tent. I was ecstatic! After a stunning evening, I was so blessed!
I checked to see if Steve was awake because the loud engine sound had stopped but he was sleeping. So I just remained there, in silence, watching this magnificent white horse in the dark night, with, in the background, a large majestic tree and a sky illuminated with infinite stars. All I would hear was the sound of the horse eating and the vibration of its legs hitting the ground. And when I thought it couldn't be more magical, I saw a shooting star.
I know it sounds too good to be true and it's the exact reason why I thanked like for this unique opportunity I had.
Not long after, Steve woke up too so I showed him the horse and we quickly realized that there were at least 2 more horses. But we didn't see them.
After this incredible moment, we went back to bed and I was able to get a few hours of sleep.
We all woke up at 5AM, quickly took down and packed our tents, sleeping bags and all our stuff and left. We did the same shorter hike than the night before, to the active crater, but this time, we were carrying our backpacks because we were not coming back.
Oh, I must say that I brought my bandana, my headlamp and my vest again with me and this time, I used everything, including my vest.
Once there, we stopped and sat on rocks but today, we were facing East; and from the obscure night sky, we started seeing, very timidly at first, different shades, starting with a dark grey. And, just as if we were watching an invisible but very talented painter adding colors and textures to the initially black canvas, we saw the grey growing and rising higher in the sky, a touch of yellow appearing just above the volcanoes and transforming the sketch, and eventually, a few nuances of orange.
From the top of this volcano, we were witnessing the creation of this new day, that would be nothing like yesterday and no more than an inspiration for tomorrow. This was priceless!
Not long after 6 o'clock, the sun was high enough to surpass the big volcano chain and we could already feel the warm sunrays.
We had bananas and cookies and continued our hike down the volcano. It was a different path and was much shorter. By 7:30, we were in the truck, on our way back to the tour shop in León.
Once there, we had breakfast, which was included in our tour, and got back to our hostel at around 9:30.
I forgot to mention that we ended up even dirtier than when we did the volcano boarding so let me tell you that we really needed to shower! Fortunately, even if we didn't sleep at our hostel the night before, they accepted that we use the showers. Their showers, just like almost everywhere else, had no pressure and no hot water but who cares! It was my best shower ever! Sunscreen and black volcanic sand is the perfect mix for a very tenacious everlasting body mask! But the advantage is that after my shower, my skin was very soft!
We still had maybe half-an-hour before the arrival of our shuttle to Las Peñitas, our next destination, so we made research and booked a place to stay for 3 nights.
We got there at lunchtime, unpacked our dirty stuff from our hike, I put sunscreen on, because Steve doesn't do that of course, we put our swimsuits on and left our room.
Las Peñitas is a very small fishing village on the Pacific Ocean and is the perfect place to chill out and recharge for a few days. And our hostel had a nice courtyard, on the beach, with a swimming pool, good snacks and beer. Exactly what we needed!
First thing first… Food! We had the best guacamole I ever had and a very good croque-monsieur. I know, a croque-monsieur is nowhere near Nicaraguan food but the owners are Belgian so we assumed it would be good, and it was… basic but good.
We spoke with Silvana who owns this place for 5 years now and she explained how hard it was since the political crisis of 2018. Before that, tourism was quickly growing and business was good. Since 2018, tourism almost completely stopped. She said that it was not the end of the world for her because even though it's not always easy, she can always sell her place and go back to Belgium. She still has family and friends over there that would help her. But she was more concerned about her employees. If she has no clients, she has to let them go because she cannot pay them and they don't have anything else.
Since we started traveling, we never saw such desolation. The potential is amazing there, I mean, it's an entire beachfront village! But at least half of the properties are deserted and destroyed. A few years ago, when tourism was good and growing fast, people invested their lifetime savings to buy lands or properties to transform them into hostels, restaurants or surfing schools for tourists. And in 2018, it stopped very suddenly. So they lost everything and had to give up their project. Today, some buildings are still half constructed or you can see the beginning of a foundation…
And because of countries like Canada which, still today, stays very cautious by strongly warning people wanting to travel to Nicaragua, and so, by all means, continues to feed the idea that this country is dangerous, tourism is very slow to grow back. It's too bad because in the past 15 days, we have always felt safe and we keep getting the same comments from the other tourists that we meet. The only thing I would say is that, unlike Asian countries, I would not travel alone or with a girlfriend to Nicaragua or other Latin countries. Not necessarily because it's more dangerous but the culture is different and men do not necessarily treat women with respect when you walk alone on the streets.
So, back to our day now… after lunch, we did something incredibly necessary! We brought our clothes to the reception for cleaning! I don't think I ever been so happy to see a laundry service in a hostel!
We then sat by the swimming pool and relaxed. Not long after, I went back to our room to get my charger for my cellphone and, on my way back, I saw familiar faces at the reception. It was the 2 Frenchwomen we met on the bus to Managua about 10 days ago! We chatted a little, they went to their room and I went back to the pool.
They joined us not long after and we spent the rest of the afternoon alternating between the swimming pool and our chairs. I have to mention, now that we actually got to know the girls better, they are not both from France. Mariette is but Vanessa is from Switzerland. And, just like Steve and I, Mariette lives right by the border, in France, because it's cheaper and she works in Switzerland. We had a cool and cozy afternoon!
At around 4 o'clock, Steve and I left as we had already planned to meet the folks who did Telica with us in a nearby hostel in Las Peñitas. Because when you book a tour with this company, it also gives you free access to a shuttle that leaves León at 4pm everyday and you get to spend a few hours at the beach. Since we were already going to Las Peñitas on our own, we didn't take the shuttle but we said we would meet them there. It was maybe a 1.5-km walk.
We had 2 beers with them and again, we saw 2 familiar faces. It was the couple from Quebec city. We grabbed a table at the bar right on the beach, introduced ourselves properly this time and we had a few drinks. We quickly realized that Christine and Philippe had a lot in common with us. Our values and personality were similar on a lot of things. We even got to see another gorgeous sunset, on the ocean this time.
Beer was good but after a few drinks, we had to eat! So we walked to a restaurant that was a few steps away. We had a great night! Food was good, we were the first table right on the beach, there was a really good live band and we were in good company. We laughed, shared opinions, learned from them, sang and danced. It was a very fun night!
We said goodbye because it was their last day in Nicaragua and they had their flight to catch the following day. Thank you Christine and Philippe!
Today started with a serene and unforgettable sunrise above the Nicaraguan volcano chain and ended with a festive and beautiful sunset on the endless Pacific Ocean!
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